Management systems and filing are not a strong aspect of education over here. Everything gets thrown in a box, or a pile etc. For example the sheets that get filled in on student period attendance, or the form the students fill in if they are late to school in the morning. Mike our management advisor has worked quite hard to get the social workers, those involved with the pastoral care of the students to have a clear file for each class and at least keep the classes together. To this point that has worked.
Al Sharheen come to the boys school on Tuesdays and Thursdays to work with the Grade 9 -12 Emirati students only, on a type of military programme. If the students pass the course they get 4,000 AED.. now thats a a bit of an incentive, but thats a whole new story. Today Al Sharheen wanted a list of the Emirati parents phone numbers so they could phone home to tell them their student would be involved with weapons, bullets guns etc. The secretary was asked for the names. He sends his little assistant up to our office with stacks of pieces of paper stapled together. NO filing, no downing loading off the database etc. The assistant who is quite computer savvy, had a smile on his face bigger than the piles of paper, as he enjoyed the joke about finding the appropriate parents and their phone numbers.
3 comments:
Oh dear! And I thought my systems were sloppy....
That puts a smile on my dial. It all seems so simple to us. Do the administrators see a purpose for better systems? It makes our School Management Systems (SMS) look so many light years ahead - let alone School Management Systems that we are diving into this year. Now, firing off real bullets and getting paid to pass is my kind of education!!
A cardboard box is a great way to file stuff. If no-one asks for it then you burn the box and its contents a few days later.
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