What makes a good school

Characteristics essential for a good school

Importance of good schooling

‘What makes a good school’ is a subject of particular significance due to the important impact of education on the future of every child and on the development of societies.  This issue is of special importance to educational authorities, educational leaders and parents because educational authorities and educational leaders are responsible for developing and implementing policies that should lead to effective schooling, and parents have to make correct decisions when selecting schools for their children and support their children's education.  In our view, a good school is one that
maximises students’ readiness for life through development of useful knowledge foundations, sound decision-making and thinking skills, good personal and social habits and skills, moral values and a commitment to lifelong learning.  Performance of a school should hence be measured against the value it adds to its students’ readiness for life and I shall try in this article to shed the light on the major determinants of good schooling.

Benefitting from the community         

There is strong reciprocated influence between every school and the community it serves; a good school would strongly contribute to the education of its community including the promotion of cultural values that treasure education and promote self discipline.  The community, thus empowered, would in return be ready to provide different forms of support to the school.  A school benefits from being in an environment that is conducive to learning and the culture of the community is bound to have a key impact on that school’s performance and the development and achievement of students.  Schools which serve a community of ‘good readers’, for example, have greater chances of success than schools which serve communities which do little reading.  A well-disciplined community also adds value to its schools. Students who come from such communities cooperate better with their teachers and positively influence their own education.

Good Leadership

The quality of leadership influences all school operations and enables a school to accomplish its mission and develop continuously.  A good school has a leadership team which articulates the educational vision and models good values to all stakeholders.  A good leader is both decisive and consultative; their main goal is leading and optimising the learning processes, and maintaining an environment where all are working together in pursuit of this aim.  Close guidance and support, high levels of communication, networking, reflection and continuous education are at the heart of the work of leaders of good schools.

Teacher effectiveness

The competence of its human resources, and more specifically its teachers, is another characteristic of a good school.  Teacher competence is to be measured by their effectiveness in promoting their students knowledge and skills.  Although teachers benefit in their career from having a relevant university degree and experience, some teachers remain unfortunately less effective than more talented, less experienced colleagues, who may even hold lower academic qualifications.  A good school recognises the prime importance of teacher effectiveness on student learning and aims to employ the most effectual classroom practitioners.  A good school is one whose administration realises that teacher competence is measured by their effectiveness rather than by their university degrees or number of years of service.

Adequate facilities

Schools need adequate facilities and material resources; the architecture of school buildings, for example, should ensure safety and provide comfort.  However, excellent facilities on their own do not make a good school, neither do elaborate material resources.  A modest science kit within a school, for example, put into good use, is by far more effective than a sophisticatedly equipped but neglected laboratory.  A good school would provide a safe and secure environment with adequate resources and would optimise the effective usage of all resources.

Accountability, Consistency and CPD

A system defines the modes of operation of an institution, the relations within it, and its relationships with its surrounding environment.  A good school relies on sound educational thought, follows a clear consistent system that incorporates effective management policies, and implements rigorous and coherent methodologies.  A good school system incorporates accountability, embraces progress and provides effective staff development.  A good school system creates awareness of the relevant findings from educational research and particularly in the field of cognitive neuroscience and adjusts itself accordingly.

Tolerance, Fairness and Objectivity

Many parents are concerned, and justifiably so, about the happiness of their children at school.  There is nothing more disconcerting than an evening at home with a discontent child. So, is a school whose students are happy necessarily a good school?  Unfortunately, learning is not always fun; effort is necessary and hard work is not always pleasant.  A good school should definitely try to motivate all its students and create happiness but not at just any expense. Furthermore, a good school has a well-disciplined environment that provides emotional safety and protects the interests of students and staff.  A good school provides a well-disciplined atmosphere and promotes tolerance, fairness, objectivity and other good moral and civic values.  A good school is not one whose main aim is to please a consensus, but one that promotes what is actually in the interest of the child and the community, irrespective of whether or not this may lead to some loss of popularity.

Staff Satisfaction and Student Wellbeing

Good education also demands dramatic efforts on behalf of teachers and administrators.  A good school should try to provide a pleasant atmosphere and job satisfaction for its staff, but definitely not at the expense of the child's wellbeing and learning.  A good school should hold everyone accountable for their work, and should deal fairly with conflicts and issues of dispute.  In an educational system that adopts accountability and quality assurance policies, there is bound to be some discontent in spite of the efforts of the administration to provide support, guidance and decent working conditions for all staff.

Collaboration

Good schools utilise collaborative practices at all levels which include all groups of the school community. This collaboration builds on the diversity within the distinct groups, thus enriching the learning process for every student. It also develops the school as an organisation of learners.

Student Involvement

Schools must educate students for living a healthy and responsible life within a spirit of community and service to others. This involves providing opportunities at school for students to participate and lead academic, social and creative pursuits where the needs of all are considered and catered for.  Student leadership in school life activities builds experience for responsible adulthood and citizenship.  Involving the students in the learning process is one of the characteristics of a good school. Such involvement should utilise the immense power of the social nature of children and direct peer pressure to become a constructive parameter.

Effective Teaching

Knowledge preparation is like construction of buildings; it is done in phases and at stages. Every stage relies on some preceding stage and proceeding from one stage to the next without securing and fortifying the basis, jeopardises the whole learning process and endangers the child’s future.  Students mainly drop out of school or fail after developing detrimental gaps in their knowledge and skills because their schools neglect continuous objective assessment.  A good school adopts continuous valid and reliable formative assessment of student progress and systematically and promptly takes effective measures that secure proper skill acquisition and learning.

Educational authorities and decision makers need to be very careful with the policies and requirements that they adopt and impose.  There are educational beliefs, theories and practices that have become so common to the extent that it does not occur even to specialists to question them.  Many such modes unfortunately are wasting precious administrator time and are causing other harmful outcomes at all levels.

The expectations from a good school need to be addressed very methodologically and need to be continuously scrutinised and revised so that educational institutions may play effective roles in social progress and help nations sustain development.

Saad Abou-Chakra