Management Practices

Poor management can undermine the quality of education. Principals need to have the right skills to manage their time effectively, to confront problems, and to create an environment where good teaching and learning goals are in place. Studies have shown that management practices are an important determinant of teacher effort and engagement as well as student achievement (Coelli & Green 2012; Dhuey & Smith 2014; Grissom, Kalogrides, and Loeb 2015; Crawfurd 2017; Dobbie & Fryer 2013; Angrist et al. 2013). For example, a study of school management data from 8 countries showed that a 1.0 standard deviation increase in an index of management capacity was associated with a 0.23-0.43 standard deviation increase in learning outcomes (Bloom et al. 2015). The index of management capacity is based on a list of 20 different practices grouped into four categories: operations, monitoring, target-setting, and people/talent management. They include practices such as adopting educational best practices and rewarding high performers. This dashboard indicator is meant to measure the principal’s facility with using some of these key practices, which have been linked to other factors contributing to learning, such as quality teaching and a conducive learning environment.