By: Benilda N. Navarro
OIC-Public Schools District Supervisor
Talisay District, Division of Batangas Province
To be able to create an impact on people while making positive changes under your supervision – that’s one of our goals as supervisors of schools in a specific area.
Education is one of the prime sectors that fuel the success of a country. With educated students being taught by expert teachers, we can say that we are already part of the solution to most of our problems. Nevertheless, managing schools in a district-wide area is not that easy. Dealing with numerous concerns in instructional supervision, school management, monitoring and evaluation of school funds, curriculum development, and a lot more that must be taken into consideration – supervisors indeed really have a lot on their plates.
Applying the right amount of leadership is one of the most challenging parts of being a supervisor. Dealing with school heads, teachers, non-teaching personnel, and learners, one must be able to send out strong clear guidance which everyone should follow without taking away the independence of each school. To be able to get the right mixture of micromanagement and leadership is indeed a road to be paved properly by those who are in the administration.
Having a number of responsibilities resting on the shoulders of a Public Schools District Supervisor, one must be able to manage schools in ways of open communication. There must be clear guidelines and protocols on how the supervisors, school heads, and teachers provide each other insights into varied areas of education. There’s a lot, but there are some that are worthy to be mentioned.
One area of it is providing guidance and instructional supervision to school heads. The strengths and development needs of each school head must be observed and verified through observation and gathering data on their strengths and development needs. With the data on hand, one must be able to coach and provide guidance to schools toward improved instructional leadership practices. Through this, School heads and their teachers will be able to identify actions needed on enabling an environment for quality basic education.
Next is providing technical assistance on school management – from the crafting of School Improvement Plans, Basic Education Learning Continuity Plans, and Learning Recovery and Continuity Programs — by conducting workshops and coaching, then providing appraisal and feedback on the drafts with the main aim of each school head to improve their plans. Then coaching and guiding schools in his/her assigned district to effectively implement their programs and projects and attain their objectives.
One of the most important roles of a district supervisor is to monitor and evaluate. It is essential for knowing whether a school plan is being implemented or not. Through the data being collected, monitored, analyzed, and evaluated, sub-offices will be able to learn and reflect from the findings and become a basis for the future crafting of policies and plans in the future. Monitoring the SBM Level of practice through validation of their documents and outputs to determine areas for development and possible provision of technical assistance to improve school performance. Also, to determine if schools adhere to the policy and standards using pre-designed M & E and transparency tools.
On supervision and leadership, skill matters. In the education field – according to UNESCO – supervisors play three different yet complementary roles, which are quite evident in the job descriptions: to control and evaluate; to give support and advice, and to act as liaison agents.
Becoming a good supervisor entails becoming a good leader. We have to learn how to listen and understand the aspirations, weaknesses, and strengths of our school heads and guide them properly for them to become effective in their posts. Hence, developing supervision skills is very important for effective leadership so we can create schools that deliver quality education for all.
Source: https://www.teacherph.com/public-school-district-supervisor-sdo-cid
