Financial management policies and practices in Secondary Schools within Kwekwe District of Zimbabwe

Abstract

This study was motivated by reports that school leaders in charge of financial management abuse school resources despite policy guidelines on school financial management that are in place. Stoker’s (1998) Governance Theory and Freeman’s (1984) Stakeholder Theory guided this study. Stoker’s (1998) Governance Theory focuses on power decentralisation, local self governance, and involvement of all sectors in the school governance process. Freeman’s (1984) Stakeholder Theory focuses on, engagement, stakeholder value, accountability, collaboration, and the identification of interested parties, The two theories’ tenets were relevant to the study of policies and practices in a decentralised financial management system in secondary schools within the Kwekwe district. The Pragmatic Research Paradigm, Mixed Methods Research (MMR) approach, and explanatory sequential mixed methods research design formed the basis of this study. Disproportionate stratified sampling was employed to select 4 clusters from 30 clusters housing 56 secondary schools in the Kwekwe District. The population of the study was 570 school officials in charge of financial management in the secondary schools. Data generation instruments were closed-ended questionnaires, in-depth interviews, and document analysis. A stratified random sample of 61 respondents answered close-ended questionnaires during the quantitative phase. A purposive sample of 19 participants answered in-depth interviews during the qualitative phase. A purposive sample of documents on school financial management was read during the qualitative phase until saturation. Quantitative data from the survey questionnaires were analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 20. Atlas Ti was used to analyse qualitative data derived from interviews. Manual techniques complemented document analysis. The study showed that 95.2 % of the respondents agreed that the unavailability of documents that guide financial management affected actual practices in financial management. Similarly, 43.8% of the respondents agreed that available and adequate documents were good for practice, and (78.6%) of the respondents did not associate actual practices in school financial management with the usefulness of documents that guide financial management. The study recommends,training, simplification and translation of financial management documents into vernacular languages. The study also found that financial control policies, challenges with school financial management policies, and policies on financial management had a significant positive relationship with actual practices in financial management. The study recommends regular auditing of schools, capacity building of school finance committees by schools, government, universities, and the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education, and recruitment of school financial management personnel with appropriate skills. The study developed a framework for financial management policies and practices that serve as strategies and guidelines for financial management in school