THE DEVELOPMENT AND IMPLEMENTATION OF QUALITY INDICATORS AND EXCELLENCE: A STUDY AT THE STATE SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN EASTERN SAUDI ARABIA

Abstract

ABSTRACT This study describes and analyzes the indicators of quality and excellence, and the way they are applied in the secondary schools in the Eastern Region of Saudi Arabia. The indicators of quality and excellence were studied in five areas: the school administration (the school principal), the teachers, the students, the curriculum, and the educational environment (the school). This study focused on the following objectives: 1) explaining the concepts of quality and excellence from the point of view of the Islamic Sharia and the quality pioneers, 2) identifying the requirements, constraints and stages of their implementation, 3) presenting some indicators to assess the quality and excellence of secondary education, the extent of their application, and identifying the strengths and weaknesses of the application, 4) presenting the experiences of some countries in applying the quality and excellence measures, 5) identifying the statistical variances in the respondents’ results, which were attributed to the following variables: educational qualification, gender, and professional experience, and finally, 6) recommending practical application measures that would contribute to improving the quality level and education excellence in secondary schools. To achieve the objectives of the study, the researcher followed the descriptive survey approach from the point of view of the male and female teachers. The study was conducted on a sample of (430) male and female teachers from among (3422) teachers in the teachers society. The sample was chosen using the layered random method. The questionnaire contained (84) indicators that were used to collect and analyze the data. The researcher found the following important results. There existed several obstacles to the application of quality and excellence assurances in secondary education, most prominent of which were the heavy load of teaching, insufficient motivation and encouragement for the teachers, centralized decision making, and infrequent development training programs on problem solving, decision making and creative and critical thinking skills for the school administrators, teachers and students. The researcher stressed that the implementations of countries that pay strong attention to the principles and standards of quality and excellence couldn’t be replicated to the letter. Those countries’ implementations could only inspire some ideas and directions that could enlighten and guide implementation. The responses of (agree) by the male and female secondary school teachers in the eastern region on the indicators of quality and excellence and their application reached an arithmetic mean of (3.67). This result reflected a high level of awareness and understanding of the importance of applying the indicators of quality and excellence in the educational process in the general secondary schools. The study revealed also that there were Statistical differences variances among the study sample responses of the ((averages?)) of the sample individuals attributed to the variables of educational level, gender, and the years of experience (10 years and over). A proposed plan for applying the indicators of quality and excellence in the schools of secondary education in the eastern region of Saudi Arabia and the construction of the message tool, which is a questionnaire had been prepared after careful consideration of relevant studies and their results.