TAP 401: EDUCATIONAL PLANNING

THE SOCIAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS

AFFECTING EDUCATIONAL PLANNING IN THIRD WORLD COUNTRIES

BY
Prof. Raphael Nyonje
University of Nairobi
 • This are general problems which involve
various aspects of human behaviour;
including; social, economic, political and
psychological aspects of humanity
• Two basic assumptions will help us
understand the factors
➢that educational planning is a technical
Introduction process
➢that educational planners, in
attempting to plan, require not only
technical know-how relevant to
planning, but also knowledge of what
their responsibilities are and the extent
to which these responsibilities go
 Introduction cont…
• This assumptions are important because educational
planners are neither politicians who are
responsible for the formulation of broad
educational objectives, nor are they
administrators who are responsible for taking
action to achieve these objectives.
• They are technicians whose job is to develop and
describe alternative technical means by which
objectives may be achieved (Ruscoe, 1969)
From the
assumptions:
first and foremost, educational planners require data
which can enable them to determine their area of
operation to such an extent that they do not infringe
on a politician's and\or an administrator’ s sphere of
influence

Secondly, while evaluating plans as they are being

implemented or after they have been implemented,
the educational planner's aim is to acquire
additional technical sophistication from examining
the results, rather than, redefining the objectives; or
re-organizing administrative procedures.
Problems/ challenges
affecting/influencing effective
educational planning
 Existing policies
• Policies are key components of
educational planning
• In most cases there may exist a
policies but for effective planning, it
may require changing
• In most cases there may be no policy
at all

Examples:
• sitting of schools in many developing
countries is determined on the basis of
political patronage rather than on such
technical grounds as: concentration of the
school-age population, location and size of
existing schools, transportation and other
infrastructural facilities
Availability of funds
In developing countries, resources available for allocation to various
sectors of the economy are scarce

Kenya for instance, 30% of the annual budget is spend on education

It is so difficult to subdivide the % to subsection of educational sector

such as primary, secondary, tertiary and university

This is complicated by the fact that each sub-sector has divisions that
exert demand on resources

For instance, primary sector may have divisions- for instance:

administration and planning; directorate of basic education; and
directorate of quality assurance and standard
 • Effort to establish the age structure of the
population is often made on the basis of a
national census
• Many people give inaccurate statements or even
outright false statements.
• Many people do not give accurate data on a
number of variable that are key for planning; e.g;
age, gender, number of children, level of
education, electronic gadgets

Inaccurate • This could be because of the characteristics of the

population or may demand on how the census
questions are framed
population data • it is difficult for educational planners to
adequately forecast school enrolments by age, and
even by sex in a given year.
• difficult to estimate the number of classrooms,
books, desks and teachers that will be required
for the year in question
• Difficult to estimate finances required
• Difficult to construct age pyramid
 • absence of funds, minimal development will take place because
other facilities and resources cannot be acquired.
• As much as there has been a lot of stride made by the
SHORTAGE OF government of Kenya, many schools are still underdeveloped in
PHYSICAL the area of
• Infrastructure e.g classroom, laboratories
FACILITIES/RESOURCES • Teaching and learning materials – thought the country has
achieved appropriate ration of pupils/textbook – there is
still challenges with libraries, storage facilities e.t.c
• Implementation of CBC which is more oriented to talent
growth is also challenging the provision of physical
facilities and resources – for instance how do you
encourage a pupils with swimming talents in underserved
areas with no swimming pool
• All this provides challenges to educational planners
 As we observed in the previous session where we discussed the
development of educational planning, there existed a phase where the
entire world suffered from lack of qualified personnel ‘manpower phase’

There were a number of efforts including some countries such as Kenya

embarking on crash programmes so as to meet the manpower gaps

Qualified Today, in the Twenty-first century, it is no longer a question of lack of

personnel qualified personnel as such, but lack of opportunities for the qualified
personnel to find meaningful employment.

The issue of brain drain is key and must be planned for in advance

There are key sectors that still surfer from brain drain for instance health
sector has lost the best doctor who seek the ‘greener pastures’
Time element
A final difficulty in planning for education
in the developing world occurs because of
time lags
Educational planners may decide that
more teachers need to be trained, it is
almost certain that several years may
elapse before the actual work of
Time lag is the period when planners make
decision on an activity and the actual time training begins
when the activity is implemented.
Possible solution
The political authority and
atmosphere should allow for the
establishment of planning offices
and have enough commitment to
support planning activities.
Policy-makers must refrain from
treating the development of
alternatives as political rather
than a technical matter.
Educational planners must have a
clear idea as to what their
responsibilities are.
Educational administration must
actively support changes implied
in educational planning.
Serious attention should be
directed towards the
development of clear educational
policies and priorities so that the
educational planners have some
better notion of what they are
planning.
Generally, there should be
mutual co-ordination of all those
concerned with the development
of education as a whole.
End