The Development of a Participatory Internal Quality Assurance for Evaluating Model Schools under the Office of the Basic Education Commission

Abstract

The objective of the study was to develop a participatory internal quality assurance evaluation model in schools under the Office of the Basic Education Commission. The samples consisted of 2 schools under the Office of Nakhon Si Thammarat Primary Educational Service Area 2 with evaluation results of external quality assurance round 3 at the excellent level, and 2 schools with uncertified evaluation results of external quality assurance round 3. Twenty respondents were made up of school administrators, head teachers of academic work, head teachers of quality assurance, the president of the Basic Education Commission, parent representatives, and 5 experts on the education quality assurance. The research instrument was a structured interview which involved an internal quality assurance system in schools, ways of operation, and obstacles in an internal quality assurance operation in schools. Data analysis was done by analyzing the relating information.

            The results showed that a participatory internal quality assurance evaluation model in schools under the Office of the Basic Education Commission consisted of two-dimensional quality assurance components. The one component was the internal quality assurance dimension in schools which was composed of 8 steps: (1) specification of educational standards in schools; (2) creation of school education management development plans; (3) organization of administration and information system; (4) implementation of education management development plans in schools; (5) monitoring of educational quality; (6) arrangement of internal quality assessment according to educational standards; (7) implementation of annual reports on internal quality assessment; and (8) application of  continual educational quality development. The other was the participatory evaluation dimension comprising 3 steps: (1) assessment preparation; (2) monitoring and evaluation; and (3) presentation and dissemination. This participatory evaluation involved the use of operation strategies, including the collaboration of thinking, doing, responsibility, and decision in promoting and supporting the development of internal quality assurance system in schools by applying the group process to create joint summary and decision through qualitative data analysis by means of inductive summary, keyword searching, and mind mapping creation. The quantitative data analysis employing basic statistics focused on self-evaluation and success evaluation through systematic assessment designs.