BURAIDAH, 25 November — The Ministry of Education has introduced a new system to evaluate performance of its schools. The system is currently being applied in five educational directorates, according to a ministry circular sent to all schools in the Kingdom.
The School Comprehensive Evaluation (SCE) is meant to appraise the school as a whole; it will cover various educational aspects such as the achievement of students, teaching methods, school management, student behavior, extra-curricular activities, school buildings and other facilities and parent-teacher relationships.
It uses measuring devices and methods that help reach correct conclusions. These include questionnaires, observation scales, inventories and interviews.
The new system aims at improving the school environment and the performance of the teaching staff. It will identify the weak and strong points in each school.
This will also provide necessary data to the decision-makers at the ministry so that they can devise future education plans by revising the current strategy.
Every school will be evaluated by a team consisting of three to five members and only those who undergo a training program on SCE can take part in the evaluation.
The members of the team can be selected from headmasters, education supervisors, retired academics and university teachers.
The team will tell the school in advance of the schedule of the inspection visit which may take three to five days according to the size of the school.
A final evaluation report will be sent to the school, the educational directorate and the SCE department in the ministry.
