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Project ActivitiesAbsolute majority of the activities envisaged by the project took place as planned. Following is detailed description of each activity.
In February 2008, the project team visited Gardabani and had very fruitful meeting with the head of resource centre Ms. Marina Ugulava, who promised full support for the project. After a week, the meeting with the principles of schools was organized and project presented. Out of 40 schools presented on the meeting, 10 were selected, even all showed high interest and motivation to participate in the project. The criteria for school selection were: understanding of Georgian by BOT members (with different language skills, other than Georgian, of target BOTs conducting training for them would be difficult); size of the school; territorial placement (for transportation and logistics reasons).
2. Presentation of project in schools
The project team visited each school and had presentation of the project in front of BOT members, parents and teachers. The meetings were lasting 1-2 hours. The duration of the meetings depended on size of the group present, interest and activeness of participants, as well as socio-economic situation in the village, which affected participants’ mood and attitude. These meeting at schools were very valuable, as BOT and parents got opportunity to sit down, think and discuss their school issues, meet with representatives of the resource centre. Further, the dates of the first training were also agreed. This activity was also conducted in February 2008.
The first training on “School development planning” was conducted in March, 2008 in Bakuriani. There were 20 participants presented. The training lasted three days. The aim of the training was to help BoT to assess competitive advantages of their schools as well as develop a common vision, understanding and plan of school development. The training was conducted by the experienced trainers of Civitas Georgica Mr. Zviad Nakaidze and Ms. Irma Kortua. These trainers were selected based on their professionalism. Both trainers have experience working on leadership issues, decision making and school plan development. The analysis of separate modules and sessions of the training as well as results of the tests and analysis of the evaluation questionnaires demonstrates that the goal of the training has been achieved. Participants gained knowledge and increased their skills in planning.
Following the training in Baluriani the BOTs started drafting the school plans. To support the process, project team was visiting schools and consulting BOTs during May, 2008. They have visited each school at least twice. To sup-up the work done and provide participants with the possibility for exchanging their ideas, problems and solutions, one day training was organized in Tbilisi, at Civitas Georgica office on May 23, 2008. There were 20 participants from 10 public schools.
During the training the issues of financial management and school budgeting were considered. The training was conducted for target school accountants in Gardabani in the resource centre building. There were 9 participants from schools and representatives of resource centre. The special handouts of “financial management of public organizations” were distributed. Ms. Marina Ugulava, the director of resource centre made a short presentation about the changes in legislation and Ministry of Educations’ intention to organize in-depth seminar on financial matters for school accountants in June 2008.
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The resource centre representatives were present on nearly all activities conducted within the project, including training on participatory planning methodologies. Thus, in agreement with the director, it was decided, that there is no need of special training for just few people from resource centre, besides, they suggested organizing a final conference to evaluate the project results. As to the TOT for resource centre, it was decided that this activity would be done by coaching indicated resource centre staff. Ms. Irma Cortua, Training coordinator of Civitas Georgica and senior trainer for this project has organized three meetings with resource centre staff discussing the issues of school planning. She has also provided two sessions on facilitation techniques for them.
Each school has prepared two types of plans – “school strategic development plan for 5 years” and “Strategic directions for development”. The first is the inner document of the school approved by the decision of the board and will serve as basis for school development in next few years. It was published in limited number (20 copies per each school) and handed to BOT.
The second one – “Strategic directions for development” is oriented on general public and gives the understanding of main itinerary school has chosen for the next few years. This one is for parents, students and all interested people. It was published 200 copies each (total 2,000 copies) and distributed during the public meetings at schools.
In order to sum-up the project results and also get broader attention from other schools to the importance of development planning, the final conference was organized. The conference appeared to be also a good tool to share lessons learned and gained experience on strategy planning methodology to other school representatives. The published school plans were distributed among the participants. There were representatives from 33 schools, local government, NGOs and Ministry of Education.
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Copyright Civitas Georgica 2007