The Evaluation of Managerial Activity of Education Institution Managers

Abstract

Activity evaluation questions of education institution managers have been and are the focus of attention of education policy strategists not for one year already. Seeking concrete changes in Lithuanian education system, quite a lot of political decisions were legislated in the latter years, which became very important for the education institution managers’ activity and its evaluation. This increased not only delegated responsibilities for the managers, but also foresaw bigger accountability for every year cadence. A written survey was carried out for the data collection of the managerial activity evaluation of the managers. 11 education institution managers from Vilnius, Šiauliai, Panevėžys districts, who work in general education schools and pre-school education institutions, participated in the research. The respondents differ in the aspect of gender and age, have different managerial work experience according to length. Since every manager’s experience was analysed as an individual case, their demographic characteristics did not have influence on the results. A carried out qualitative data content analysis allows asserting that the respondents justify school community expectations, which are to see managers – leaders, who evaluate their managerial activity as successful. However, there happen to be difficulties in the activity of managers as well. Prior to becoming an education institution manager, many of them face competency assessment difficulties, which is a national problem in education sector, requiring clearer decisions for many years. Being an education institution manager, one has also to face internal, external and personal difficulties: lack of bilateral trust, lack of managerial experience, managerial stereotypes, community split and other mentoring activities, which are not the primary functions of a manager, however, become an inseparable part of manager’s activity. Keywords: education institution, education institution manager, managerial activity evaluation.