International Co-ordinator Training for Schools

Strategic school development

Calin Rus, Intercultural Institute of Timisoara, Romania

Structure of the session

• Clarifying key concepts: strategy / plan / project

• Benefits and challenges of a participatory strategic planning approach

• Integrating international cooperation in the school development strategy

Key concepts

Strategy•General orientation•Vision – mission – strategic goals

Plan•What is to be done to achieve goals•List of key activity areas

Project•Focused on specific outcomes•People, resources, time, methods

International activities Can be performed as ad-hoc / additional / temporary work, for example, in response to a

partnership proposal

Or

Can be integrated into your schools‘ development strategy

If integrated, who and how does it?

Strategic planning cycle

The integration of international activities in the school‘s development strategy

Can be delegated to the international coordinator, or done by the coordinator in coorperation

with the headteacher

Or

Can be done based on a participatory process, by a team, involving and/or consulting a

variety of relevant stakeholders

Participatory strategic planningWhat are the benefits of integrating international activities in school‘s development strategy

through a participatory approach?

What are the challenges of integrating international activities in school‘s development strategy

through a participatory approach?

A scenario

The UK headteacher leaves and his replacement is not keen on

continuing with the school partnership as he feels that it will

distract from improving exam results. This leads to the UK

school not responding to the others in the project.

"Our school partnership will be run as an after school club by

one of the teachers"

An exampleIn school X a participatory strategic planning process was initiated by the international

coordinator with the support of the head-teacher. A call was launched to identify teachers

interested. The team of teachers made a review of the situation by using the SWOT analysis

model. Parents association, student board and a local partner NGO were also consulted. Three

directions were identified for the strategy, based on existing resources, interests and

preferences of key stakeholders and with a view to achieving the overall goal defined in the

school development strategy:

• Organising international activities focused on environmental issues using French as

working language and using ICT

• Giving priority to partnerships with schools in Turkey (a significant number of students

speak Turkish at home)

• Giving priority to partnerships with schools in Spain and Greece (many children go to

these countries during summer with their families but know little about them)

A plan was agreed on how to develop, implement and evaluate at least one partnership project

considering these priorities.

Implementing a participatory strategic planning process

1. Who should be the participants in the process?

2. What needs to be done to prepare the process?

3. How the process is expected to be implemented?

Strategic use of funding sources

• Partnerships driven by funding source (open call)

• Partnerships driven by strategic planning and using funding sources