The qualitative and quantitative measurements of quality education for-and-against standards and indicators of high, medium and low performing primary schools in Oromia Regional State, Ethiopia

ABSTRACT

Creating high quality primary schools associated with the existing contextual, socio-cultural, economic and political factors is important in Ethiopia. With this, the study examined qualitative and quantitative measurements of quality education for-and-against standards and indicators of high, medium and low performing primary schools in Oromia Regional State. The study employed mixed method with embedded mixed design. The primary data were collected from 687 participants using different data collection tools and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The quality and quantity of human, material and social capital were below standards of quality education in primary schools. Although the twenty-first century classroom requires competent teachers to address diverse needs of children, the standards and indicators of quality were deteriorated in terms of inputs, process and outputs. The schools should foster children's learning potential through school improvement and teacher professional development program standards, indicators, and facilitate school feeding program for children under starvation.

KEYWORDS:

• School performance and gaps
• qualitative and quantitative measurements
• standards and indicators
• zero-defect quality
• learning environment
• high, medium and low performing schools

1. Introduction

1.1. Background

The twenty-first century has brought rapid transformation into individualized growth, social, cultural, political, economic and technological development (Schwab 2010) although it is difficult to create high quality learning environment because of perplexing contextual factors. At the core of accelerating SDG4 of 2030 agenda-inclusive and equitable quality education transforms experiences and competencies of people from generation to generation. Education It helps build knowledgeable professionals professionals with capacities of achieving SDG1-reducing extreme poverty (UNESCO 2019). Accordingly, education takes the position of constant state of change to prepare the much needed workforce with competencies to transform educational economies situated at the central spheres of challenging contexts (Donaldson et al. 2013), and effective education comes primarily through social interactions in school settings as a process of living (Flinders and Thornton 2013; Gutek 2014).

Practically, the average child in a low-income country is expected to attend 5.6 fewer years of school than a child in a high-income country (World Bank 2020). By the age of 10, 90 percent of children in low-income countries still cannot read with comprehension, compared with only 9 percent in high-income countries (Azevedo et al. 2019) including our country, Ethiopia. In Ethiopia, the assessment of EGRW, 2008 show that primary schools children were not mastering basic skills such as literacy, numeracy and arithmetic skills (Daniel, Desalegn, and Girma 2013; MoE 2008). With limited educational resources, policymakers made choices about what to invest to improve education outcomes from constructing schools to coaching teachers, from improving school management to deploying new educational software (MoE 2018). Although policymakers increase the number of ‘years of quality education’, a single concept incorporates both quality and quantity dimensions of instruction (Crawfurd et al. 2020; McKeever 2020). There is evidence that the benefits of education including economic growth are more closely associated with learning (Hanushek and Woessmann 2012) whereas others are associated with years of schooling (Duflo, Dupas, and Kremer 2017) Thus, improving quality of education via its standards and indicators has more impacts if more children go to school for longer, and programs that increase years of schooling leads to high or zero-defect quality in education.

The performance capacity in education is perceived as abilities, skills, and expertise of school leaders, teachers, department, staffs, students or viewed as the collective competency or investment necessary to improve schools in meaningful ways (Hatch 2009; Newmann, King, and Youngs 2001). The school capacity may include the quality of embracing the ability of a school to grow, change or improve. The common variations of capacity include leadership capacity, school capacity, and teacher capacity, among others (Newmann, King, and Youngs 2001). The school capacity gaps assessment facilitates to build capacity in schools so that students can achieve better by pointing out the areas of weakness that leads to better targeting of solutions as schools with effective educational leaders and teachers produce better outcomes from students’ learning process (Darling-Hammond, Chung Wei, and Andree 2010). The quality of citizens essentially depends on the quality of education, and ultimately, the quality of education relies on the quality of schools in general and teachers in particular who are educating young citizens (Kothari, Patel, and Shelat 2012). The instructional capacity is envisaged as the optimal amount of production that can be obtained from a given set of resources and organizational arrangements (Corcoran and Goertz 1995). However, instructional and school capacities are best estimated in the context of standard-based reform in the service of improving student performance recognizing the ability of the system of the state-district-school as a whole to enable students to meet academic standards (Hatch 2009; O’Day, Goertz, and Floden 1995).

The four research-based components that can be applied in school-level analyses of performance capacities and gaps that include human capital, social capital, program coherence and educational inputs (resources) are useful school capacities enrichment and development analysis units (Hatch 2009; Fullan 2016; Corcoran and Goertz 1995). The human capital is the amount that a school benefits from having each individual working there, each person with his or her own strengths, weaknesses, and preferences. Although researches are unsatisfying the degree to which teacher’s inputs such as salaries, experience and credentials which matter in terms of student achievement and school capacity enrichment, some evidence suggest that teachers’ basic skills, commitment to school goals, and high level subject-matter content-knowledge are predictors of student performance and higher capacity (Rockoff et al. 2008). However, political, economic and social environment inclined to affect teachers’ motivation to aspire for teaching profession and professional development activities (Esayas and Congman 2021; Girma and Dawit 2023). The other important factors are poor attraction of teaching as career (Tesfaye 2014), teachers’ poor motivation (Aweke 2015), and job dissatisfaction (Tesfaye 2014) affect the implementation schools’ activities’. The social capital is the component of capacity that is inherent in the relationships among individuals in the school (Hatch 2009). In this context, social capital in the school is demonstrated by enhancing mutual understanding, development of collective competences, fostering care and concern among staff, and support for integrity and the alignment to mutual goals (Bryk and Schneider 2002). Equally, social capital is views as trust, reciprocity, the flow of information, and support for emerging norms (Gamoran, Gunter, and Williams 2005). Thus, social capital is closely linked to human capital and is called professional capital (Hargreaves and Fullan 2012). Without social capital, the skills and expertise of staff are not shared and therefore remain trapped at the individual level and cannot be leveraged for ongoing organizational improvement. The schools in which staff is well trained and trust levels were high were more likely to experience student performance gains (Hargreaves and Fullan 2012). Likewise, Osman and Warner (2020) indicated that teacher’s motivation is crucial to successful implementation of professional development (Girma 2023). Similarly, it is known that people rely on the economic return of education (Aweke et al. 2017).

In addition, program coherence focus on clear learning goals, and sustained over a period of time (Newmann, King, and Youngs 2001) when the three conditions are met within a school. 1st, the school must possess common instructional frameworks that guide teaching, learning, curriculum and assessment. 2nd, working conditions for staff in the school must support incorporation of the instructional frameworks into practice. 3rd, the school must devote the necessary time and resources to fully implement the common instructional frameworks (Newmann, King, and Youngs 2001). The school policy settings; school work culture, curriculum practices, leaderships and local contexts of schools where academic staffs enacted affect the executions of its activities (Adams and Mann 2020; Palmer and Noltemeyer 2019). Thus, the types of contexts such as target knowledge, skills and dispositions, organization and facilitation of educational process determine the capacity of schools (Desimone 2009; Egert, Fukkink, and Eckhardt 2018). The school capacity works in one context may not work in another context (Murphy 2013). The intersecting contexts are related to ‘why, who, what, how, when, and where’ educational leaders (principals, supervisors, experts), teachers, caregivers, students and other stakeholders are promoting teaching-learning process in classrooms.

Education inputs in the component of school capacity is considered the list the resources that schools with high capacity usually possess, including high-quality curriculum, instructional material, assessment instruments, classroom technology, and workspace (Newmann, King, and Youngs 2001). Following the roadmap policy document (MoE 2018), the school improvement program and classification framework (2019) developed focusing on school improvement and classification into standards-1, 2, 3 and 4. Using the four components as analysis frames, the researcher examined high, medium, or low-capacity schools where: (1). High performing capacity schools are characterized as schools which are well positioned with regard to all of the capacity components such as human capital, social capital, program coherence, and resources are in place to facilitate students’ learning. (2). Medium performing capacity schools are portrayed as schools having fair school facilities, and teaching and learning resources. (3). Low performing capacity schools: are described as schools which are concerned with non-instructional issues such as students’ conditions and possessing required facilities. Therefore, the theoretical framework of this particular study focuses on thematically organized input-process-output system.

1.2. Problem statement

From the professional experiences the researcher, the schools are facing multifaceted contextual factors such as economic, social, cultural and political challenges in a multi-linguistic and diverse society in Ethiopia. However, the Ethiopian MoE actively identified four key areas of interventions to improve schools’ performance capacities as parts of quantifying and qualifying quality in education although the contextual factors are cumbersome to improve pathways of quality of education forward. Eliminating learning, poverty will be harder than what you think, and what to do about it (Azevedo et al. 2019) is an important brain storming idea to certify whether or not ‘every child be able to read by 2030’ (Azevedo et al. 2019). The status of schooling related to the attainment of SDG 4 – inclusive and equitable quality education (UNESCO 2019). For instance, more trained teachers were made available, and the teacher-pupil-ratio decreased from 32:1 in 2004/05 to 16:1 in 2008/09 (MoE 2010), and to 10:1 in 2015 in primary education (MoE 2015). However, the expansion of educational access in terms of educational inputs and process were collapsed post-2015, and seriously abusing schools’ performance capacity of quality instructional process. The gross intake of student is increasing with decreasing net enrollment from time to time. Henceforth, based on the assumptions of Ethiopian educational road map policy document, the school performance capacity evaluated in terms of standards and indicators of school improvement and classification (MoE 2018).

As far as the knowledge of the researcher concerned, when looking in-depth at the themes that emerged from these groups, the study comprises of 12 (8 public and 4 private) low, medium and high performing capacity primary schools. This study identified challenges and opportunities of poorly performing capacity schools ignored by policymakers, education officers, experts and principals and other stakeholders. The study identified conceptual, knowledge and practical gaps and partially bridged those gaps leaving some recommendations and implication for future studies related to qualitative and quantitative measurements quality of education for-and-against standards in Oromia Regional Stae, Ethiopia

1.3. Objectives

The study examined the qualitative and quantitative measurements of quality education for-and-against standards and indicators of high, medium and low performing capacity primary schools and paradigm shift from imaginary to zero-defect quality. The study helps to:

1. Evaluate performance capacities and potential gaps of primary schools with particular focus on strengths and limitations of quality measurements.

2. Examine conduciveness of learning environments in terms of quality indicators (classroom setup, teacher-student-ratio, and student-to-book ratio, library, laboratory, pedagogical center, administrative and staff offices) to maintain quality education.

3. Evaluate practices of experiential learning, relevant training, workshops, participatory action research, differentiated instruction and exposure to professional visits implemented to ensure quality education.

4. Assess awareness, knowledge and practice gaps of teachers, principals, caregivers, supervisors and PTAs to improve students’ learning performance and outcomes.

1.4. Research questions

The central research question is: What are the qualitative and quantitative measurements of quality education for-and-against standards and indicators of high, medium and low performing capacity primary schools and paradigm shift from imaginary to zero-defect quality?

The specific questions are:

• 1. What are the performance capacities and potential gaps of primary schools with particular focus on strengths and limitations of quality measurements?

• 2. To what extents are the learning environments conducive in terms of quality indicators (classroom setup, teacher-student-ratio, and student-to-book ratio, library, laboratory, pedagogical center, administrative and staff offices) to maintain quality education?

• 3. To what extents are practices of relevant training, experiential learning, workshops, participatory action research and differentiated instruction and exposure to professional visits implemented to ensure quality education?

• 4. What awareness, knowledge and practice gaps of teachers, principals, supervisors, caregivers, and PTAs affect students’ learning performance and outcomes?

1.5. Significance

The study has policy, social, academic and practical significance to improve and maintain quality of education for-and-against the established standards and indicators depending on IPO system model. This study is essential to improve quality of teachers at the center of educational system and contributes to inclusive and equitable quality of teaching-learning process.

1.6. Conceptual framework

The conceptual framework used in this study is the systems theory which depicts the teaching and learning process as having inputs that interact to produce outputs (Shavelson 1987). The input includes the learners, accessibility of facilities and equipment, teachers’ pedagogical skills, students … etc. whereas, the process is the interaction between the students and the context of instructional process which includes teaching-learning process. The three performing capacity schools such as low-capacity, medium-capacity and high-capacity performing schools were evaluated based on the input-process – output standards and indicators of system of education.

2. Methodology

2.1. Method and design

A mixed research method with embedded (QUAN + qual) mixed design were employed with the intention of getting necessary information about the schools’ performance capacity and implementation gaps of quality standards and indicators, and a paradigm shift from imaginary to zero-defect quality in education. The design is considered embedded because quantitative data results are explained further with the qualitative data (Creswell 2014). The quantitative part of the design includes survey, correlation and randomized control trials whereas the qualitative part covers multiple thematic case studies. Regarding this design, Creswell and David (2018) stated that it assists researchers to collect both numerical and non-numerical data, analyze, interpret and give meaning for deeper understanding of the research problem simultaneously.

2.2. Sampling techniques

The assessment was carried out to gather relevant data about primary schools’ potential capacities from public and private primary schools in line to working towards perfect quality. Principals, teachers, students, caregivers, supervisors/experts and PTAs were the target population and participants of the study. Different probability (simple random sampling and stratified sampling techniques) and non-probability (purposive and availability) sampling techniques were employed to engage the right participants in the study. The researchers determined a sample size for the large target population (e.g. students) using Cochran (1977) to decide the numbers of representative sample students. n = $\frac{N}{1+N(e)2}$^, n = required sample size, N = Total population size = 3985, Cl = Level of confidence interval 95%, e = Margin of error = 0.05%., n = 365 students as shown in Table 1 below.

Table 1. Bio-data of research participants.

Categories of Participants	Target Population	Sample Size	Sampling Techniques
Principals	26	21	Availability sampling
Teachers	268	103	Stratified sampling
Students/ target children	3985	365	Simple random sampling
Care givers	911	172	Simple random sampling
PTAs (12 x7) = 84 members	84	21	Purposive sampling
Education experts & supervisors	10	5	Availability sampling
Total	5284	687

Table 1 above showed that non-probability sampling technique was important to select participants who collect qualitative data and probability sampling technique revolves around selecting samples participating in quantitative data collection. Availability sampling technique was used to select school principals, PTAs, and education experts/supervisors because of the manageable size of sample frame units. Likewise, stratified sampling followed by simple random sampling technique was used after allocating proportionality to select teachers from their respective department on the bases of strata such as gender, discipline and grade level.

2.3. Sources of data

In this particular, quality standards and indicators implementation in high, medium and low performing capacity public and private primary schools data were collected from diverse sources. The school’s principals, teachers, students, caregivers, education experts/supervisors and PTAs were primary sources of data whereas secondary sources included inspection guidelines, rosters, inbuilt-supervision minutes, school improvement program document, professional development portfolios, and MoE (2018) policy documents, for triangulation and enrichment (Creswell and David 2018).

2.4. Data collection tools

For the sake of getting adequate and relevant data regarding schools’ capacity gaps (Creswell 2014), the study employed mixed or both quantitative and qualitative data gathering instruments. The close-ended and open-ended questionnaires and observation checklists were employed to collect numerical facts of the schools capacities within the study boundary. Additionally, important open-ended questions, semi-structured interviews and focus group discussions’ leading questions were prepared to collect in-depth data (Yin 2018) in English and translated into Amharic and Afan Oromo. Then, the researcher collected the views and comments from participants’ point of references about the schools’ performance capacity and implementation gaps of standards and indicators.

2.5. Validity and reliability

The data collection tools were approved and validated by expert reviewers proceeded to actual data collection phase of the study. In addition, a measure of trustworthiness of the qualitative research was secured by utilizing multiple methods for data collection. Finally, the quantitative data reliability was guaranteed via a pilot test study of three (high, medium and low performing capacity) schools result using calculated Cronbach alpha (teachers, α = .831, students, α = .817 and caregivers, = α .822) respectively. The three groups of respondents rated the questionnaires greater than α = .800 and accepted for further use. Then, the researcher collected actual data from low, medium and high performing public and private primary schools.

2.6. Methods of data analysis

Quantifying and qualifying quality in education (3QE) are convincing the mixed method researchers from the perspectives of pragmatism. Accordingly, the the researcher sorted out and organized the data for mixed analyses. The quantitative data were coded, organized and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics, and the qualitative data were narrated thematically. Thus, frequency, percentage, average mean, and two-tailed t-test were used to make assumptions about the characteristics of wider population, and test significant differences (Cohen, Manion, and Morrison 2018). The findings were triangulated to secure trustworthiness (Patton 2015). The data derived from the questionnaire, interviews, focus group discussions, observation and document reviews were coded and categorized into themes and subthemes. Parallel data collection and analysis techniques were employed, convergence, divergence or differences of data were determined (Creswell 2014). The researcher checked that all quantitative data were extricated from the questionnaire, and were precisely recorded, computed and reported. Additionally, the qualitative data were analyzed in line with the discussion of the quantitative results.

2.7. Ethical practices

Ethical approval for this study was obtained from District education bureau to avoid the research misconduct because harm is narrated in the context of institutional characteristics, policies, procedures, guidelines and work environment (Petousi and Sifaki 2020). Before distributing the instruments to the participants for data collection, permission was sought from education administration offices.

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Background of participants

The descriptions of background information of all categories of research participants such as their gender, age, qualification, position in the career structure, and total years of experiences. The study participants comprised of 337(49.05%) males and 350 (50.95%) females. From this figure, the majority of participants were diploma graduates, 198 (61.49%), 68 (21.12%) were first degree graduates, and 56 (17.39%) certificate holders. In the same manner, the majority of the staffs, 120 (37. 27%) have 16–20 years of experiences. The majority of staffs, 120 (37.27%) are ‘teachers’ in the position of their career ladders. A total of 687 respondents: 231 staffs were selected from public primary schools, 81 were selected from private primary schools. The 365 public and private schools’ students: 256 students and 109 students from public and private primary schools, respectively.

3.2. School capacity quality standards and indicators

This part presents a summary of the statistics of responses gained from three categories of participants of the study pertaining to the input-process-output (IPO) as standards and indicators of quality of education. The quantitative data analysis was carried out by counting the frequencies and percentages in accordance with the themes of analyses. The qualitative data was analyzed simultaneously to supplement the quantitative results of the corresponding themes. The school capacity gaps, standards, indicators and detailed analysis were important for school capacity measurement and analysis. These are the human capital, social capital, program coherence, and educational resources (Hatch 2009).

The study identified human capital justifying the existing knowledge, skills, commitment, accountability, disposition, and intellectual ability of the school’s staff. This capacity gaps assessment identified the strengths and weakness, and preferences of each member within the schools under investigation. Having necessary educational inputs and professional practices determine the capacity of schools to provide quality educational service for students. The social capital is analyzed in light of the level of relationships among individuals in the schools. It is examined the staffs’ commitment for ongoing school and school-wide improvement. The study researched out that schools in which the staff is well trained and trusts levels high were more likely to experience student performance gains (Bryk and Schneider 2002).

… .In addition, the observation checklist, focused group discussions and interviews with participants of the study confirmed the scarcity of textbooks in primary schools is serious. Furthermore, it is found that the middle and low performing capacity schools under assessment have the lowest access to reference books in the library more than (1:30) (MoE 2018). This implies that primary schools’ students in the target schools were not getting access to additional reading materials. The open-ended and close-ended questionnaires, interview, FGD, structured checklist and document reviews were combined for each school level capacity components to create an overall capacity assessment.

3.3. Academic staffs’ qualification and students’ gross and net enrollments in primary schools

This section discusses the status of provisions of education services in public and private primary schools. This section depicts the actual realities of teaching-learning process schools at 1st and 2nd cycles of primary schools as indicated in Table 2 below.

Table 2. A Summary of students’ enrollment & teachers’ qualifications.

Target schools	Academic Year (2021–2023)
	Pupils Enrollment			Teachers Qualifications				Teacher-to-student ratio
	Boys	Girls	Total	Cert.	Dip.	Degree	Total
Private Schools	1633	1902	3535	15	36	24	75	1:47
Public Schools	5629	6991	12620	23	135	23	181	1:70
Total	7262	8893	16155	38	171	47	256	1:63

Table 2 above showed that the teacher-to-student ratio these particular schools (public – 1:70 and private – 1.47, average – 1:63) are beyond the standard of MoE policy in both schools, which states that the student-to-teacher ratio will be up to 1:50 and even to a maximum of up to 1:30 to maintain social distancing during the times of Covid-19 pandemic (MoE 2020). However, the national study conducted by MoE (2022) tells that the pupil to classroom ratio of grade 1–8 in Ethiopia was 1:54 with high dropout and repletion rates. The number of students and teachers in particular school enables educational officers to decide up on the plan of increasing the number of classrooms and teachers to attain standards and indicators ensure quality of teaching-learning process.

3.3. Availabilities of educational inputs and facilities

According to school classification framework document (MoE 2019), the status of schools can be classified into low, medium and high performing schools. The capacity of target schools were assessed and estimated on the bases of the following quality standards and indicators. The quality standards and indicators of both primary schools were similar in the availability and qualities of almost all educational inputs and facilities. The quality indicators are important spheres to plan and implement on educational resources and facilities to improve quality of educational services on the bases of recognized gaps/needs.

… .The respondents suggested to the open-ended questions that the major problems affected the schools are associated with financial resources on ground because the government and other organization did not allocate enough budget for schools. The school has strong communication and networking with governmental and non-governmental organizations utilize the resources effectively because of lack of awareness, capacity and transparency. Thus, the schools themselves are unable to use available resources effectively (Open-ended question, 2023).

Additionally, one of the members of focus group discussion team PSE-6 reflected his views that

‘I think the majority of parents living in rural areas surrounding Fitche town force their children stop schooling because of low economic status. Besides, teachers teaching in the target schools did not take enough training to manage and equip children with necessary knowledge, skills, attitudes and abilities … ..PSE-9 further stated that the government allocated very limited amount of budget, it cannot support the school to fulfill educational resources like chalkboard, classroom, ICT and library’ (FGD-2, March 2023).

3.4. Provisions of quality educational services to children in classrooms

The following quality indicators structured questionnaires prepared to collect data from 103 teachers, 365 students and 172 caregivers’ levels of agreement depict quality of educational services in the teaching-learning process. The analyses of these indicators were triangulated by the views of interviewees (26 participants) and focus group discussion with 3 PTAs (3 × 7 = 21) participants as shown in Table 3 below.

Table 3. Quality educational service capacity in the teaching and learning process.

Quality Indicators	Public Primary Schools				Private Primary Schools				Sig(2-tailed) test	p-value
The school:	MT1	MS1	MCG1	AM1	MT2	MS2	MCG2	AM2
Addresses diverse needs of learners	2.61	2.59	2.98	2.68	2.84	2.89	3.21	2.95	1.68	.127
Encourages teachers’ motivation & students’ readiness	2.22	2.38	2.55	2.38	2.64	2.31	2.65	2.45	1.27	.165
Aligns and works on learning objectives and outcomes	2.88	2.19	2.67	2.45	3.48	2.98	2.96	3.10	7.18	.000
Possesses best experiences of taking remedial actions for improvement	2.25	2.54	2.72	2.50	2.98	2.77	2.49	2.79	.149	.146
Monitors and evaluates instructional practices	2.68	2.79	2.44	2.70	2.89	2.92	3.00	2.97	.017	.537
Positively reacts to the comments and feedbacks	2.34	2.62	2.18	2.47	2.67	2.71	2.99	2.75	1.72	.122

Table 3 above summarized that the schools were not capable to properly address the diverse needs of learners using differentiated instruction on the bases of their specific learning styles. Thus, the three categories of respondents in each school type rated their agreement (AM1 = 2.68 & AM2 = 2.95) for public and private primary schools respectively. These means lie below the expected ideal mean (3). The schools were not committed to encourage teachers’ motivation & students’ readiness for implementation of teaching-learning process in the target schools were limited. The groups of respondents rated their agreement below the expected ideal mean for each target school (AM1 = 2.38 & AM2 = 2.45) respectively. On the other hand, the efforts of aligning school’s objectives with the learning outcomes of students while preparing lesson plan and implementation, significant differences were observed in public (AM1 = 2.45) and private (3.10) primary schools which lies below and above the expected ideal mean (3). This contradiction may call for alternative direction like either experience sharing practices.

Both public and private primary schools have relatively poor experiences of monitoring and evaluating an ongoing instructional practices effectively (AM1 = 2.70 & AM2 = 2.97). Table 3 further indicates that the capacity of both target primary schools were rated the average means of (2.47 & 2.75) which lie below the expected ideal mean regarding the school capacity capability to react to comments and feedbacks regarding the teaching-learning and leaderships tasks. Therefore, although there are some differences between each target school, the two groups of schools are practically belonging to low capacity performing schools as their separate average means were below an ideal mean. However, the situation is worse in some public primary schools than a private school which requires devising a strategy to provide capacity building interventions for both categories of schools in light of quality standards and indicators. There are no statistically significant differences of average means of the three categories of respondents of public and private primary schools on items 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6 (p > .05), except an item 3 which is related to alignment and works on learning objectives and outcomes (p < .05) which shows a statistically significant difference between public and private schools.

The members of focus group discussion reflected that

‘I (PSE-1) think the families in the schools under investigation economic status is low to fulfill educational materials for their children. …  … . PSE-2 discussed that due to such problem, in 2022 from the 208 students dropout registered, 117 were because of relocation and low socio-economic status of their families to fulfill necessary preconditions for schooling such as exercise book, uniform clothes and psychological threats (FGD-1, April 2023).

In addition, one of the interviewees confirmed about quality of education in both public and private primary schools that

‘ my school is attempting to implement government education policy using small amount of allocated budget on top of using large agricultural farming, family contribution. However, the target primary schools have intertwined challenges such as low professional competencies of teachers, neatness of school, lack of facilities, classroom size, students’ disciplinary problems, lack of transparency and commitment, poor leadership capacity, shortage of finance and the influences of economic inflation on teachers’ (IW-15, March 2023).

3.5. The leadership capacity of creating conducive learning environments

The states of capacity of creating conducive learning environments is shown in Table 4 below.

Table 4. The learning environment capacity in target schools.

Quality Indicators	Public Primary Schools				Private Primary Schools				Sig (2-tailed) test	p-value
Learning environment:	MT1	MS1	MCG1	AM1	MT2	MS2	MCG2	AM2
Classroom set up is appropriate and inclusive	2.34	2.61	2.48	2.58	3.04	2.98	2.81	2.95	3.18	.009
Teacher-to-student ratio is to standard	2.45	2.56	2.98	2.67	2.64	2.88	2.77	2.98	2.13	.062
Library contains sufficient reference materials and usually functional	2.17	2.29	2.55	2.50	3.39	3.11	2.97	3.17	5.87	.000
Laboratory has technician, sufficient equipment, apparatus and chemicals	2.47	2.63	2.26	2.47	2.60	2.73	2.71	2.49	1.66	.131
Appropriate pedagogical center with instructional aids	2.31	2.48	2.68	2.55	3.23	2.76	3.10	2.94	1.09.	.188
Teachers’ access to pedagogical training opportunities	2.61	2.64	2.77	2.68	2.88	2.87	2.98	2.91	.049	.065
Offices for teachers, principals, supervisors & support staffs	2.51	2.67	2.49	2.56	3.02	2.81	3.16	3.16	8.17	.000
The school has available educational, financial and human resources	2.33	2.45	2.38	2.39	3.09	2.84	2.87	2.90	3.94	.003

Table 4 above demonstrated that the appropriateness of classroom set ups and their inclusiveness for all learners were rated by all categories of respondents in public and private primary schools (AM1 = 2.58 & AM2 = 2.95) respectively were ideal mean. In a similar manner, the participants rated teacher-to-students ratio in their particular schools (AM1 = 2.68 & AM2 = 2.91) below an expected ideal mean (M = 3). This indicates that the teacher-to-student ratios in both schools are larger than 1:50. Similarly, all categories of respondents rated (AM1 = 2.47 & AM2 = 2.49) for public and private schools. on the availability and quality of laboratory whether they possess technician, sufficient equipment, apparatus and chemicals. The respondents in public and private schools rated for-and-against whether the pedagogical center comprises of various instructional materials and aides (AM1 = 2.55 & AM2 = 2.94) below an expected ideal mean. This indicates that the primary schools were not qualified in pedagogical centers with locally available resources. The availability and functionality of library was rated by different categories of respondents in contrasting ways. The average mean of public primary schools was rated (AM1 = 2.50) while private primary schools was rated (AM2 = 3.17). This indicates that private primary schools have relatively better libraries than public primary schools. The availability of administrative offices for teachers, principals, supervisors and support staffs were rated (M = 2.57 & 3.16) for public and private schools respectively. This indicated that private schools have relatively better administrative offices than public primary schools. There are no statistically significant differences of means of three categories of respondents on items 2, 4, 5 and 6 (p > .05), except 1, 3, 7 and 8 (p < .05) which show statistically significant differences between public and private primary schools.

In strengthening the above statistical results, one of the FGD discussants confirmed that

‘I (PSE-11) think currently in my school, students are learning and teachers are teaching without feeling comfort because of large number of students at minimum of 70 in a single classroom, … ..PSE-14 extended the discussion that in this town children of families with low socio-economic status usually learn in public schools. As a result very large number of students cannot cover their educational expenditure and lack sufficient foods. These factors affected the learning outcomes of students … PSE-17 reflected her observation that public schools are usually the centers of conflicts where parents fear to send little kids to schools, social intimidation and harassment usually happen. The schools have no capacity building trends and practices to alleviate such social problems and conflicts through collaborative communication, counseling service, life skill training on ethics and disciplinary issues through continuous capacity building training and discussion programs (FGD-3, April 2023).

Moreover, one of the focus group discussion team members,

‘I (PSE-2) believe that at the very beginning the parents need to send their children to attend primary schools and advice parents who make their children stop schooling migrate abroad searching special life … .However, PSE-17 reflected her views that although there are football fields in the target schools, because of poor management systems, they become the sources of disturbances. Similarly, the lack of some separate cafeteria for teachers makes the schools unsafe for instructional process … .PSE-21 further mirrored out that making the learning environment attractive and child-friendly in schools is unquestionable (FGD-1, March 2023).

3.6. Capacity of primary school policy environment

The performing capacities of primary school policy environment are shown in Table 5 below.

Table 5. Primary school policy environment.

Quality Indicators	Public Primary Schools				Private Primary Schools				Sig (2-tailed) test	p-value
The school has:	MT1	MS1	MCG1	AM1	MT2	MS2	MCG2	AM2
positive work cultures that assist teachers, staffs, caregivers and PTAs	2.58	2.77	3.09	2.79	3.28	2.88	2.94	3.07	9.16	.000
collaborative learning and reflective practices: PAR, lesson studies and DI	2.69	2.89	2.86	2.85	3.02	2.89	3.19	2.97	.99	.163
learning communities share equal accountabilities on children learning performance	2.11	2.69	2.87	2.59	2.77	2.89	3.44	2.96	2.03	.081
Capable teachers who effectively prepare and implement lesson plans in classrooms	3.12	3.44	3.38	3.35	3.59	3.53	3.68	3.57	1.19	.143
Teachers effectively use DI to address children’s diversity in classrooms	2.09	2.48	2.38	2.36	2.78	2.86	2.99	2.87	1.97	.107

Table 5 above showed that public primary schools have less encouraging work cultures regarding assisting teachers, caregivers, staffs and PTAs towards supporting target children (AM1 = 2.79) whereas the private primary schools positively work towards supporting children (AM2 = 3.07). Likely, learning communities of practice in both public and private primary schools are less accountable and responsible of improving children learning performance (AM1 = 2.59 &AM2 = 2.96). Additionally, the two categories of schools perceptions on using collaborative learning and reflective practices such as participatory action research (PAR), lesson studies and differentiated instruction (DI) was rated (AM1 = 2.85 &AM2 = 2.97), both lie below an expected ideal mean (3). Strong professional intervention is required in both primary schools to ensure quality of instructional system,

Although teachers are capable of preparing and implementing lesson plans both target primary schools (AM1 = 3.35 &AM2 = 3.57) they were not competent enough to use varies ALMs, AfL, PAR and DI to address diverse needs of children in classrooms (AM1 = 2.85 &AM2 = 2.97) respectively. Thus, effective utilization of twenty-first century skills and competencies pertaining to teaching methodologies, assessments, reflective activities such as action research, lesson studies and differentiated instruction in classrooms. There is a statistically significant difference of average mean of the three categories of respondents of public and private primary schools on item 1 which discusses school has positive work cultures that assist teachers, staffs, caregivers and PTAs (p < .05), except items 2, 3, 4 and 5 (p > .05) which show that there are no statistically significant differences between public and private primary schools.

Furthermore, regarding school policy environment or work cultures, one of the interviewees suggested that

‘there are teachers who are responsible and usually work for whole rounded development and best performance of their students. However, these best performing teachers did not obtain reimbursement and motivation beyond certification. This consequence makes competent teachers to lose hopes of doing more innovative tasks. I am feeling feeling that in to make the learning process fruitful in the schools, it is a mandatory to improve teachers’ professional competencies through teachers continuous professional development practices capacity building training and other best alternatives. I think that the most appropriate opportunity of supports regarding children feeding and fulfilling educational materials should be provided by private and non-governmental organization to primary schools beyond the government supports (IW-20, March 2023).

 … ..Moreover, it was summarized in an open-ended question that while undertaking the teaching-learning process, the target schools have their own policy at theoretical level. However, it was not practically implemented due to capacity gaps like lack of laboratory equipment and chemicals (Open-ended question, 2023).

3.7. Capacity of primary school administration (leadership) in professional and technical practices

The performance capacities of primary school leadership professional and technical competencies are described in Table 6 below.

Table 6. Capacity of school’s administrative professional competencies.

Quality Indicators	Public Primary Schools				Private Primary Schools				Sig (2-tailed) test	p-value
The school:	MT1	MS1	MCG1	AM1	MT2	MS2	MCG2	AM2
principals plan, implement, monitor and evaluate teaching-learning process	3.09	2.89	3.16	3.05	3.25	3.22	3.29.	3.26	2.45	.086
principals organize and lead SIP and CPD practices	2.40	2.78	2.69	2.67	2.87	2.98	2.95	2.95	1.64	.133
leaders use participatory decision-making process	2.71	2.88	2.86	2.81	3.15	2.74	2.88	2.93	1.87	.111
leaders are committed to facilitate innovation and changes	2.59	2.61	2.72	2.64	3.11	2.91	3.07	3.03	5.47	.000
Supervisors provide professional and technical supports to teachers.	2.69	2.42	2.80	2.63	2.95	2.89	3.12	2.96	1.78	.144

Table 6 above summarized the analysis of capacity of school’s administrative professional competencies indicating that schools’ principals usually monitor and follow-up teaching-learning process in better ways (AM1 = 3.05 &AM2 = 3.26) in public and private schools. Likewise, the school leaders are committed to facilitate and scale up necessary changes and innovation acquired in public and private schools (AM1 = 3.11 & AM2 = 3.03). The attempts of organizing and leading SIP and CPD in both schools (AM1 = 2.67 &AM1 = 2.67) were found to be below the ideal expected mean. The two categories of schools principals did not effectively update their teacher professional competencies required in classrooms. Likely, the respondents of the study rated their schools’ leaders’ ability of using participatory decision-making process. Accordingly, the average mean value (AM1 = 2.81 & AM2 = 2.93) lie below an expected ideal mean. Thus, participatory decision-making practices were not well exercised by school leaders in both primary schools. Furthermore, respondents rated professional and technical supports cluster supervisors offer to teachers (AM1 = 2.63 & AM2 = 2.96) lie below 3; they are low capacity performing schools. There are no statistically significant differences of average mean of the three categories of respondents of public and private primary schools on items 1, 2, 3 and 5 (p > .05), except item 4 which narrates that leaders are committed to facilitate innovation and changes (p < .05) which show that there are is a statistically significant difference between public and private primary schools.

The other data obtained from interviewers shows that

‘I am observing that teachers doing CPD individually and in groups without mentors or administrative professional and technical supports. I am surely telling you that the SIP does not participate teachers in my school. I do not have information of SIP although I think that CPD and SIP practices lack practical alignments in my school. Honestly speaking, these programs did not give any benefits to the school system and we do them for nothing. There is no significance for teachers, students and the whole community’ (IW-26, May 2023).

 … In addition, the document review showed that there are organized teachers’ portfolios of CPD in public schools which were missed in private primary schools. In addition, a fragmented school improvement program is present in public primary schools, it is missed from private primary schools, nevertheless, and the alignments between CPD and SIP are out thought by school principals, teachers and other stakeholders.

School’s administrative staffs have professional and technical competencies as learning communities of practices. They diagnose school needs, plan, and implement/act, observe, and reflect/evaluate the overall activities of their respective schools.

3.8. Capacity of school networking and partnerships

The analyses of quality indicators were triangulated by the views of interviewees (26 participants) and focus group discussion with 3 PTAs (21 participants). Accordingly, one of the discussants of FGD reported that

‘my (PSE-18) school established PTA committees composed of 7 members to plan, organize, implement, monitor and evaluate the overall duties of the school system including teaching and learning process, administration and management and community participation. The PTA of each school makes meetings at 3 and 6 months to evaluate the overall progress of their respective schools. The PTA involves in school capacity building, probing the society for financial support, making decision on budget and teachers’ promotion. … .. PSE-23 stated that the PTAs in my school are not capable, transparent and resourceful to solve the financial problems of schools on ground because of weak networking scheme between the target schools and the nearby communities (FGD-2, March 2023).

 … .Similarly, some categories/parents suggested to open-ended questions that family of students are participating in superficial decision making meetings but it did not focus on perfect feedback and solution to the existing challenges especially related students’ disciplinary issues, lack of cooperatively working in the schools, harassment, health problems of children associated with suffocation, and hygiene (Open-ended question, 2023).

3.9. Students’ access to inclusive education

Although inclusive education is a welcoming approach of the education system, emphasis was not given to organization of special needs education in the target schools under investigation. Concerning, the implementation of inclusive education, participants suggested their observation as follows. Accordingly, one of the interviewees discussed that

‘I think there are large numbers of students with special needs education in all primary schools I knew. Besides, some children with special needs education (SNE) left at home without attending schools, special attention was not given by educational leaders, teachers, PTAs, parents and the community at large on top of lacking positive attitudes and professional competencies to assist their learning. I am sorry to say that the lack of emphases by stakeholders identifying children with learning difficulties cause lack of provisions of feasible rehabilitations to them; then, the leave the schools for unknown reasons (IW-8, April 2023)

Likewise, the focus group discussion team members summarized that

‘as to my understanding (PSE-7) nobody cares about children with visual impairment, hearing impairment, mental impairment, linguistic difficulty, physical impairment and learning difficulty while planning and implementing the teaching learning process … ..PSE-19 confirmed that some teachers and school leaders are complaining about the conflict and disciplinary problems of students without recognizing their abilities (be it special needs, intelligence or gifted/ talented students). I am confident to say that special cares were not given to children with special needs education in our schools (FGD-1, April 2023).

3.10. Development committees and clubs in primary schools

The development committee’s especially co-curricular activities are essential in the capacity development of learning communities of practices in t schools. The learning capacities include principals, supervisors, teachers and students. The interviewee discussed important points missed from the target primary schools as,

‘I doubt that my school is capable to practically implement development committees, especially co-curricular committee which provides dual importance to the school. i.e. it enriches the implementation of school curricula in one hand and develop economic productivity of the school on the other hand. Regarding the states of implementation of the co-curricular activities, and an interviewee identified key factors that are influencing the realization of co-curricular activities in their target schools. These are lack of awareness about the value of co-curricular activities, the lack of material and financial assistance for different co-curricular activities, and lack of co-curricular management skills’ (IW-22, 2023).

4. Discussion

As a school capacity component, the program coherence was analyzed for-and-against instructional practices within the schools. Educational inputs include school improvement practices, professional development practices, instructional support system, and teacher-to-student-ratio which range of 1:63–1:70, greater than 1:50 and class size. Regarding textbooks and student ratios in primary schools, document analysis revealed that textbooks-to-student ratios are 1:10, greater than 1:1 and reference books in the library-to-student ratio is than 1:30. This finding contradict with the expected quality standards and indicators related to smooth and collaborative school capacity building interventions such as continuous professional development, maximizing school improvement practices and school capacity enhancement (Hargreaves and Fullan 2012; Kennedy 2016; MoE 2018).

Although the performing capacities of public primary schools were better than private primary schools with the worst problems of quality of teaching-learning process in some low capacity performing public primary schools. This shows better direction to education officers and partner organizations to plan and implement necessary capacity building interventions to enrich schools’ physical facilities and quality of instructional system which relates to the IPO system related to school’s physical facilities cause significant effects on instructional process and students learning outcomes at higher order thinking levels (Girma 2022). Similarly, both public and private primary schools showed the wide capacity gaps in terms of quality educational service standards and indicators. The schools under investigation showed low performing capacity and needs further capacity building interventions. Thus, the qualities of educational services related to the input-process-output system were strongly threatened although professional and pedagogical competencies of teachers are important to improve students’ engagement and performance in classrooms (Girma 2022).

Furthermore, the findings showed that public and private primary schools showed the performance capacity gaps in terms of creating conducive learning environment for children. The quality indicators estimated that the schools to be classified as low performing capacity schools and needs further capacity building interventions. However, the quality of learning environment is worse in both public and private schools as they are susceptible to conflicts, dropout and malnutrition although it is the worst in a few public primary schools although public schools possess relatively better access to training and experimental learning than private schools. This practice contradicts with the targets of school improvement and classification framework (MoE 2019).

This finding indicated that improving public and private schools’ policy environment or work cultures is linked with the states of taking and sharing accountability and responsibilities of learning communities of practices especially, teachers and school leaders such as principals and supervisors (Girma and Dawit 2023). There are misalignments between principals and teachers professional development program and school improvement program and practices (Girma 2023). These lack coaching and mentoring practices from professional technical personnel. Therefore, it is difficult to support the transition from low to medium to high performing capacity schools based on the standards and indicators of school classification and improvement framework (MoE 2019).

The finding of the study indicated that students with special needs education and talented or gifted students were not given attention in an instructional system although identifying and rehabilitating or accelerating and enriching students learning styles applying VAK (visual-auditory-kinesthetic) model Cone of Dale’s Experience minimizes those challenges of addressing diverse needs of learners in classrooms. Regarding this, using differentiated instruction, developmentally appropriate curriculum and pedagogical practices, and participatory action research are important to enable students with diverse needs to reach their zones of proximal development (Girma and Dawit 2022). The researcher witnessed that there were lack of relevant and appropriate co-curricular activities planned, organized and implemented related to the subject matter/discipline contents although they have potential effects to facilitate students’ intellectual developments, aesthetic development, character, spiritual growth, physical growth, moral values, higher order thinking, creativity and innovation.

5. Conclusions

The study concluded that the quality assessment based on the theoretical, conceptual, knowledge and methodological gaps, designed objectives and research questions were aligned to quality standards and indicators such as human capital, social capital, coherence of program and educational resources. The practicability of themes of quality standards and indicators regarding conduciveness of learning environment, availability and quality of educational resources, academic staff competencies, leadership competencies, students’ readiness, technical and professional supports, networking and partnerships were not effectively exercised to move from imaginary to zero-defect quality in education. The twenty-first century classroom requires competent teachers to address diverse needs of children. However, the learning environments of primary schools were not child-friendly and to the standards of MoE (2019) school’s improvement and classification framework. The schools have shown inadequacies and poor qualities of educational inputs, process and outputs: educational resources, size of teacher-to-students’ ratio, students-to-classroom ratio, student-to-book-ratio, teachers’ capacity of applying new active learning methods and assessment for learning, differentiate instruction, participatory action research, leaders’ commitment and accountability, collegiality, networking system and partnerships. The schools have shown performing capacity gaps to motivate the learning communities of practices to strive for excellence. Similarly, the schools have little capacity of improving professional competencies of teachers, principals and supervisors through provisions of continuous professional development practices. Furthermore, the schools possess performing capacity gaps of improving the overall learning environment to foster child protection and care through implementation of school improvement program standards and indicators. Finally, public and private primary schools in towns and sub-towns were not able to facilitate school feeding program for all children because the majority of children from parents with low socio-economic status were under starvation and unable to keep their health and susceptible to malnutrition on top of causing high dropout and repletion rates.

6. Recommendations

Based on the research findings, the researcher forwarded suggestions to improve the capacities of primary schools working against illusive or imaginary quality and towards zero-defect quality education based on the assumptions of quantifying and qualifying quality in education. These are:

1. To alleviate high, medium and low performing capacity gaps of both public and private primary schools should (i). Equip and develop child-friendly learning environment (the third teacher) and classroom, and monitoring and evaluating progress. (ii). provide opportunities of scaffolding children until they reach to zone of proximal development and ready for social constructivism which includes collaborative learning and independent learning in classrooms. (iii). Adjust capacity building short-term training for primary school teachers on developmentally appropriateness of curriculum, differentiated instruction, participatory action research, lesson planning and play-based pedagogical practices and parental management and cares.

2. To minimize the challenges associated with IPO in those low performing capacity schools, (i). Special attention should be given to repairing and renewing the existing educational facilities like fences, offices, recreational facilities, classrooms, pedagogical center, cafeterias, library, latrines, store, etc. (ii). New laboratory rooms, library rooms, water supply, SNE rooms, first aid room/clinic, and sport materials and equipment, and pedagogical materials, and books should be full-filled via undertaking construction or purchasing from market/shops.

3. The competencies of teachers, principals, supervisors, caregivers and PTAs should be enhanced through providing continuous and appropriate capacity building training like seminars, workshops, ICT, panel discussion and experience sharing practices with best/high performing capacity model primary schools.

4. The leaders should pay attention to the provision of financial and material supports for academic staffs (teachers, principals and supervisors) upgrading their academic status and updating their professional competencies through participating in continuous professional development practices and school improvement program throughout the year are found to be important. In addition, adjusting school feeding program is important for quality of children’s learning, reduces health problems, dropout and repetition rates.

7. Future of the study

The current study has potential effects to elevate the paradigm shift from imaginary to 0-defect quality through evaluating quality standards and indicators implementation in low, medium and high capacity performing primary schools. However, further research could provide empirical evidence on the predictive relationship of variables between inputs, process and outputs. Thus, futures research may address the causal-effect relationships via consecutive interventions.

Availability of data and materials

The data used to support the findings of this study were included within the manuscript. The authors can provide the raw data on request

Acknowledgements

The researchers acknowledge the primary sources of data for the willingness they have shown while giving responses during the preliminary and the main study

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).