Empowering school leaders, ensuring quality education

By Reaven D’Souza
Executive Managing Editor

Quality education is key to achievements in life and work. Good education develops critical-thinking and problem-solving skills, and equips individuals to comprehend, navigate, and address issues that matter to their lives, as well as opens opportunities to attain their social and financial goals. Quality education also helps broaden outlooks and contribute to developing sustainable, equitable and inclusive societies.

In addition, quality education is key to equip youth for the world of tomorrow, and to shape generations aware of their responsibility to protect and preserve the planet and its biodiversity. The International Day of Education, observed annually on 24 January, inspires us to reflect on this significant power of education to create knowledgeable societies that contribute to the productive, innovative, sustainable and peaceful development of communities and nations worldwide.

Given this criticality of education to overall holistic development of individuals and nations, it is alarming that more than 250 million children worldwide are currently out of school, and millions more are leaving school without the basic literacy and numeracy skills to rise in a rapidly evolving world. The inability of global educational systems to provide quality learning opportunities to all, is highlighted in the latest Global Education Monitoring (GEM) report released by the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) last October.

The report examines the role of good leadership in advancing educational progress, through their ability to inspire and motivate their teams to achieve goals, to encourage stakeholder engagement, and to establish a culture of continuous improvement. The report also monitors progress on the fourth UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 4), which calls for ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education, and promoting learning opportunities for all by 2030.

The UN report finds that unless we invest in effective educational leadership and catalyze the pace of progress on SDG 4, more than 84 million children and youth could be left out of school, and over 300 million students would be denied the basic literacy and numeracy skills they need to succeed in life. This educational shortfall could contribute to further deepening inequality and poverty worldwide by 2030.

The report also explores the visions of good leadership, practices that lead to improved education outcomes, and the impact of external social, cultural, and governance factors on effective leadership. In this regard, the GEM report emphasizes the criticality of developing strong educational leadership to drive progress towards SDG 4, and improve learning outcomes through quality education.

Effective educational leadership is also vital in providing vision, direction, and guidance for educational institutions, as well as promoting positive change that fosters a conducive learning environment and enhances overall quality of education. Despite this need for effective, empowered school leaders, only half of school principals globally receive training in core areas like teaching, collaboration, and personnel development.

The urgent need to invest in training and empowering dedicated school leaders cannot be overstressed, as this forms the core of reversing current educational challenges. Without effective leaders in education we risk condemning millions of children to a life of illiteracy and mediocre educational outcomes. Educational leaders, in the context of schools and learning institutions include administrators, principals, teachers, and others in the community directly involved with schools.

At the system level, leaders in education include government officials working as education district officers, supervisors or policy planners. At the societal level, the leaders involved include ministers of education, legislators and other stakeholders who help shape education goals, including education researchers, civil society organizations and the media.

In Kuwait, there are many dedicated school principals, district managers and education ministers, committed to improving educational processes and outcomes. However, it is at the legislative level that the educational ball appears to have been dropped in the past. Use of influence in educational appointments, interference in the educational processes and policies, and appeasements to ease pressure in parliament have all taken a toll on the quality of education delivered previously.

Although education in Kuwait is compulsory for all students up to intermediate level, and free for nationals from primary all the way to higher education, these factors are not reflected in educational outcomes In addition, despite allocating a relatively high 6 percent of its GDP on education, this outlay on education has not translated into improving quality of learning and teaching in the country.

A recent report by the World Bank titled ‘Learning Poverty Brief (2024)’ found that 51 percent of children in Kuwait at late primary age are not proficient in reading. While this is 2 percentage points lower [better] than the average for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, it is 30 percentage points higher [worse] than the average for high income countries.

Additionally, an earlier report that assessed the quality of educational output in Kuwait found that a child leaving after 12 years of formal schooling learns the equivalent of only 7.4 years, meaning that children lose more than 4 years of schooling due to poor learning outcomes. To put this shortfall in perspective, a high-school graduate in Kuwait learns the equivalent of a middle-school graduate in Singapore.

In a welcome move, the Cabinet headed by His Highness the Prime Minister Sheikh Ahmad Abdulla Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah has indicated its commitment to change the status quo, and has made reforming and enhancing education a key plank of its development strategy. Newly appointed Minister of Education, Jalal Al-Tabtabei, and his immediate predecessor and current Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Dr. Nader Al-Jalal, now face the challenging task of redressing past anomalies, and leading the country to a renaissance in learning.

Following his appointment in October last year, Minister Al-Tabtabie held a meeting with Assistant Under Secretaries at the ministry, where he stressed the need to focus on qualifying, training and supporting teachers and educational leaders to enhance educational outcomes. He added that the rapid technological advancements, and profound political, economic, and social transformations globally, made it vital to reformulate Kuwait’s education system to equip students for tomorrow’s world.

The importance of enabling educational leaders was also reiterated by Minister Al-Jalal, who said that school leaders including teachers play a vital role in the country’s renaissance, and in achieving Kuwait’s vision of a knowledge-based sustainable society. He added that teachers are leaders, role models, and knowledge providers who enable students to face present and future challenges.

Al-Jalal indicated that it was through dedicated leaders in teaching that,“minds are shaped, capabilities are augmented, talents are refined, and ambitions realized”. He emphasized that Kuwait remains committed to investing in the professional development of teachers and school leaders, and improving the work environment, so as to enhance the educational process and quality of education in the country.

The emphasis on teachers and educational leaders was also underlined by the Director-General of UNESCO, Audrey Azoulay. In his foreword to the 2024-25 GEM report, Azoulay stated that educational leaders are catalysts for change, they bring out the best in teachers and are instrumental in improving learning outcomes. He called for a shift from hierarchical, centralized education systems to more inclusive leadership that engages principals, teachers, parents, student representatives, and community members.

Azoulay noted that while many leaders in education are passionate about their work and dedicated to making a difference on the ground, rigid systems and political interference prevent them from striving for excellence.

He added, “By enabling and empowering school leaders to fulfill their potential, we can bring new energy into educational systems, inspire younger generations, and help build a sustainable shared vision that calls for inclusive and quality education for all.”