Ebook Devolved School-Based Financial Management In New Zealand: Observations On The Conformity Patterns Of School Organisations To Change
A focus on education and the management of the educational process forms an important element of the public sector management reforms that have been implemented throughout many countries. Of particular interest is the role of accounting in the reform process (Broadbent & Guthrie, 1992; Hood, 1995). This paper provides one response to this challenge through an examination of financial management procedures that were invoked during a period of change in the NZ schools sector, and our story begins in the late 1980s.
The reelection of the fourth Labour government (1984 – 1991) in 1987 heralded the commencement of a period of considerable change to the administrative structures and processes of NZ state provided education (Codd, 1990; Macpherson, 1989). In brief, the reform abolished the intermediary stages of education administration, radically reduced and restructured the central agency and identified individual schools as “… the basic building block of education administration” (Department of Education, 1988, p.1). Elected Boards of Trustees (BoTs) were responsible for the governance of individual schools and principals were charged with day-to-day management. Many of the direct controls that existed under the pre-reform structure were replaced by other steering mechanisms such as: school charter; national curriculum; national educational guidelines; educational reviews and financial audits.
Arguably, the then government had sought to introduce economic and managerial ‘rationalism’ into the education system and, specifically, the school site. The official rhetoric of the wider public sector reforms emphasised issues such as ‘efficiency’, ‘devolution’, ‘choice’,‘competition’ and ‘accountability’ and impacted on all areas of the NZ public sector, which the government sought to steer, including education. Schooling was re-oriented in line with these terms and schools modelled on structures more commonly found in the private business sector. The vertically integrated operational model of the education system that existed prior to the 1989 reform was remodelled with a decoupling of politics and management, and has been redefined in terms of purchasers and providers of education. The reform intent had more to do with making education providers more responsive and to be held accountable for the efficient and effective use of resources (Education Review Office, 1994; Picot Report, 1988), and had less to do with issues of ‘education’ (Bowe, Ball & Gold, 1992; Dale, 1994; Dale & Ozga, 1993). This led to significant change in the administrative structures and processes within the NZ education system.
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