Empowerment of educators in the implementation of school safety measures
Sr No:
Page No:
9-16
Language:
English
Authors:
Simbongile Mditshwa*
Received:
2026-01-15
Accepted:
2026-02-21
Published Date:
2026-03-04
Abstract:
The main aim of the study was to find out how educators are empowered to implement safety measures in selected public
high schools in the Alfred Nzo East Education District, Eastern Cape, South Africa. The study was motivated by multiple media
reports about incidents that threatened the safety of learners especially in rural public schools and how educators are empowered to
deal with such incidents. This case study was grounded on qualitative research principles. The study was theoretically guided by the
principles of the Street-Level Bureaucracy (SLB) and Rational Decision-Making Model. The data was collected from three public high
schools in the Alfred Nzo East Education District, Eastern Cape. A purposive sampling technique was utilized to choose the research
participants. A total of four educators and one principal were involved in semi-structured interviews. Interviews were supplemented
with short observations and document analysis. The findings of the research include the following: the measures are not implemented
properly. The piloted school had no school-based safety policies which can serve as a guide for educators in ensuring. It was also
established that educators are not empowered to implement safety policies. The researcher recommended that there should be
empowerment programmes on school safety management on continuous basis for all the in-service educators twice a year. The
researcher further proposed that the training programmes that are provided by institutions of higher learning for pre-service teachers
must have multiple law-related modules to provide insight to the novice educators.
Keywords:
School safety, Teacher-empowerment, Monitoring & safety measures