Abstract:
The study focused on assessment of the influence of
school stakeholders in
implementation of public schools strategic plans’ i
n Machakos Sub County as the main
objective and parent influence, government influenc
e, board of management influence
and teachers influence as the Independent variables
. The Descriptive design was used in
the research design. The target population of the s
tudy consisted of was all 62 public
secondary schools registered in Machakos Sub County
by 2014. Simple stratified
sampling technique was used. The sample comprised o
f 19 schools which were stratified
according to categories of national, Extra County,
county and sub county schools. The
main research instrument used in the study was ques
tionnaires comprising of structured
questions to collect qualitative and quantitative p
rimary data developed in accordance
with the research objectives and questions. Data ca
pturing was done using SPSS
software. Descriptive statistics were computed for
presenting the data. The inferential
statistics was used to come up with the forecasting
models and validation of the same
models. The study found out that through parents in
fluence; School fees defaulter’s
affects implementation of the school strategic plan
and Parents level of education
influences implementation of the strategic plan. Th
e study revealed that through
government influence; government policies have posi
tively influenced implementation of
the school strategic plan and to a moderate extent;
the Government trains principals on
strategic plan formulation. Respondents further ind
icated that in Board of management
influence; Board of management is actively involved
in planning the school strategic
plan, there is adequate gender representation among
the Board members and the age of
the Board of management members influences the impl
ementation of the school strategic
plan. Teacher influence indicated that teachers inf
luence the implementation of the school
strategic plan through active involvement in extra
curricula activities of the school, the
parents are provided with a forum for educational d
iscussions with teachers, creation of
an active guidance and counseling department, invol
vement in the discipline of the
students, giving Teachers opportunities to develop
in their career and frequent discussion
of discipline of the students with parents and fina
lly in terms of moderating effect of
resources on the relationship; the respondents were
of the view that resources actually
moderates the relationship between school stakehold
ers and implementation of public
schools strategic plans’ in Machakos Sub County. M
ore specific; Availability of School
finances have influenced the implementation of stra
tegic plan, Enrolment trends in the
school have forced schools to change the school bud
get thus affecting implementation of
the strategic plan and some projected sources of fu
nds have influenced changes in the
strategic plan. The study also found out that indep
endent variables significantly
influences dependent variable (r
2
= 0.722). At the same time by introducing the
moderating variable the explanatory power improved
significantly.