The document outlines the importance of strategic planning in schools to enhance academic performance, unify staff, and allocate resources effectively. It emphasizes the need for institutions to identify their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and challenges, along with developing a clear mission and vision statement. Additionally, it discusses the process of problem analysis, objectives, targets, activities, and strategies to improve overall institutional performance.

1. SCHOOL STRATEGIC PLANNING HINTS
Good performance of students is essential for social and economic development. The aims of the
Government’s Education Policy for secondary schools are to achieve equity in education and prepare all
students for higher education. To raise achievement in academic performance a school’s strategic plan is of
vital importance. The Strategic plan is the document that charts an institution’s broad direction forward. It
helps an institution decide what it wishes to achieve and the main actions it will need to undertake in the
future. A strategic plan clarifies institutional priorities and unifies the staff in the pursuit of shared objectives.
It also provides an opportunity to address fundamental questions, to focus away from day to day operations,
and to take initiatives to improve performance.
Strategic planning focuses on the forests, not the trees. It answers the following questions:
 Why does an institution/school exist?
 What are its objectives?
 What do its clients/students/parents expect?
 How will the school measure its own performance?
 How will the school use this information to make improvements?
The main purposes of schools Strategic Planning are:
 To improve academic performance
 To create more relevant institutional structures
 To increase levels of institutional, departmental, and individual accountability.
 To improve transparency and communication between management, employees and
stakeholders/students/parents.
 To establish priorities for efficient and effective resource allocation.
SWOT/C ANALYSIS
Youth for Sustainable Development Organization
P.O.Box 141 Njombe
Executive Secretary 0717517023
imeldamtambili@gmail.com
Programme Coordinator 0756058976
nmlangwa@yahoo.com
Strengths
 What advantages does the institution/school have?
 What does the institution/school do well?
 What relevant resources does the institution/school have access to?
 What do other people perceive as the institution’s/schools strengths?
Weaknesses
 What could be improved?
 What does institution/school do badly?
 What should be avoided?
Opportunities
 What are the opportunities available?
 What are the positive trends?
Challenges
 What obstacles are faced by the institution/school?
 What are the competitors doing?
 Are the specifications for the institution’s/school’s functions, products or services changing?
 Are changes in technology threatening the institution’s position?
 Does institution have bad debtors or cash flow problems?

2. SCHOOL STRATEGIC PLANNING HINTS
 Could any of the institution’s weaknesses seriously threaten the business?
PROBLEM TREES, CAUSE–EFFECT RELATIONSHIPS, KEY ISSUES, AND VISIONING
Problem analysis identifies the negative aspects of an existing situation and establishes the ‘cause and
effect’ relationships between the problems that exist.
Problem analysis has four main steps as indicated below:
1. Identify the stakeholders affected by the institution and its key services
2. Identify the major problems faced by beneficiaries. Institutions should start with external clients
and problems they face. These tend to signal the existence of major problems that are often
internal to the institution.
3. Develop a problem tree to establish cause-effects relationship.
4. Derive objectives by inverting the problem tree.
Mission Statement
It brings the institution into focus. It explains why the institution exists and tells what it does. It defines the
institution’s core business as well as its key clients. The Mission Statement articulates the direction and
scope of work of the institution.
Vision Statement
It describes where the institution/school intends to be in the future. It represents a shared sense of
direction and incorporates the core values of the institution/school. It describes what the institution/school
believes in.
Objectives: A broad statement of what is to be achieved. An objective describes an intended outcome or
impact and summarizes why a series of actions have been undertaken.
Targets: The final goods or services produced over a given period of time, by an institution/school, in
order to achieve its objectives. A target corresponds to an output.
Activity: The actions taken or work performed in order to produce a given target. Activities are what
institutions/schools do and describe processes which are largely internal to the institution/school. They
describe how a target is to be produced.
Input: Financial, human, and material RESOURCES USED in carrying out the activity.
Youth for Sustainable Development Organization
P.O.Box 141 Njombe
Executive Secretary 0717517023
imeldamtambili@gmail.com
Programme Coordinator 0756058976
nmlangwa@yahoo.com
STRATEGIES
Strategies are broad statements about how something is to be done. In this context, they describe how
the institution/school will achieve its objectives; they link Objectives to Targets. Each objective will have
its own set of unique strategies which describe the broad approach to effect change.
Performance Indicators: The degree to which an intervention or an implementer operates according to
specific criteria/ standards/guidelines or achieves results in accordance with stated objectives or plans.