The National Development Plan (NDP) – Vision for 2030 emphasizes the importance of enhancing accountability in the education sector and promotes the importance of mutual accountability between schools and communities for their overall improvement on key indicators so as to enhance teaching and learning in schools. Improvement in teaching and learning requires a radical approach underpinned by quality and efficiency at school and district level.

Performance management is a key process in any school / district and should assist the management and staff to focus on key issues and objectives to ensure sustainability and improvement in delivering quality education.

A number of initiatives have been put in place to strengthen accountability and management systems, and improve the quality of education. These include:

1. The Integrated Quality Management System (IQMS), which was signed as Collective Agreement No. 8 of 2003 at the ELRC, provides for the evaluation of school-based educators including School Management Teams (SMTs). The IQMS also makes provision for the evaluation of principals by circuit managers.
2. The Performance Management and Development Scheme (PMDS) provides for the evaluation of office-based educators as per ELRC Collective Agreement No 3 of 2002.
3. The national policy (Government Gazette Vol. 433, No. 22512, 26 July 2001) on Whole School Evaluation (WSE) aims to evaluate the effectiveness of a school in terms of national goals as well as to increase the level of accountability within the education system. This is intended to enable schools to improve the overall quality of education they provide as well as to increase learner attainment.
4. The Skills Development Act No. 97 of 1998 makes provision for a skills development framework to address the needs for scarce and critical skills in the Provincial Education Departments (PEDs).