Safe School Practices and Education Administrators: A Review of Borno State Conflict Context

The rising concerns of school safety in recent years across Nigeria is becoming alarming with Borno State being an epicentre following multiple attacks on schools and other related threats that impacted teaching and learning. This has continued to open fora for debate on the ways to address these concerns which necessitated this study aimed at exploring the roles of education administrators in ensuring school safety practices for effective teaching and learning in elementary schools in Borno state. The paper adopted a qualitative research approach which collected data from largely secondary sources through in-depth desk review and less of primary sources through key informant interviews with strategic education administrators in the state. The paper identifies the educational administration flows through different stages which involves policy formation, policy domestication, interpreting, implementation and monitoring. The study reveals that education administrators play a critical role in school safety and security such as development of policies and procedures, ensuring implementation and monitoring effectiveness of the policies and procedures in enhancing safety and security of schools. It is concluded that there is an important nexus between education administration and school safety which must be effectively utilized to improve the effectiveness of teaching and learning amidst the increasing concerns of insecurity, natural hazards and other school related safety concerns.