O understand and reflect the wishes of parents/guardians and community residents concerning school management in administration,

○ obtain the cooperation of parents/guardians and community residents in school management,

○ fulfill accountability as a school by making known the status of school management and by taking other measures.

The percentage of schools that installed school advisers (including similar systems) in fiscal 2006 was 82.3% for public schools and 100% for national schools. Recently, many cases have been seen where the system is used to encourage participation of parents/guardians and community residents in schools through, for example, the appointment of evaluators to evaluate persons concerned with schools.

## (3) Measures to evaluate schools and information provision

To increase school independence and autonomy, measures must be taken to evaluate the results of educational activities and improve and develop school management. Schools must also fulfill accountability and encourage collaboration between parents/guardians and community residents. For this purpose, the School Education Law was amended in June 2007 and school evaluations were performed. Based on the results, steps were taken to improve school management and educational standards, and regulations concerning the provision of information by schools were newly established.

In response to the amendment of the School Education Law, the Enforcement Regulations of the School Education Law were amended in October 2007, establishing provisions for the following matters:

○ Implementation and announcement of self-evaluations

○ Implementation and announcement of evaluations of persons concerned with schools based on the results of self-evaluations

Reports issued to the establishing body of the school of the results of self-evaluations and evaluations of persons concerned with schools

Schools are required to promptly implement measures based on the provisions of laws and regulations and to implement and announce self-evaluations by the end of fiscal 2008 at the latest.

In response to the above amendment of law, the School Evaluation Guidelines for Compulsory Education will be amended to School Evaluation Guidelines, which will include provisions pertaining to high schools. Through these and other measures, efforts aimed at promoting school evaluations will continue to move forward based on the ideas of schools and boards of education.

## (4) Expansion of school discretion

In order to develop schools open to the community, it is necessary to perform independent and autonomous school management in schools that is based on their respective educational principles and policies and that is suited to the circumstances of the community. From this perspective, boards of education are implementing the measures described below in order to expand the discretion of schools.

The involvement of boards of education will be reduced through measures such as substituting with notifications that which previously required the approval of boards of education under school management regulations that stipulate the relationship between schools and boards of education

The discretion of schools in school budgets will be expanded by providing for special outlays under the principal’s discretion

For example, with regard to long vacation periods previously set uniformly by boards of education, measures now exist allowing school principals to shorten summer vacations or to introduce a two-semester system depending on the school's circumstances if they submit notification. In addition, an increasing number of boards of education have revised the school budget system, whereby allocations were previously made for each detailed item of expenditure, and have introduced a system allowing schools to formulate their own budgets from a fixed total amount (Figure 1-2-14).