Developing a Balanced Scoreboard (BSC) for Evaluating the Safety Performance of Saudi Public Schools

Abstract

Since a number of school fire accidents occurred in 2002, the Saudi Arabian government has realised that providing school safety regulations is necessary in order to avoid accidents in the nation’s schools. The Saudi Ministry of Education has been actively seeking to develop applicable regulations to measure the safety performance of each school. Nowadays, school safety has become an important topic for all Saudi parents, especially parents of children who are just starting school for the first time; it also has become an important priority for the Saudi Minister of Education. For this reason, the Minister, in 2012, issued an important decision to develop an administrative unit, under the name of Schools Security and Safety Administration, to achieve the following goals: provide a safe and healthy environment in schools; prevent accidents or injuries during school hours; control school accidents and emergencies; provide necessary information and instructions to know the risks that students and staff may face at school and guide them on methods of prevention; contribute to educating students on the safety aspects in their schools; and finally, document accidents and injuries for the purpose of evaluating school safety processes. Kaplan and Norton (1992) developed an innovative performance management system that includes three core subsystems, namely, a measurement system, a strategic management system and a communication system. This performance management system, called a balanced scorecard (BSC), showed great potential to be adapted to enable the Saudi Ministry of Education to meet its need for effective safety performance at each school. Therefore, the study’s key aim was to develop a BSC, which includes diverse perspectives for evaluating the various leading and lagging indicators of safety performance in Saudi schools.