Preparation for an education programme requires knowledge of any set calendar, whether it is an election calendar or a calender of special commemorative dates. But it requires its own calendar as well.
Visibility and Detail
This calendar should be inscribed where all can see it. In education programmes where administrators are experienced, such a calendar may note only the event milestones. But where administrators are less experienced, the calendar should include all the preparatory deadlines. Detail is important, as is display. All those who have a stake in the programme need to be able to
see and understand the programme.
Apart from the confidence this gives that the programme will continue even in the absence of a key team member, the calendar provides a visual imperative in favour of completing the programme according to the original plans.
Calendar Construction
In order to construct such a calendar, educators should begin by blocking out the phases of their programme. Then, they should identify particular event milestones.
On the basis of these, educators count back to put in realistic deadlines. Such deadlines may include a best and worst case scenario so that a set of dates become bracketed.
There is project management computer software to assist in this process, but it can be done manually and charts can be prepared using newsprint or year planners. Of course, as staff become more experienced, their ability to predict precisely how much lead time is necessary before each milestone on the calendar improves.
To begin with, extra time should be built in and calendars should be constructed in such a way that alterations can be made as more information about progress is acquired.
Imposed Deadlines
In some cases, planning backwards the preferred route when a programme is being established for the first time is not possible. There are ninety days, or some such figure, to a democratic moment. In such a case, the crucial issues are those of external suppliers and available person-days (multiply the number of days available by the number of persons available for that particular job). Speed can be obtained by spending money: to increase supplier incentives, and to employ more staff to do the same job.
Decisions about these can be made earlier if the education team has a draft calendar already available.
