Financial management is a very complex issue; at the dawn of democracy the full responsibility for the financial management in public schools was given to school governing bodies. The governing body usually asks the school principal to act as finance manager who executes the financial responsibilities on a daily basis. This puts the principal in a precarious position. The research investigates the role players' understanding of the public school principals' legal responsibilities regarding financial management in Limpopo province. It looks at how the school principals, finance officers and the departmental officials perceive the public school principals' understanding, interpretation and application pertaining to his or her legal responsibilities. It further looks at the knowledge of legislation, reporting of financial expenditure at school level, reporting of financial irregularity cases found in schools, as well as the legal responsibility of financial accountability. A predominantly qualitative research approach with nominal application of the quantitative approach, an interpretive paradigm and multiple case studies allowed the researcher to gain an in-depth understanding of how various role players view or perceive the public school principals' legal responsibilities regarding financial management. I interviewed six principals, six finance officers and six departmental officials about their understanding of the public school principals' legal responsibilities regarding financial management in Limpopo Province. A total of 53 principals, 22 finance officers and four departmental officials successfully completed a questionnaire about their understanding, perceptions and experiences of the public school principals' stipulated legal responsibilities regarding financial management. All these people were involved in the day-to-day management and administration of funds in public schools. Documents such as finance policies, finance files, minute books, school budgets and audited financial statements were analysed to build a clear picture of the state of financial management in the selected public schools. Findings from this study are that there are vast differences in how various role players understand and interpret the public school principals' legal responsibilities regarding financial management in Limpopo. The rationale for having the legislation is to make things uniform and give guidelines. There is a lack of implementation of legal responsibilities by principals who sometimes experience fear of intimidation and victimisation and threat from teacher unions defending their members, SGB and the community. There is lack of knowledge of legislation and sheer ignorance of the law. There are misconceptions that principals in South Africa are accounting officers for everything happening in their respective schools. I found misconceptions of the principals' responsibilities of reporting the financial expenditure and financial mismanagement cases which are not reported, but resolved in schools. There is a culture of non-accountability, non-adherence to prescripts as a result of limited knowledge of legislation, expertise and experience of the principal in financial management. The study has unearthed a number of challenges that are serious concerns for the role players such as the principals, finance officers and the departmental officials regarding financial management. These include issues such as limited understanding, interpretation and application of the law, inadequate knowledge of legislation and financial skills, ignorance of policy and legislation, lack of transparency and openness when dealing with public finances, signing of blank cheques, intimidation, threats and victimisation from victims, teacher unions' interference in the appointment of principals, a lack of proper monitoring and control of expenditure at school level by the principal as well as by departmental officials from circuit level up to provincial level characterise school financial management. Much work remains to be done to close the gaps identified and to make financial management in South African public schools even better. The findings of the study have led to recommendations to assist public school principals, finance officers, school governing body members and departmental officials to understand the legal responsibilities of the principal in this regard better. The recommendations include models for the understanding principals' legal responsibilities in financial management, internal financial control and monitoring in public schools by holding principals accountable for the use of every cent in the schools. Other recommendations include intensive training and capacitating, compliance with legislation and the centralisation of auditing of public school financial books. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2016. / Education Management and Policy Studies / PhD / Unrestricted

The purpose of this study was to describe the influence of increased legal requirements on current or former Inter local tenured special education teacher attrition or retention by reporting their reasons for staying or leaving through the theoretical perspectives of organizational learning and organizational culture. I conducted a qualitative multiple case study of two units of analysis through a constructionist epistemology. Data were collected from current and former Inter local tenured special education teachers through focus groups, semi-structured interviews, the Left Hand and Right-Hand Column Case Method (LHRHCCM), and review of appropriate documents. Data collected were analyzed using text analysis software, content analysis, and pattern matching. Four salient findings from my study were: (1) Current tenured special education teachers want to be listened to and have their needs considered, (2) Current tenured special education teachers feel overwhelmed by the workload related to state assessments, (3) Current and former tenured special education teachers believe that legally-required changes affected them in practice, and (4) Current and former tenured special education teachers perceive that time requirements for administrative tasks reduce time for student services. Implications for praxis include organizational learning and organizational culture that encourage listening to the experience of tenured special education teachers and including them in decisions that affect them in an effort to retain them. My study adds to the body of knowledge surrounding special education teacher attrition by describing how tenured special education teachers believe increased legal requirements influence their retention or attrition. Areas for future research include studying the time it takes special education teachers to complete legally-required administrative tasks and why those tasks are perceived as stressful, and the impact of special education administrator leadership on special education teacher retention, including the application of resources within an inter local. During this time of critical shortage of special education teachers, findings from this study may be crucial to understanding the factors related to the retention and attrition of tenured special education teachers in the Inter local and elsewhere. / Thesis (Ed.D.)--Wichita State University, College of Education, Dept. of Educational Leadership

The thesis aims at analyzing the responsibility corporations, which are extracting valuable minerals from conflict risk and conflict affected areas, have in terms of respecting human rights. The thesis analyzes corporate responsibility mostly from a moral but also a legal perspective. In terms of the moral responsibility, the thesis has strategically chosen to examine the moral responsibility of corporations to respect human rights through the moral responsibility of their employees. The stance, that the thesis launches, is that the moral responsibility of the employees as individuals does transcend upon corporations making the business enterprise responsible for respecting human rights. The legal obligation of corporations in this matter is referred to domestic court decisions, which have ruled that corporations through business decisions have violated the human rights of affected individuals.  The theoretical framework is based on the principle of due diligence, which has proven to be crucial when incorporating management policies and risk-assessment mechanisms within the structure of corporations. Through the analysis of the Kimberley Certification Scheme, which is a state-to-state agreement with the aim to hinder conflict-diamonds from entering into the international market, a lack of due diligence framework suitable for corporations has been revealed. The scheme is flawed as it does not provide corporations extracting diamonds from conflict risk and conflict affected areas with a due diligence framework. The thesis draws the conclusion that corporations are both morally and legally responsible to respect human rights. In addition, the Kimberley Certification Scheme is a step to hinder conflict diamonds from entering into the international market. However, the scheme must be re-examined and elaborated into a framework where due diligence is included. These measures will allow corporations to operate with clear guidelines on how to extract valuable minerals in conflict risk and conflict affected areas whilst performing due diligence. Such an adjustment will allow corporations to avoid either directly or indirectly to finance actions, which could lead to human rights abuses.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-25T18:40:43Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Aldeir de Lima Campelo.pdf: 995111 bytes, checksum: c7cf8c7b0fda9f1cdf4b7c92b2226ab4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-04-26 / The independent audit activity can exclusively be performed by accountants who conduct the investigation of the financial statements of listed companies, as well as large companies, as defined by article 3º of Law 11.638/2007, even if such large companies are not listed. In order to exercise such activity the accountants are required to be registered in the Brazilian Securities and Exchange Commission as well as in the Regional Accounting Council of their jurisdiction. All professional activities require involvement, commitment and mainly responsibility in its practice and such responsibility may vary according to the implications from their work. Independent auditors also follow this rule and due to the relevance of their services, must be totally reliable. Based on these aspects, the goal of this study is mainly to identify the legal responsibilities of independent auditors in Brazil through the verification if such liabilities are being monitored by regulators and how this monitoring is performed. Therefore, the study presents the development of independent audit activity in Brazil, the conceptual aspects, genres, as well as financial statements, generally accepted auditing standards and professional standards. This is a study with a methodology based on the review of theoretical literature and also in research of the explanatory-descriptive. Regulators presented in the research are the Federal Accounting Council, the Brazilian Securities and Exchange Commission and the Brazilian Central Bank. These three regulatory agencies have designated a person to answer the questionnaire prepared for this purpose, with open questions. The responses of the regulators, in conjunction with the theory study, since the initial development to the results, present a study that meets its objective, and provides credibility to the reader / A prática de auditoria independente é de exercício exclusivo do contador que, para realizar o exame das demonstrações contábeis de sociedades por ações, bem como, às sociedades de grande porte, ainda que não constituídas sob a forma de sociedades por ações, conforme previsto no artigo 3º da Lei nº 11.638/2007, tem como necessário o seu registro na Comissão de Valores Mobiliários além do registro no Conselho Regional de Contabilidade da jurisdição do contador. Todas atividades profissionais exigem envolvimento, compromisso e principalmente responsabilidade em seu exercício e essa responsabilidade pode variar de acordo com as repercussões que sobrevêm do seu trabalho. Os auditores independentes seguem essa regra e que devido à relevância dos seus serviços prestados, devem total confiabilidade à sociedade. Com base nesses aspectos, este estudo objetiva, preponderantemente, identificar as responsabilidades legais dos auditores independentes no Brasil pela verificação se tais responsabilidades são monitoradas pelos órgãos reguladores da profissão e como se dá esse monitoramento. Para tanto, o estudo apresenta a evolução da atividade de auditoria independente no Brasil, os aspectos conceituais, os gêneros, bem como, trata das demonstrações contábeis, das normas de auditoria das demonstrações contábeis e das normas profissionais da atividade. Trata-se de um estudo com metodologia focada teoricamente na revisão da literatura e também em pesquisa do tipo exploratório-descritiva. Os órgãos reguladores apresentados na pesquisa são o Conselho Federal de Contabilidade, a Comissão de Valores Imobiliários e o Banco Central. Os três órgãos designaram um responsável para ser o respondente do questionário elaborado para este fim, com questões abertas. As respostas dos órgãos, em comunhão com a teoria estudada, desde o desenvolvimento inicial até os resultados obtidos, apresentam um estudo que atende ao proposto, bem como oferece credibilidade ao leitor