Sharing responsibility: student leadership and accountability mechanisms at an urban government primary school in Tigray

This paper introduces student leadership and internal accountability mechanisms at a government primary school in Ethiopia. The network system (also known as ‘one to five’) is a means of sharing responsibility with students for supporting the academic learning, and regulating the behaviour, of their peers. Another practice, gim gima, is a forum for public critique, whereby students, teachers and others in the school community evaluate the conduct of their peers and leaders, with a view to identifying misconduct, learning from mistakes, and making future improvements. This paper draws from ethnographic research undertaken for my PhD research.