The Importance and Challenges of Biometric Machine in School Supervision. A Case Study of Access High School, Calabar

Schools in the 21st century are supervised and managed electronically with the use of computer system and other electronic device. Biometric machine as one of such device is a unique machine capable of managing time attendance in any school or organization such as employee work hour, resumption and departure time, number of hours worked, number of days at work, amount of extra hours worked, amount of extra hours incentives earned, adequate staff monitoring, existence of ghost workers, number of punctual employees, number of late employees and number of absent employees. But there are numerous challenges faced by principals and school supervisors in using this wonderful machine. This paper seeks to identify these challenges and profound solutions to them. Questionnaires were designed, distributed and completed by twenty four administrative staff, fifty two teaching staff and fifty two staff from other department in Access High School, Calabar municipality in Cross River State. The departments were selected as a cluster to represent the school generally. Results indicated that administrative staff and the teaching staff believe that biometric machine strengthen their commitment to work as they are being monitor and paid accordingly. While other staff including kitchen, library, security, gardeners etc. believe that the use of biometric machine in school supervision contribute to the shortage in their salary. The paper concludes that the negative perception about the use of biometric machine in school supervision can only occur when the machine is faulty or as a backup battery problem and that biometric machine is a blessing for school supervisors and administrators and it makes their work more efficient than before