A Dissertation Submitted to Mzumbe University, Dar es Salaam Campus College, in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Award of Master’s Degree in Public Administration (MPA) of Mzumbe University.This study was carried out to examine the role of school inspection in improving academic performance in community secondary schools in Tanzania using sampled public schools in Bariadi District as a case study. The school inspections were those carried from 2008 – 2014. The study was guided by three specific objectives which were; to assess the teachers’ perception on school inspection activity, to explore how the recommendations in inspection reports are implemented by schools and other authorities and to examine the challenges that inspectors face in the whole process of inspection. The study adopted a descriptive case study design. The target population for this research was teachers, students, heads of schools and school board members drawn from four secondary schools, namely Old Maswa, Nkololo, Gasuma and Byuna. Inspectors were also involved as well as the District Education Officer. It was from this population that 107 respondents were sampled through purposive and simple random techniques. Both primary and secondary data were collected. Primary data were collected using questionnaires and interview while secondary data were obtained through reviewing reports available. The findings revealed that, school inspection is not effective in improving academic performance since first of all it not done as it was seen, that only one school among four schools was inspected once, since 2008 to 2014. Secondly, the school that was inspected, the recommendations were not worked upon effectively. Most of teachers view school inspection negatively and there are many challenges that inspectors face. Such challenges include lack of the authority to punish teachers who fail to adhere to the way they should teach, transport problems, fewness of inspectors as compared to the number of schools and poor budget. All these make school inspection not deliver as it is supposed. It is concluded that school inspection has not improved academic performance because it is not done at all and that when done its recommendations are not worked upon such that schools continue performing poorly. Academic performance in community secondary schools is very poor. This poor academic performance is also contributed by other factors like poor working conditions of teachers, absence of libraries, books, laboratories, insufficient teachers just few to mention. The researcher recommends that school inspection has to be improved since it is the authority that is supposed to ensure that there is high education quality in Tanzania.