Teachers’ and Students’ Perceptions of Principals’ Transformational Leadership and Students’ Academic Achievement in Public Secondary Schools of Nairobi County, Kenya

Ndiga, Beatrice Achien’g (2015) Teachers’ and Students’ Perceptions of Principals’ Transformational Leadership and Students’ Academic Achievement in Public Secondary Schools of Nairobi County, Kenya. PhD thesis, Catholic University of Eastern Africa.

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Abstract

The study sought to establish teachers’ and students’ perceptions of the Principals’ transformational leadership in Nairobi County, Kenya. A secondary concern was to determine if transformational leadership led to increased levels of satisfaction, improved classroom management and willingness to expend effort among the teachers of such principals. Two transformational leadership variables of Intellectual Stimulation and Individualized Consideration were examined and correlated with the study dependent variable, the student academic achievement. Seven research questions guided the study along with the following null hypotheses: HO1: there is no significant relationship between student perception towards principals’ transformational leadership and student achievement; HO2: there is no significant relationship between teacher perception towards principals’ transformational leadership and student achievement. A mixed method approach was adopted by the study where both naturalistic and descriptive survey designs were used. Qualitative approach was utilized to gather more in- depth information from the principals and other respondents. A total of 21 eligible public secondary schools were drawn from a sampling frame of 73 schools through stratified sampling method. A total of ten teachers, ten students and the principal from each eligible school were sampled and included in the study. A total of 21 principals from each eligible school were included in the study. The total sample size was therefore four hundred and forty one (441) respondents drawn from the selected 21 public secondary schools. Questionnaires and interview guides were employed to collect data. Likert items with a 5-point response scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree were included in the questionnaire. The data was sorted out and analyzed by use of descriptive and inferential statistics. Correlations and T-test were used to examine how well the transformational leadership factors correlated with student performance. The data was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) and Microsoft's Excel and data presented using tables. The results of the study indicated that (i) there was a moderate, negative correlation between student perception towards principals’ transformational leadership and student achievement, which was statistically significant (ii) there was a strong, positive correlation between teachers’ perception towards principals’ transformational leadership and student achievement, which was statistically significant (iii) there was a significant difference in the student and teacher perceptions towards principal’s transformational leadership (iv) there was a positive correlation between teacher perception of principals’ individualized consideration and student achievement, which was statistically significant (iv) as the principals’ intellectual stimulation increases, student academic achievement also increased. Methods used by principals to enhance student academic achievement included: teacher and student motivation; Strict discipline, team teaching, provision of revision materials, setting high standards, purchase of teaching and learning resources and benchmarking. Challenges faced by principals included, parents abandoning their parenting roles, insufficient funds to manage the schools, negative attitude from teaching and non teaching staff amongst others. The study recommends action plan by TSC in establishing training needs and training principals in transformational leadership, mentoring program for newly appointed and underperforming head teachers, involving secondary school principals in decision making and motivation of principals through capacity building.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD28 Management. Industrial Management L Education > LB Theory and practice of education > LB1603 Secondary Education. High schools
Divisions:	Africana
Depositing User:	JHI Africa
Date Deposited:	25 Sep 2017 09:54
Last Modified:	25 Sep 2017 09:54
URI:	http://thesisbank.jhia.ac.ke/id/eprint/2364

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