PRINCIPALS’ DECISION MAKING PRACTICES AND TEACHERS’JOB PERFORMANCE IN PUBLIC SENIOR SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN EDO STATE

ABSTRACT

This study investigated principals’ decision making practices and teachers’ job performance in public senior secondary schools in Edo State. It determined whether there was a significant relationship between principals’ decision making practices and teachers’ job performance. Specifically, the variables of gender, age, years of work experience, qualification, school location and school size were considered for the study. Nine research questions were raised, two were answered while 7 were formulated as hypotheses and tested at 0.05 level of significance.

          The study was a correlational research design. The population of the study comprised all the 306 principals and 2280 teachers in the 306 public senior secondary schools in Edo State. A multi stage sampling technique comprising of stratified and random sampling was used to select 61 principals and 366 teachers from 61schools representing the three senatorial districts of Edo State. Two sets of questionnaire; Principals’ Decision Making Questionnaire (PDMPQ) and Teachers’ Job Performance Questionnaire (TJPQ) were used to elicit information from the respondents. Cronbach’s alpha reliability statistic was used to determine the coefficient of reliability and 0.90 and 0.93 were obtained respectively. The questionnaire was administered and retrieved by the researcher and three research assistants. The research questions were answered using mean and standard deviation, hypotheses 1 and 2 were tested with Pearson Product Moment Correlation Statistics while hypotheses 3-9 were tested using Fishers’ Z statistics.

The findings revealed that the predominant decision making practices of principals was the feedback system and the level of teachers’ job performance was high in public senior secondary schools in Edo State. It was also revealed that there was a significant relationship between principals’ decision making practices and teachers’ job performance in Public Senior Secondary Schools in Edo State. Therefore, it was recommended that principals should sustain the high level of teachers’ job performance through the feedback system and also delegating authority to teachers in the school, thereby giving them a sense of belonging and stimulating them to always perform better.