THE EFFECT OF DISTRIBUTIVE LEADERSHIP ON TEACHERS COMMITMENT IN SEKELA WOREDA SENIOR

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess the effects of distributed leadership on teachers commitment in sekela woreda government secondary schools. The study was carried out using descriptive and correlation research design and employed both qualitative and quantitative approach. Data was collected from 4 government secondary schools using questionnaire, interviews and focus group discussion. The participants include 91 teachers,4 school principals and 1 cluster supervisor. The teacher respondents were selected using simple random sampling technique and school principals’ and supervisor were also selected using available sampling technique. Structured questionnaire was used to collect quantitative data and Interview and focus group discussion also use to obtain in-depth (qualitative) information on a number of selected issues. The quantitative data was analyzed using a relevant statistical package SPSS . One sample t-test was computed to distinguish the significance difference between mean scores. Pearson product- moment correlation coefficient analysis was used to determine the relation between variables. The finding of the study revealed that, the perception of teachers was high towards the practice of school principals distributive leadership in the schools and the leadership task is distributed to the staff members to the extent that staff members set directions, develop people, redesign the organization and manage instructional programs. Despite their practice the leadership role that teachers and school principals played are clearly defined but not communicated. The school principals did not encourage informal distributive leadership. The school principals have used both group and individual empowerment techniques to strengthen distributive leadership. But not used reward as an empowerment mechanism. The study shows that there is significant strong positive relationship between the practice of principal's distributive leadership and the teacher's commitment in the school under study. Finally, the researcher recommends that the school principals should have to distribute the leadership tasks both formally and informally i.e. informal distributive leadership, should have to communicate the leadership roles that principals and teachers play in the school to the whole staff members, should have to use reward to strengthen distributive leadership and Build instructional knowledge and skills, create opportunities for collaboration, involve teachers in school decision making, interpret results and provide feedback to sustain teachers commitment in the school.