Date of Award

2012

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

EdD Education Leadership, Management and Policy

Department

Education Leadership, Management and Policy

Advisor

Mary Ruzicka, Ph.D.

Committee Member

James Caufield, EdD.

Committee Member

Meta Van Sickle, Ph.D.

Keywords

Charter School Leadership, Perceptions of Leadership, Principal Leadership, Educational Leadership, Instructional Leadership

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine differences between the self-perceptions of principals in relation to the five leadership practices delineated by Kouzes and Posner's (2003) Leadership Practices Inventory in relation to the perceptions of their teachers on their (principal) leadership across the same five dimensions. The Wilcoxon Rank Sum Test was used to compare the median differences for statistical significance to address the four hypotheses of this study.

Hypothesis 1: Perception scores of charter school principals on themselves and teacher perception scores of their principals will not differ significantly on the five dimensions of leadership. An analysis of the data in this study show that, with this population, there are statistically significant differences in three of the five leadership categories: Model the Way, Challenge the Process, and Enable Others to Act. However, there were no significant differences found in the two leadership domains, Inspire a Shared Vision and Encourage the Heart.

Hypothesis 2: Perception scores of charter school principals on themselves and

of their teachers, one comparing male principal perceptions to their teachers, and one comparing the perceptions of teachers working for female principals to those of teachers working for male principals.

An analysis of the data revealed that, for all but one condition, there were no statistically significant differences between groups based on the gender of the principal. The sole situation where significance was found was on the leadership domain of Challenge the Process in the group examining the differences between female principal's self-perceptions and the perceptions of their teachers.

Hypothesis 3: Perception scores of charter school teachers and principals will not differ significantly on the five dimensions of leadership for principals having three or more years' tenure at their charter schools.

An analysis of the data revealed that, for the leadership domains of Model the Way and Encourage the Heart, there were significant differences in perception scores with this sample population. Therefore, Hypothesis 3 was rejected for these dimensions of leadership.

Hypothesis 4: Perception scores of charter school teachers and principals will differ significantly on the five dimensions of leadership for principals having less than three years' tenure at their charter schools. No significant differences were found in any of the five leadership domains between principals with less than three years experience and their teachers. Therefore, this hypothesis was rejected.

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