Influence of Principals’administrative Styles on Teachers’ Performance in Aba Education Zone of Abia State, Nigeria

This survey study examines the influence of principals’ administrative styles on teachers’ performance in public secondary schools in Aba education zone of Abia State, Nigeria. The examination focuses on the areas of teachers’ punctuality to school, regularity to classes, and preparation of lesson notes. Three research questions and three hypotheses guided the study. A sample of 40 secondary schools was selected in Aba Education zone. 22 of these schools were headed by male principals and 18 of them by female principals, including 295 teachers stratified randomly, and proportionally drawn from the zone. The instrument for data collection was a set of “Teachers’ questionnaire†on principals’ administrative styles; “Observation schedule†on teachers’ lesson preparation (TLP); and “Inspection schedule†on teachers’ school and inspection schedule (TSIS) validated with a reliability index of 0.73, using test – re-test correlational statistics. Data were collected using 10 trained research assistants who returned with a total of 285 i.e. 98% of properly filled copies of the questionnaire. Mean was used to determine the principals’ styles of administration, ANOVA statistics was used to determine the influence of principals’ administrative styles on teachers’ punctuality to school and regularity to classes, while Chi-square statistics was used to test principals’ administrative styles and teachers’ preparation for lesson. Results revealed that some schools practiced autocratic, some democratic, and some situational style of administration. Laissez-faire style of administration does not exist. It was also noted that most of the newly appointed principals and female principals tended to be autocratic while the highly experienced ones adopted situational style of administration. There was no significant influence of administrative styles on teachers’ punctuality to schools and preparation for lessons. However, there was a significant influence of administrative styles on teachers’ regularity to lesson. The paper recommends regular seminar and workshop for principals to harmonize their styles of administration and also properly-kept school records such as teachers’ time book and teaching audit.