Practices of Participative Leadership in Relation to Professional Competency of Principals at Saudi Kindergartens.
Abstract
The research aimed to identify the extent of practicing participative leadership for the kindergarten principals from the teachers’ prospective, and how principals’ practices of participative leadership’s pattern contributes in determining the level of their professional competency. Also, this research aimed to identify variances amongst sample responses in accordance to the research variables (qualifications, educational background, and years of experience for principals). The statistical-descriptive approach is used, where a random sample of teachers at public kindergartens in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia were adopted. A survey was sent to (5) teachers in each public kindergarten, which is equivalent to a total of (165) teachers representing (39%) of the population. However, the retrieved number of surveys was (120) teachers. The research gathered information through a survey, which consisted of two parts; the first part covers demographic data, and the second part covers two sections: 1) participative leadership divided into four dimensions (practice, decision-making, characteristics of participative managers, and human relations) which is consisted of (46) items, and 2) professional competency divided into four areas (planning and implementation, guidance, monitoring and evaluation, sustainable professional growth) which consisted of (24) items. The research results were as follow: The level of practicing participative leadership scored high in all dimensions with a mean of (4.19). Similarly, the professional competency level of principals is high in all areas with a mean of (4.24). While, there were significant differences at the level of practicing participative leadership dimensions and professional competency fields in accordance to the research variables, there were also a high correlation between the level of participative leadership and professional competency with a value of (0.923) at a significance of (0.05). The research recommended providing training and development programs in leadership generally and participative leadership particularly for kindergartens’ principals, likewise, incorporating participative leadership skills in the principal’s annual evaluation form. One of the contributions of the research is the list of professional competency areas (derived from the research tool) for the process of nominating kindergarten principal to raise the applicant' efficiency level. The research highlighted the importance of adopting an educational participative leadership program within the preparation programs for school leaders and teachers’ training programs.
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