Principals’ management functions and teachers’ effectiveness: the case of some government bilingual secondary schools in the Mfoundi division, centre region-Cameroon

Abstract

The general objective of the study is to investigate how Principals’ Management Functions influence teachers’ effectiveness in some government bilingual secondary schools in Mfoundi Division, Centre Region-Cameroon. It is noticed that the principal through his management functions sets the stage for a conducive working environment for the teachers to perform their duties well. Regrettably, some teachers in Government bilingual secondary schools conspicuously exemplify a very lukewarm attitude towards the execution of their duties: intentional absenteeism, idle time at work, persistent lateness to school, non-preparation of lesson notes, inadequate coverage of scheme of work, just to name a few, which affects the quality of education for which they are guarantors. This study is based on the premise that the principals’ management functions such as; planning, organizing, controlling and motivating influence teachers’ effectiveness in Mfoundi Division. The study used the descriptive survey design and was guided by four research questions and hypotheses. The study used data collected from the teaching staff in government bilingual secondary schools in the Mfoundi Division wherein simple random sampling was used to select seven (07) schools and three hundred and fifty seven teachers as the sample of the study. The study made use of theoretical assumptions such as; Henri Fayol’s Administrative theory, Herzberg’s two factor theory and McGregore’s theory X and Y. The instrument used for data collection is the structured questionnaire which was addressed to the teaching staff. The data obtained from the field was analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptively it was analyzed using percentages and presented on tables and charts. The hypotheses for this study was tested with the help of simple linear regression. The research findings revealed that Principals’ Planning Functions, Principals’ Organizing Functions, and Principals’ Controlling Functions have a significant relationship with Teachers effectiveness. However, Principals’ Motivating Functions, showed no statistically significant relationship with Teachers effectiveness.