Principals’ leadership practices for goal attainment in Public Senior Secondary Schools in Rivers State

Abstract

The study examined principals Leadership practices for goal attainment in public senior secondary schools in Rivers  State. Three research questions and three corresponding hypotheses guided the study. The study adopted a descriptive  survey design. A sample size of 86 representing 30% was drawn from a population of 258 principals in Rivers State, using  stratified sampling technique. An 18 items validated instrument titled; principals leadership practices for goal  attainment questionnaire. (PLPGAQ) was used for data collection. The test re-test method was used to obtain the  reliability of the instrument. The reliability coefficient was established at 0.71. The mean and standard deviation were  used to answer the research questions, while the mean was used to test the hypotheses. The findings revealed that  principals’ decision-making, instructional-supervision and transformational leadership practices enhance teachers  performance and students academic achievement in public senior secondary schools in Rivers State. it was inter-alia recommended that Rivers State government should partner with school principals to ensure that there is shared  decision-making in secondary schools and effective supervision of instruction. A principals should also be   transformational leaders.