The Effects of a Principal's Interactions with Teachers on Teachers' Well-being
Open AccessThis study explores the effects of a principal’s interactions with teachers and the effect on teacher well-being. Due to the predictive nature well-being has on a teacher’s personal and work life, including health, productivity, job absenteeism, and engagement (Beck & Harter, 2014; Rath & Harter, 2010; Sears et al., 2014), the understanding of how principals can positively impact teacher well-being is the primary goal of this study. The interactions between the principal and teacher were studied in three categories: interaction frequency, interaction quality, and combined interaction frequency and quality levels. The data for this study was obtained from Gallup, Inc. in two datasets, one reporting items relating to interaction frequency and quality by a principal with teachers and another reporting teacher Overall Well-being, five well-being elements (Purpose, Community, Social, Financial, and Physical), and a Life Evaluation: Present item. The datasets were merged and cleaned for analysis and consisted of self-reported responses from 415 self-identified teachers from September 4th, 2013 through December 3rd, 2013. The researcher created two composite scores from five interaction frequency items (IF5) and seven interaction quality items (IQ7) to measure interactions by a principal with teachers. Tertiles were created within the IF5 and IQ7 composite means to identify levels of High, Medium/Mixed, and Low interaction types within each composite for a combined interaction type analysis.A hierarchical multiple regression was used for analysis of the interaction composites and an estimated marginal means comparison was used for analysis of the combined interaction composites in relation to the well-being dependent variables. Results from the analysis showed that the interaction frequency and quality of a principal with a teacher have significant effects on teacher well-being above and beyond available demographic data. Interaction quality was also found to have a larger affect than interaction frequency. When combining the interaction composites, the high frequency/high-quality interaction group had significantly higher teacher well-being marginal means than any other combination of interaction group types studied. This study contributes to literature on administration practices and provides principals opportunities to create and apply strategies for increasing their interaction frequency and quality with teachers, to increase teacher well-being.
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Reckmeyer_gwu_0075A_15299.pdf | 2020-09-10 | Open Access |
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