| dc.description.abstract | Many teachers engage in significant leadership activities even though leadership rarely features in their educational discourse. Thus leading to lack of clarity about what it means to be a teacher and a leader, when not holding the position of principal or deputy principal. Many Principals are finding it • cult and challenging to be educational leaders. The main objective of the study was to establish
educators' beliefs and perception of delegated leadership and its impact on teaching and learning in public secondary schools. The study adopted a descriptive research design. The target population in this study constituted all the ten public Secondary schools within lmenti North District that had participated in leadership development programs all the ten principals, ten deputy principal and one hundred and seventy nine public secondary school teachers. The ten principals and ten deputy principals of those schools were purposely sampled as they are senior leaders who have supported development of leadership throughout the school. One hundred and thirty two teachers were randomly selected using Krejcie and Morgan 1970 table from the ten schools. The study had a total sample size of one hundred and fifty two respondents. Questionnaires were used to collect data from teachers and interview schedule for deputy principals and principals. The researcher conducted a pilot study in three public secondary schools (30.0% of the population) within the study location. In testing the validity of research instruments, the researcher applied contents validity, where the experts from department of education of Kenya Methodist university opinions were sought. In this study, Split-half method together with the Spearman Brown Prophecy Formula was applied to determine the reliability of the instruments. The study establish that , 93.9 % of teacher respondents perceive delegated leadership as including their involvement in Decision-making and in leading new initiatives in the school. Delegated leadership and teaching and learning were evident through 93.9% respondents' agreed that student learning is enhanced, when teachers work together and that their own teaching improves when they receive support from management and colleagues. 86.4 % of participants agreed that teachers should work together in planning and reviewing their work, sharing ideas within and across subject departments and sharing their professional development experiences but less than 50% of respondents agreed that these practices were well established in their schools. The research highlighted the need for principals, deputy principals and teachers to support students' learning in a variety of ways and to ensure that teaching and learning issues are on the agenda at staff meetings. The outcome of the research provides useful insights to advance leadership practices in the area of study as well as in other learning institution in Imenti North District of Meru County. The study recommends in-service training needs were identified and whole school in-service training provided to the teachers, deputy principals and principals in Imenti North District. The study also recommends delegated leadership to be encouraged in schools through working collegially, engaging the wider school community and delegating tasks, when appropriate and evaluating progress with an aim to: embed a shared vision, focus within the team, further develop communication skills within the team, further develop Self Evaluation and create a culture of shared leadership amongst the team. | en_US |
