The assess of principal competency of the physical education teacher as a principal in secondary education according to their personnel’s perception

Abstract

By 1985 Physical Education teachers (PETs) were not allowed to apply for the post of Principal in Secondary education schools. Currently, the PETs are the fourth most popular specialty in Greek school management positions thus giving rise to the question; Can PETs be effective school leaders? The purpose of the present research was to assess PETs’ performance as school principals in Principal Competency Factors according to their personnel’s perception, and to detect perspective differences based on gender and specialty. Making use of a questionnaire (the Principal Instructional Management Rating Scale-PIMRS) translated and adapted to a Greek reality, a total number of 580 teachers of 35 schools run by PETs participated in the study. Gap analysis technique revealed statistically significant results in the entire questionnaire’s the items of the measurement tool. It is concluded reveal that teachers are not experiencing the anticipated leadership behaviors from their PET-Principals and the latter’s skills/abilities are not the expected ones since school management performed by PET-Principals. In addition, PET-Principals, in order to achieve effective school management, should improve, among others, the promotion of the teachers’ professional development, the monitoring of the students’ progress and the improvement of the learning process as well as the determination and Dissemination learning objectives. Furthermore, the study concluded that their personnel’s perspective regarding the effectiveness of school management by a PET does not differ based on gender and specialty.