The mediating effect of teacher self-efficacy regarding the relationship between transformational school leadership and teacher agency

ABSTRACT

The quality of school leaders and teachers is critical to both school development and student achievement. Thus, quality school leaders are needed for teachers to perform their assigned roles and tasks in line with the school goals. This paper examined the effect of transformational leadership behaviours of school principals on teacher agency. The study adopted a correlational research method and was conducted with 349 teachers working in primary, middle, and secondary schools of 15 cities located in eastern, central, and western Anatolia regions. Based on the variables observed in the school, path analysis was applied to analyse the relationships between implicit variables. A direct relationship was found between the transformational leadership practice of school principals and teachers’ behaviours. In addition, transformational leadership practices of school principals had a direct as well as a moderate effect on teacher agency; teacher self-efficacy led to an indirect increase on this effect.

KEYWORDS:

• Transformational leadership
• self-efficacy
• teacher agency
• school
• principals

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mahmut Polatcan

Mahmut Polatcan is currently working as an assistant professor in the Department of Educational Sciences at Karabuk University, Turkey. His research interests cover educational leadership, organizational behavior, and school improvement. He has recently focused on exploring principal leadership effects on teacher learning, and change in instructional practices.

Pinar Arslan

Pınar Arslan received his Educational Administration from the Institute of Education Sciences, Ankara University, Turkey in 2018. She has served in primary schools, secondary schools, and high schools in the Ministry of National Education.  Sheis currently working as a counseling and guidance teacher in special education schools in the Ministry of National Education.  Her research interests cover children's rights and the high benefit of the child. 

Ali Balci

Dr. Ali Balcı is currently as a professor of Educational Administration at  the Department of Educational Sciences of  Faculty of Educational Sciences, Ankara University. He received his Ph.D. in the area of Educational Administration and Supervision from Ankara University. He is the author of the books;  “ Effective Schools and school improvement”, “Organization Development”, “Organizational Socialization”, “Research in Social Sciences”, “Educational Administration Terms Glossary”, “Organizational Metaphors” (as editor) and “Comparative Education Systems” (as editor). He has more than 50 articles in his own field which have been published in national or international journals. Until now, 51 doctoral dissertations and 45 master theses were completed under his supervision.