High school teacher perceptions of principal influence and organizational change

Change within schools is necessary to support federal and state mandates focused on school reform. High schools must operate within rapidly changing and complex contexts to support student achievement and college readiness initiatives. This study is to expand upon the existing research on high teacher perception of principal influence and how it relates to organizational change. This study explores the relationships between teacher perception of principal influence and five aspects of change in high schools in south central Texas. The research specifically addresses high school teacher perception of principal influence and the relationship between teacher and principal openness to change, teacher and principal anxiety to change, as well as community pressure for change.

The sample for this study included forty high schools in south central Texas. This survey-based study consisted of three thousand five hundred and fifty-six teacher respondents from seventeen school districts. Descriptive statistics were examined for all variables. Next, correlation analyses were computed for principal influence with each subset of change orientation to measure the strengths of the variable relationships.

The results yielded four significant findings with moderate to strong effect sizes and one statistically non-significant finding. The significant findings included negative correlations among teacher perception of principal influence and principal openness to change, teacher and principal anxiety to change, and community pressure for change. The non-significant finding was between the relationship of teacher perception of principal influence and teacher openness to change.