Associations Between the Quality and Stability of School Leadership and Teacher Perceptions of Working Conditions

• In Event: Exploring School Culture and Teacher Well-Being in Uncertain Times

Abstract

Transactional theory (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984) suggests teacher stress results from appraised imbalances between classroom demands and resources (Chang, 2009). Researchers worked with district leadership from a large system in Texas to identify items focused on classroom demands and resources, job satisfaction, and perceived levels of instructional support within their annual school climate survey. District-level key informants provided evaluations of the quality and stability of school leadership independent of teacher perceptions. Multi-level models with school characteristics at Level 2 (n-schools=47) and teacher characteristics and perceptions at Level 1 (n-teachers=1,850) demonstrated that the quality and stability of school leadership was positively associated with both job satisfaction and teacher perceptions of instructional support, and negatively associated with teacher risk for occupational stress.

Authors

• Richard G. Lambert, University of North Carolina - Charlotte

• Christopher J. Mccarthy, The University of Texas at Austin

• Bryndle Bottoms, University of North Carolina - Charlotte

• Timothy Scott Holcomb, Duke University

• Cathy Malerba

• David J. Osman, Gibson Consulting