MEKELLE UNIVERSITY

INSTITUTE OF PEDAGOGICAL SCIENCES

DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATIONAL PLANNING AND
MANAGEMENT

A RESEARCH PROPOSAL ON THE ASSESSMENT OF PRACTICE AND

CHALLENGES OF INSTRUCTIONAL LEADERSHIP IN SELECTED
PRIMARY SCHOOLS OF GULOMAKAD A WOREDA, TIGRAY

BY: YIRGA HAGOS

ADVISOR: ISAYAS GORFEE (MA)

NOVEMBER, 2015
MEKELLE, ETHIOPIA

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
1.1.

Background of the Study..................................................................................................1

1.2.

Statement of the Problem..................................................................................................3

1.3.

Research questions............................................................................................................4

1.4.

. Objectives of the Study...................................................................................................4

1.5.

Significance of the Study..................................................................................................5

1.6.

Delimitation of the Study..................................................................................................5

1.7.

Operational definition of key Terms.................................................................................6

1.8.

Ethical Consideration........................................................................................................6

1.9.

THE RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY....................................................7

1.9.1.

Design of the study..............................................................................................................7

1.9.2.

Sources of Data....................................................................................................................7

1.9.3.

Sample Population and Sampling Techniques......................................................................7

1.9.4.

Data Gathering Instruments...............................................................................................10

1.9.5.

Procedures of Data Collection...........................................................................................10

1.9.6.

Method of Data Analysis....................................................................................................10

WORK PLAN................................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
1.1.

Background of the Study

Schools depend on leadership to shape their productive future. The term instructional
leadership has been prevalent in educational leadership literature for the past two to three
decades (Goddard & Miller, 2010). During this period instructional leadership theorists
have developed different frame works that guide the functions of educational leaders as
instructional leadership. Hollinger and Murphy (1985), for example, developed a framework
consisting of three elements: a) defining the school mission, b) managing the instructional
program, and c) creating a positive school climate. According to them, the instructional
leaders are required to frame school goals, communicate, supervise and coordinate
curriculum, monitor progress, and support the learning culture in order to make their schools
effective.
Hopkins (2001), on the other hand, emphasizes on the collective roles of principals while
defining the term and suggesting his framework. For him, instructional leadership is the
collegial practice of working together with teachers and others in order to improve the
quality of teaching and learning in schools. The other theorist, Snyder (1983), for instance,
conceptualized instructional leadership in terms of planning, staff and program development
and evaluation. This framework relates the tasks of instructional leadership with
administrative responsibilities. Unlike Snyder, Day (2007) developed a conceptual
framework much focuses on instruction. According to them, setting directions, developing
people, engaging in collaboration, and using data and research are primary components of
instructional leadership.
A more refined and elaborated framework was developed by Wallace Foundation (2012,
P.54) based on the research works of others. Accordingly, the following five elements were
considered as the central components of instructional leadership functions: Shaping a
vision of academic success for all students, creating a climate hospitable to education,
cultivating leadership in others, improving instruction to enable teachers to teach at
their best and students to learn at their utmost; and managing people, data and processes to
foster school improvement. Thus, by combining the views of various theorists Fullan, (2001,
P.59) concludes in short that instructional leadership are those actions that a principal takes,
1

or delegates to others, to promote growth in student learning. According to him the

instructional leader makes instructional quality the first priority of the school and attempts to
realize that vision.
Although the practices of instructional leadership vary according to the country, the
conceptual frameworks developed by different leadership theorists can be implemented in
different countries with different rate. In Ethiopia, especially, after the downfall of the Derg
regime, education has been given due attention and direction with an education and training
policy declared during transitional government of Ethiopia (MoE, 1994). As clearly stated in
the MoE (2010), educational management would be decentralized specially at institutional
level and schools become autonomous in their internal administration. This means that the
role of managing the schools and teaching and learning carried out in schools distributed to
all individuals involving in school activity, not limited only to principals.
As result, different measures were taken by the government and MoE in line with the policy.
Among these measures some include the education system was decentralized, different
individuals were allowed to involve in the education decision making affairs and leadership
and managerial trainings were provided to those on leadership positions and others. Still
educational leadership and management will be the focus of the system as indicated in the
MOE (2010, P.14).
With regard to Gulomakad Woreda, Tigray, there have been some attempts to involve the
various practitioners in leadership activity and practicing instructional leadership at primary
schools levels. Also many principals were sent to higher education to attend their leadership
trainings at in-service program. Special training was also provided to leaders and other
stakeholders in relation to instructional leadership in combination with MOE experts while
introducing GEQIP and its implementation. However, the changes is being observed and the
results is being obtained in schools are very low. Although there might be various reasons for
this low achievement of students, many raise the instructional leadership practices as one
major problem. The purpose of this study, therefore, is to investigate the practices and
challenges of instructional leadership in in selected primary schools of Gulomakad a Woreda,
Tigray

1.2.

Statement of the Problem

A strong instructional leadership is mandatory in order to create effective school that makes
a difference to both teachers and students through their skills as instructional leader
(Dimmock, 1993).
In most cases the problem with instructional leadership is related to the fact that
many schools leaders are not educational experts. Moreover, there are some school
leaders who perceive their role to be administrative and, as such, they purposely distance
themselves from the classroom environment. Similarly, Hollinger (2009) suggest that in
many cases school leaders have less expertise than teachers they supervise. This notion is
further complicated by the fact that the school leaders authority is severely limited as
he/she occupies a middle management position.
Traditionally, the instructional roles of principals included several dimensions of
administrative responsibilities (Hollinger and Murphy, 1985). According to this model,
the principals were primarily responsible for managing all instructional and non instructional
processes in schools. In current practice, however, principals have been expected to share
their leadership responsibilities with teachers and collaborate with them on curriculum,
instruction, and assessment in order to enhance the quality of teaching and learning (Marks
and Printy, 2003).
However, the problem is that the instructional leadership practices were not effectively
implemented across in the schools, i.e. the shift from principals as managers to principals as
instructional leaders has not been effectively occurred internationally. This is due to several
challenges including change in political and social situations of the countries,
paradigm shifts, the complexity of the nature of the tasks and other human and non-human
factors (Goddard, 2010).
Regarding Ethiopia, there are some evidences that verify that the instructional leadership
practice was not effective. According to Alemayehu (2011), teacher resistance to change;
pressure from none instructional jobs; lack of instructional feedback and lack of staff
cohesiveness, lack of training and inefficiency in administration are the major hindrances for
unsuccessful implementation of instructional leadership in the primary secondary schools of
Addis Ababa.
Regarding the practices in the primary schools of Gulomakad Woreda, since the researcher
3

himself is working in one primary school as a principal, he has faced a lot of challenges of
instructional leadership. In addition, there was a bitter complain from educational officials at
the Woreda and Zonal levels regarding the poor performance of principals in relation to their
leadership responsibilities, lack of training and inefficiency and lack of commitment.
However, to the best knowledge of the researcher, no studies were identified that show the
degree of the problems and the challenges prevalent in the schools. This by itself initiates the
researcher to undertake this study in order to identify the major challenges in the
implementation of instructional leadership and recommend some remedies that could better
address the problems.

1.3.

Research questions
In the process of the study the researcher would attempt to answer the following basic

questions:
1.

To what extent do the school leaders perform different dimensions of instructional

2.

leadership effectively?
To what extent have the current instructional leadership roles affect the teaching learning

3.

process?
What are the major challenges that faced the instructional leadership practices in the
schools?

3.1.

. Objectives of the Study

1.4.1. General objectives of the study

The main objective of this study is to assess the practice and challenges of instructional
leadership in selected primary schools of Gulomakad Woreda, Tigray
1.4.2. Specific objectives of the study
1. To examine the current practices of instructional leadership in the schools.
2. To assess if leaders in the study schools are effectively practicing the instructional
leadership roles.
3. To identify the major instructional leadership challenges that hinders the effectiveness of
school leaders.

3.2.

Significance of the Study

The results of this study would help to create awareness among preparatory schools
4

instructional leaders by revealing what sort of instructional leadership competences do they

lack while they were leading their schools and how should they fill these gaps in order to
bring changes in their respective preparatory schools. Therefore, the researcher strongly
believes that the findings of this study report and recommendations would have the
following contributions:
1.

It would help to create awareness on the part of the school leaders about the different

roles of instructional leaders and the challenges they will face in their real world.
2. It will also serve as information source for educational officials at different levels of the
education hierarchy to identify the gaps existed in relation to the instructional leadership
and address the problems in the future.
3. It will serve as stepping-stone for those who want to carry out in-depth research on the
topic in the study area.
4. It will also provide valuable information to the schools about how do they practice
instructional leadership roles and enable them to take corrective actions for the major
challenges they faced.

3.3.

Delimitation of the Study

Since this study is the first work of the researcher, the study was delimited both in scope and
depth to manageable size to assessing the practice and challenges of instructional leadership.
The research could be more comprehensive and reliable, if it could have included all, primary
school leaders and teachers in Gulomakad Woreda,. However, due to shortage of finance and
time resources, the research will be delimited to three selected primary school schools in the
Gulomakada Woreda.

3.4.

Operational definition of key Terms

Classroom supervision: Refers to instructional support from Woreda supervisors, principals

and seniors teachers given to teachers to enhance the teaching-learning process (Signal,
1996).
Instructional leadership dimension: Refers to the main pillars or frame works of
responsibilities, competence and the roles that instructional leaders performs to achieve
improved inputs (Krug, 1992)
Instructional leadership Effectiveness: Frequency of leaders engagement in the role
5

behaviour (or practices) used to represent the five instructional leadership dimensions
(Hollinger and Murphy, 1985, p.98).
Instructional leadership: Refers to role behaviour (or practices) of school leaders in
defining the school mission, managing curriculum and Instruction, supervising instruction,
monitoring student progress and promoting school learning, monitoring student progress and
promoting learning climate (krug,1992,p.56).
Leadership: The process of influencing the activities of an individual or group in effort
towards goal achievement in a given situation (Krug, 1992)
School Climate: refers to the set of internal characteristics such as the way people interact,
treat and respect one another and distinguishes one school from another and influences the
behaviours of its members (Demoze Degafa, 2007).
School leader: Refers to instructional leaders namely, principals, supervisors, department
heads, unit leaders, and senior teachers that take part in the leadership of the
teaching- learning and management (Sergiovanni, 2001)

3.5.

Ethical Consideration

Efforts will be made to make the research process professional and ethical. To this end, the
researcher will try to clearly inform to the respondents about the purpose of the academic study.
The participants will be made to understand what were explained and be given the opportunity
to ask questions and have them answered by the researcher. The informed consent document
must be written in lay language, avoiding any technical terminology.
The participant's consent to participate in the research must be voluntary, free of any coercion
or promises of benefits. Finally to start the study the researcher will introduce the objective and
advantage of the study to the respondents to obtain their voluntarily participation; and also
informed the information to be obtained from the respondents and documents will be kept
confidential.

3.6.

THE RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY

3.6.1. Design of the study

A descriptive survey method will be employed in this study. Because the intention of the
study is to assess the existing situation and to describe opinions that are held on by
6

participants of the study and to look into school leaders problems with regard to
instructional leadership practices. This method is preferred on the ground that practices and
problems of school leadership are better perceived from the opinion survey of the school
leaders (Principals, vice principals) and other staff members in schools (teaching and non
teaching).
3.6.2. Sources of Data
Data will be collected using both primary and secondary sources. The primary sources of the
study will be key informants including Woreda educational experts, supervisors, principals,
vice principals, and teachers of the primary schools. Those in the managerial position will be
contacted for information sources for the reason that they directly involved in the practices
of schools leadership. Teachers will be taken as source of information for the reason that
they were direct beneficiaries of the service delivered.
As a secondary source the data to be collected from documents mainly focus on records and
minutes concerning the school based supervision and instructional leadership support in the
preparatory schools. In addition to this, other relevant documents of the schools such as
brochures that state the vision, mission, goals, and manuals prepared for training purposes
will be referred.
3.6.3. Sample Population and Sampling Techniques
There are about 51 primary schools in Gulomekada Woreda grouped in 9 clusters namely
Mereta, Sindada, Asefe. Kerseber, Fikada, Hadish Hiwet, Shewit, Sebeya and Zalanbesa.
Since it was difficult to include the whole population in the process of data gathering, the
sampling methods was applied. To do so, a non-probability sampling technique,
specifically, purposive or judgmental was used during sample selection in order to get
accurate and reliable data.
Accordingly, Sebeya cluster including Ayrire, Kidst Slase, and Sebeya primary schools will
be selected.
After such selection of sample schools, the selection of the respondents of the study will be
conducted. Accordingly, data were collected from six categories of respondents
including 3 Woreda Education experts, 3 principals, 2 vice principals, 1 supervisor, and 68
teachers. As result, all the existing 3 Woreda Education experts, 3 principals,

2 vice
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principals, 1 supervisor will be selected is due to they are few in numbers, and their direct
involvement in the practices of schools leadership and they are very close to the overall
instructional activities of teachers and closely assist teachers in the practices of instructional
leadership in particular.
In selecting sample teachers, out of total 68 teachers in the sample primary schools,
34(50%) of them will be selected through simple random sampling technique, particularly
through lottery method with the assumption that all teachers have equal chance of being
selected and to obtain representative sample.

Table 1: Population and sample size statistics

Population size
Sample Study
area

school
name

Sample size

SIP
Principa Vice Supervisors
SIP Educationa
Vice supervisor
Educationa Teachers
committe
ls
principals
committe l express
Teachers principals principals
s
l experts
(45%)
(50%) (100%) (100%)
e
e
(100%)

Ayrire

14

Kidst
slase

14

Sebeya

40

Total

1
3

Woreda
education office
68

1
87

20

3
10

34

10

53

3.6.4. Data Gathering Instruments

Three instruments will be used in the process of gathering the necessary data for the study.
These are questionnaire, unstructured interview and document analysis.
1.9.4.1 Questionnaire
The questionnaires will be prepared and distributed for the sample teachers, principals, vice
principals and SIP committee who have been purposefully selected as information sources.
Open ended questions will be included because it gives respondents a freedom to give their
extended views on the issue. Close ended questions will be used for their easiness in
tabulation, objectivity and suitability to keep respondents on the subjects of discussion.
1.9.4.2 Interview
Interview will be used as data gathering instrument in this study with the belief that deeper
information is obtained on issues critical to the study underway. It is intended to cross-check
the responses obtained through questionnaire and it let the interviewee to express her/his
feeling freely and knowledge of people in a program in depth. The Woreda Education
experts and supervisor will be selected for interview in the ground that more information can
possibly obtained from them due to their position in the instructional leadership and daily
engagements in the core activities of instructional leadership.
1.9.4.3 Document Analysis
Document analysis will be the other essential data collecting tool. Various documents
including school performance reports, guidelines of the MoE, minutes that show what
leadership decisions made and discussed, and records will be explored in the process of the
study. It is believed that the data obtained in this method will be used to validate and
substantiate the information gathered by the questionnaire and semi-structured interview.
3.6.5. Procedures of Data Collection
First, the researcher will visit the Woreda education office and school director and vicedirector of the selected primary schools in the Woreda and will discuss the purpose of the
research.
Then the researcher will conduct interview and distribute questionnaires to the respondents.
3.6.6. Method of Data Analysis
After the collection and gathering of data from the respondents, the next step is analyzing of
10

the given data by using tables, graph and so on according to similarities of issues raised in
the questionnaires. Depending on the nature of the variables quantitative as well as
qualitative data analysis method will be employed.
A five point Likert Scale ranging from strongly agree to strongly disagree will be used for
the sake of analysis and interpretation.
Finally the qualitative data that were collected through interviews and document analysis
will be analyzed qualitatively and reported through narrative description to complement the
quantitative data.

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WORK PLAN
Table 2: Work plan
S/N

Activities Tasks

Sep - Dec

1.

Preparing proposal draft and submit to

advisor

2.

Preparing questionnaires and interview

questions

3.

Data collection

4.

Data
processing
interpretation

5.

First Submission of research work

6.

Final Submission and presentation of the

research work

JanFeb

and

Jun

Jul

analysis

MarMay

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