Principal Emotional Intelligence and Teacher Perceptions of School Climate in Middle Schools

The purpose of this study was to determine the correlational relationship of principals’ emotional intelligence on the perceptions that teachers have of a school’s climate. The Organizational Health Inventory for Middle Schools (OHI-M) served as the assessment for teachers’ perceptions of the school climate or the overall health of the organization. Principals’ emotional intelligence competencies were assessed using the Mayer Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test version 2, hereinafter referred to as the MSCEIT V.2.0. Participants of the study included 22 principals of public middle schools in Mississippi. There was an average of 45 teachers employed at each middle school. A Pearson product-moment correlation analysis was conducted to assess the relationship between principals’ emotional intelligence competencies and teachers’ perceptions of the schools’ climate, as evidenced by responses to the OHI-M. A positive, statistically insignificant relationship was determined to exist between total emotional intelligence and total school climate scores. Additionally, a statistically significant positive relationship was found to exist between the principals’ ability to understand emotions and the teachers’ perceptions of school climate. A preponderance of the data suggests that a positive relationship between the variables exists substantiating that as a principal’s emotional intelligence increases, the school climate increases. In a rapidly changing world of public education, emotions play a vital role in the creation of the school’s environment and climate. The researcher anticipated that by exposing middle school principals to the importance of their emotional impact on the school’s health, they might reflect and begin to change schools into more effective places of learning