Impact of the Annual Professional Performance Review on Principals\u27 Self-Efficacy

The purpose of this qualitative study was to gain a better understanding of the impact of New York State’s Annual Professional Performance Review (APPR) on principal self-efficacy. While school districts enact reforms to evaluate and retain efficacious leaders in schools, principals are leaving the principalship in record numbers. Furthermore, as a result of high accountability demands and the complexity of their roles as school leaders, principals opt to hold their positions for shorter periods of time. Participants in this study were school principals from two elementary schools, two middle schools, and two high schools in a suburban school district in New York State. Responses from each participant were analyzed and organized in alignment within the framework of Bandura’s self-efficacy theory and Tschannen-Moran’s and Gareis’s Principal’s Sense of Efficacy Scale (PSES). Findings from this study confirmed that principals perceive their roles as essential to the success of their schools. The leadership and moral aspects of the principalship were most likely to build high levels of self-efficacy. Principals ranked communication of expectations, building capacity, delegating, and maintaining focus on supporting student needs as keys to effective leadership. The demands of the principalship, particularly the managerial aspects, were overwhelming and stressful to school leaders, decreasing their sense of efficacy. Despite the numerous challenges, principals described their role as personal, mission-driven, and advocacy