Transformational leadership and Hong Kong teachers' commitment to change

grantor: University of TorontoThis study investigated the impact of principals' transformational leadership on teachers' commitment to change in primary schools in Hong Kong in 1998. The relationship between teachers' perceptions of principals' transformational leadership and teachers' commitment to change was explored and measured. Four research questions were developed for this study. Two questionnaires developed and tested by Leithwood were used. Questionnaire survey data from teachers were gathered in mid 1998 from 112 aided primary schools. The size of the samples used in the analysis of the study at the school level was 107. At the teacher level, the sizes of the samples for the "leadership questionnaire" and "change process questionnaire" were 1140 and 952 respectively. Using a combination of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, the construct validity of variables in the study were established and the instruments were empirically supported. Correlation, analysis of variance, t-test, linear regression analysis, standard regression analysis and sequential regression analysis were used to analyze the data. The research questions were answered. A framework of the conception of teachers' perceptions of principals' transformational leadership and teachers' commitment to change was formed. The findings in this study indicated that teachers' perceptions of principals' transformational leadership did give rise to teachers' commitment to change. Factors "goal" and "vision" had more effects on teachers' professional commitment than other transformational leadership dimensions. The effect of in-school conditions was much greater than that of transformational leadership. All three unalterable variables, organizational, principal and teacher characteristics, were found to have significant effects on teachers' perceptions of principals' transformational leadership. Six significant predictors, namely, leader academic qualification, leader gender, school size, school sponsoring body, teacher age and teacher post, were found. In addition, comparisons between findings of this study and Leithwood et al's studies were reported. Claims of some recent research relevant to the findings of this study were discussed. Implications for future research and practices in this area were given. It is hoped that this study could have significant contributions to the development of transformational leadership, teachers' commitment, leadership perceptions and the implementation of change.Ph.D