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R EPOR TRESUMES ED 0!! 085 24 ADMINISTRATIVE CONTROLS IN PUBLIC SCHOOLSAND EFFECTIVE WORKING RELATIONSHIPS. BY- OTTO, HENRY J. VELDMAN, DONALD J. TEXAS UNIV., AUSTIN REPORT NUMBER CRF-S-350 PUB DATE 66 REPORT NUMBER BR-5-8126 ERRS PRICE MF-$0.09HC-$2.32 58F. DESCRIPTORS- SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION, *PRINCIPALS,*FUVLIC SCHOOL SYSTEMS, *ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHERS,COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS, *ORGANIZATIONAL CLIMATE, 'TEACHERADMINISTRATOR RELATIONSHIP, DECISION MAKING, ORGANIZATIONALCLIMATE DESCRIPTION QUESTIONNAIRE, MCLEOD CONTROL STRUCTURE DESCRIPTION QUESTIONNAIRE, AUSTIN THE CONTROL STRUCTURE IN PUBLIC SCHOOLSYSTEMS WAS RELATED TO THE DIMENSIONS OF ORGANIZATIONALCLIMATE BY INVESTIGATING THE RELATIONSHIPS OF ELEMENTARY PRINCIPALS'AND TEACHERS' SCORES ON TWO MEASUREMENT INSTRUMENTS.THE HALPIN-CROFT ORGANIZATIONAL CLIMATE DESCRIPTIONQUESTIONNAIRE AND fHE MCLEOD CONTROL STRUCTURE DESCRIPTIONQUESTIONNAIRE WERE ADMINISTERED TO 38 PRINCIPALS AND684 TEACHERS. THE LATTER TEST CONTAINED 80 PROBLEM SITUATIONSDISTRIBUTEn EQUALLY INTO THE FOUR FUNCTIONALAREAS OF EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM, DEVELOPING PERSONNEL, MANAGING THESCHOOL, AND COMMUNITY RELATIONS. IT WAS FOUND THAT THEREWERE SIGNIFICANT RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN AND AMONG THE PRINCIPALS' ALLOCATIONS OF SCORES ON BOTH TESTS AND THE TEACHERS'ALLOCATIONS OF SCORES ON BOTH TESTS. THE GENERAL CONCLUSION, HOWEVER,WAS THAT PRINCIPALS AND TEACHERS DO NOT USE A COMMONFRAME OR REFERENCE FOR VIEWING THEIR RELATIONSHIPS TO EACHOTHER, AND THEY SEE DECISION MAKING AND SCHOOL CLIMATE FROMDISSIMILAR VANTAGE POINTS. (GD) f,rnl'i.VVTION AND WELFARE irhisdocum,s,, cerSori Cr Y.y = r roceivedfrom the A,. Stated 00nt,, cf viewcr opinions position or c.riiciJ Officeof Education ADMINISTRATIVE CONTROLSIN PUBLIC SCHOOLS AND EFFECTIVE WORKINGRELATIONSHIPS Cooperative Resear e t Bureau Numb 81 by Henry J. Otto, PrinoipalInvestigator and Donald J. Ifeldman The University ofTexas Austin, Texas June 15, 1965 to May 31,1966 The research reportedherewith was supported by the CooperativeResearch Program of the Office of Education,U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. Table of Contents Topic Page 1. Problem 1 2. Rationale and Hypotheses 3 3. General Information Data 6 4. Testing the Hypotheses 20 5. Concluding Observations 33 6. Bibliography 41 7. Appendix A 42 8. Vignette Instrument II 45 3 .; ii List of Tables Page 1. Vignette Decision Scores: School SystemA . 7 2. Vignette Influence Scores: School SystemA . 8 3. Correlations betweenDecision Scores and Influence Scores 9 4. Correlations betweenTeachers' Mean Self- Assigned DecisionScores and Principals' Decision ScoresAssigned to Teachers;and between Teachers'Mean Self-Assigned Influence Scoresand Principals'Influence Scores Assigned toTeachers 15 5. Correlations betweenPrincipals Self,..Assigned Decision Scoresand Teachers' MeanDecision Scores Assignedto Principals; andbetween Principals'Self-Assigned InfluenceScores and Teachers' MeanInfluence Scores Assigned to Principals 16 6. Canonical Analysis:Principals'vs. Teachers' Decision Allocation 17 7. Canonical Analysis:Principals'vs. Teachers' OCDQ Scores 19 8. Correlations betweenPrincipals' Self-Assigned Decision Scores and Principals' OCDQ Scores . 25 9. Correlations betweenPrincipals' Decision Scores Assigned toTeachers and Principals' OCDQ Scores 26 10. Canonical Analysis:Principal OCDQvs. Principal Decision Allocation . 28 11. Correlations betweenTeachers' Self-Assigned Decision Scores and Teachers' OCDQScores . 30 iii 12. Correlations betweenTeachers' Decision Scores Assigned toPrincipals and Teachers' OCDQ Scores 31 13, Canonical Analysis:Teacher OCDQvs. Teacher Decision Allocation ... , . 32 Problem The object of the study reportedherewith was to relate the controlstructure in public school systems as perceived by elementary schoolprincipals and tea- chers in four types of schoolproblem areas to the dimensions of theorganizational climate of the schools as perceived by principals andteachers. The project included 38 elementary schoolswith 698 teachers in six school systems of differentsize in,Texas. Usable re- sponses were obtained from 38 principalsand 684 teachers. Two instrumentswere administered to all teachers and the principalin each of the 38 schools. The instrumentswere the Halpin-Croft 2rganizational Climate DescriptionQuestionnaire (hereafter called 3 OCDQ) and the McLeod ControlStructure Description 6 Questionnaire. The latter, also calledthe Vignette Instrument, contained 80problem situations distributed equally into four functionalareas as follows: Functions No. of items 1. Educational Program 20 2. Developing personnel 20 3. Managing the school 20 4. Community relations 20 Total 80 1 2 The Vignette Instrument (acopy of which is appended to this report) directed eachperson to respond twice to each item. The response sheet containedseven columns labeled Teacher(s), Principal(s), Cur. Dir.(s), Supervisor(s), Business Manager, Superintendent,and School Board. The respondent's first taskwas to place an xin the column representing theperson (position) in the organization who the respondent thought madethe final decisionon each item. The second task was to place a value of 1 to 5 under thename or names of per- sons who influenced the decision; the total influence values so allocated couldnever exceed 5 but could be distributed among asmany.as 5 diff6rent persons or could all be assigned to the final decision-maker ifhe arrived at the decision by himself without influence from anyone else. The number ofx's assigned to a person provided the decision score (size of the de- cision domain) and thesum of the influence values assigned to a person provided his influencescore. The OCDQ was scored in accordance with directionsprovided by Halpin and Croft; allraw scores were converted to standard scores with amean of 50 and a standard devia- tion of 10 using statistics published by Halpin and Croft. 3 The number of elementary school teachers in the six school systems ranged from 56 to 389. In the three largest school systems only six schoolswere in- eluded in the study but thesewere chosen so that they ranged from the smallest to the largest school in each system. Rationale and Hypotheses In this study control structurewas defined as the organization for decision-making. In the formal organization role assignments (usually identified by position titles and sometimes accompanied by job de- scriptions) invariably include the authority tomake 2 decisions on certain matters. Fogarty and Greggused the phrase "locus of decision points" toidentify who in the school system'was primarily responsible for making a particular decision. The formal structure for decision-making may be highly centralizedor highly de- centralized; in the lattercase it may be said to be diffuse, with many types of decision made bypersons at different levels in the scalar chain ofcommand. A school system in which thestructure for decision- making is diffuse elementary school principalsand teachers may havea large decision domain. 4 It was assumed thatprincipals and teachers were professionals and as a result wouldenjoy a high degree of autonomy in theirwork, would be happy with a large decision and influence domain,and that those who assigned themselves highdecision and influence scores would manifest asense of personal satisfaction and accomplishment intheir work and hence wouldrate organizational climateas high in esprit, thrust, and consideration and low indisengagement, hindrance,and aloofness. For teachers thisassumption would bepar- ticularly true with referenceto the educationalpro- gram (Blau and Scottl pp. 61-68 and 209).Peabody?in studying the types ofauthority relations ina welfare organization, a policedepartment, anda public elementary school found the moststriking contrast between these three public serviceagencies to be the relativeimpor- tance attached to authorityof professional competence in the elementary school. A complicatingfactor in using decisiondo- main aloneas an index against which to relateviews of organizational climateis the fact that decision point and influenceon the 'decision do not alwaysagree. A teachermay rate his own professional autonomyas k 5 high if theteacher knows that his viewsare thesdeter- mining factor even though the finaldecision is madeby the principal or someone even higherup in the adminis- trative hierarchy. This possibilitywas gii.en strong support in Kimbroughls4 report ofdecision-making in individual schools. The following hypotheseswere formulated and tested: Hypotheses No.1. Thereare significant relationships betweenprincipals' allocation of decision scores and principals'scores in the eightdimensions of 0C D Q. Hypotheses No.2. There are significant relationships between teachers'allocation of decision scores and teachers'scores in the eight dimensionsof 0 C D Q. The precedinghypothesesare stated in general terms and ignore the factthat teachersas well as prin- cipals could assign decisionand influence'scores to supervisors, curriculum directors,superintendent, business manager, and school board. The present study focused specifically upon relationships inelementary schools; hencethe decision and influenceassignments to levels above the principalare treated only inci- dentally in the discussion of thefindings. The phraseology of the hypotheses also overlooksthe fact that the rela- tionships might differ for thefour functionalareas; these, too, will be treated in thediscussion of the findings.a General Information Data To assist the reader inunderstanding more easily the data presented