Teachers’ Perception of Educational Leadership as a Factor of Readiness for Administrative Positions

Abstract

This article analyzes perceptions of educational leadership in teachers. We conducted a survey of 234 teachers which identified the notions of preschool teachers, school teachers and university lecturers about the characteristics of administrative activities and the possibilities it provides for satisfying the individual’s basic needs for work as compared to similar characteristics of executive activities. The study revealed that there is a negative stereotype concerning the educational leadership in the collective consciousness of the teacher community. In spite of the higher wages and greater independence that this position offers, teachers tend to think it has more disadvantages as compared to their own work: it’s much more intense, complex, demanding, filled with responsibilities and much less creative. The combined effect of this negative stereotype and of the teachers’ perceptions of the leading motives of administrative activities (which are, in their opinion, quite different from the motives of teaching) is the fundamental reason underlying the teachers’ reluctance to fill up administrative positions.

Keywords

• teacher
• executive activities
• educational leadership