An investigation of the relationship between school administrators' leadership styles, school effectiveness, and organizational commitment based on teachers' opinions: The case of Sakarya province

The aim of this research is to investigate the relationship between school administrators' leadership styles, school effectiveness, and teachers' organizational commitment. The relational survey model has been employed in the research The sample of the study consists of 409 teachers from various branches working in public schools in the central districts of Sakarya province. The "School Principals' Leadership Styles Scale", "Perceived School Effectiveness Scale", and "Organizational Commitment Scale" were administered to the teachers selected by simple random sampling method and the data were analyzed using statistical methods. According to the results of the research, it was determined that teachers perceive the most effective leadership style of school principals as transformational leadership, followed by transactional and laissez-faire leadership styles, respectively. It was also found that teachers' gender, age, years of service, and educational background do not have a significant relationship with leadership style across the overall scale. It was observed that transactional leadership differs significantly by gender, transformational leadership differs by school type, and laissez-faire leadership by seniority and branch. While school administrators' leadership styles do not show a significant difference based on gender, age, years of service, and educational background, a significant difference was observed based on school type. When examining the results of school effectiveness, no significant difference was found in the overall scale or its sub-dimensions based on gender. However, significant differences were identified among groups based on age, branch, school type, length of service, and educational background. As significant differences were not identified across the general scale or its sub-dimensions based on gender, branch, or educational background in teachers' levels of organizational commitment; significant differences were identified in all subdimensions based on age and school type, and only in the continuance commitment subdimension based on years of service. According to Pearson correlation analysis conducted on the scales, it was found that the transformational leadership dimension has a negative correlation with laissez-faire and transactional leadership, and a positive correlation with school effectiveness, emotional commitment, continuance commitment, and normative commitment. Laissez-faire leadership was found to have a positive correlation with transactional leadership and a negative correlation with school effectiveness and the sub-dimensions of commitment; emotional, continuance, and normative. School effectiveness was found to have a positive and significant correlation with the sub-dimensions of organizational commitment: emotional commitment, continuance commitment, and normative commitment. Emotional commitment also showed a positive correlation with both continuance and normative commitment, and similarly, continuance commitment had a positive correlation with normative commitment. In the analysis conducted for the structural equation model, it was concluded that school administrators' leadership styles positively and significantly predicted organizational commitment, and that organizational commitment positively and significantly predicted school effectiveness. It was also concluded that school administrators' leadership styles positively and significantly predicted organizational commitment. Furthermore, it was found that organizational commitment plays a partial mediating role in the relationship between school administrators' leadership styles and school effectiveness. Keywords: School Administrators' Leadership Styles, School Effectiveness, Organizational Commitment, Teachers' Opinions.