The Relationship of Commitment Practices and Development of the School Leadership Capabilities in Implementing District Education Department (PPD) Transformation

Abstract

The Ministry of Education Malaysia (MOE) has launched the District Transformation Program under the sixth agenda of PPPM 2013 – 2025 aimed at enhancing the school’s performance by empowering the District Education Department (PPD) and developing professionalism of leaders in schools in an effort to improve the performance of the nation’s educational performance. The purpose of this research is to identify the level of commitment practices in implementing the District Transformation Program through three dimensions, which are affective, continuation, and normative, and its relationship to the Development of School Leadership Capabilities in schools. Descriptive survey method was used to gather information on the three-dimensional level of practices in implementing PPD’s transformation, whereas an inferential survey was employed to identify the relationship of commitment practices in implementing PPD’s transformation with the development of school leadership capabilities. A total of 400 respondents comprising of education services personnel from 13 PPDs in Malaysia were randomly selected. The findings indicate that change of commitment practices for affective commitment dimension is at a high level of practice (min = 4.42; SD = .33), while the continuation commitment dimension (min = 4.14; SD = .42) and normative commitment (min = 4.29; SD = .35) are at a high level. Additionally, the results of the study indicate that the development of school leadership capabilities from the defining dimensions, forming school objectives (min= 4.74; SD=.13), instructional program management dimension (min=4.46; SD=.15), encouraging learning climate dimension (min=4.43; SD=.18), and a friendly and supportive school environment dimension (min=4.42; SD=.11) are at a very high level. The findings also indicate that there is a significant positive relationship between commitment to change practice and Development of the School Leadership Capabilities (r=.280; p=.000). The findings of this research provide additional information to the stakeholders in developing a framework to increase commitment among teachers, principals, and staff at all educational institutions in order to ensure that such commitment enhances school leadership capabilities.