Abstract:
The main purpose of the study was to investigate influence of socially ascribed roles on principals’ effectiveness in secondary school administration in Ebonyi state. Five research questions and five hypotheses guided the study. The design of the study was ex-post facto research design. The population of the study was 221 principals (196 males and 25 females) in public secondary schools in Ebonyi State. All the principals were used for the study, there was therefore no sampling. The instrument for data collection was a researcher-made questionnaire which has 45 items administered to the respondents by the researcher to supply relevant data needed for the study. The researcher also applied interview technique in getting necessary data for the study. The instrument was validated by three experts from the Faculty of Education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka. To determine the internal consistency of the instrument, the instrument was trial –tested on a sample of (30) principals (20 males and 10 females) in the public secondary schools in Isi-Uzo Local Government Area of Enugu state, outside the area of the study. Scores generated from the trial-test were subjected to Cronbach Alpha analysis which yielded internal consistency of 0.89, 0.83, 0.46, 0.90 and 0.96 for clusters A,B,C,D and E respectively. The research questions were answered using mean and standard deviation, while the hypotheses were tested using t-test of independent mean at 0.05 level of significance. The major findings of the study indicate that there is no influence of socially ascribed roles on the planning strategies of secondary school principals; there is no influence of socially ascribed roles on the supervisory techniques of secondary school principals; there is no influence of socially ascribed roles on personnel management strategies of secondary school principals; there is no influence of socially ascribed roles on the financial management strategies of secondary school principals and there is no influence of socially ascribed roles on the management of educational facilities by secondary school principals. The findings further indicate that there is no significant difference between the mean rating scores of male and female principals on the influence of socially ascribed roles on the planning strategies, supervisory techniques, personal management strategies, financial management practices and the management of educational facilities by secondary school principals in Ebonyi State. Based on these findings, the researcher recommended that school principals should ensure that projects articulated in their management plans are implemented strictly. Government should do everything possible to address the gender imbalance in school leadership in Ebonyi State which is male dominated.
