Effect of School Leadership on Academic Performance of Public Senior High Schools in Ghana

Abstract

Since gaining independence, Ghana has implemented several reforms to enhance secondary education. However, these reforms have yet to fully achieve their intended improvements in the academic performance of second-cycle schools. According to the Ghana Education Service and the Ministry of Education, while pass rates in core subjects have improved from 2006 to 2021, performance in the core subjects still falls short of 40%. This persistent underperformance has been attributed to school leadership and their capacity to effectively implement a vision for enhancing teachers’ skills and knowledge. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of school leadership on academic performance of public senior high schools in Ghana. The study examined the instructional and supervisory functions of school leadership. The study was anchored on distributed leadership and social learning theories. The study employed a positivist approach to systematically explore the relationship between the variables. The target population of the study was the 928 public senior high schools listed by the Ghana Education Service as of December 2023. The study applied the cross-sectional design survey and cluster-stratified random sample to collect data from 2176 respondents. The primary data was analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The results revealed that there was a significant positive correlation (R= 0.669) between school leadership and academic performance of public senior high schools in Ghana. The study may be limited due to the use of the cross-sectional design survey, which cannot determine cause-and-effect relationships as data were collected at one point in time. The study recommends that school leadership should be prioritised in senior high schools in Ghana to facilitate the achievement of academic performance improvements in the schools. The Ministry and Ghana Education Service must ensure the appointment of competent school leadership to the senior high schools. Stakeholders of senior high school education in Ghana must equip school leadership for the performance of their roles. School leadership must adopt interventions to give teachers professional development to be effective in their teaching and learning methods.