PRINCIPALS’ USE OF COMMUNITY FINANCIAL RESOURCES AND ITS IMPACT ON THE MANAGEMENT OF SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN FAKO DIVISION, SOUTH-WEST REGION OF CAMEROON

Abstract

This study was designed to examine principals’ use of community financial resources and its impact on the management of secondary schools in Fako Division, South-West Region of Cameroon. The study was guided by two objectives which to investigate the impact of principals’ use of foreign aids and community/PTA levy and its impacts on the management of secondary schools. The survey research design particularly the cross-sectional survey design was used. This design was used because data were collected at once and not periodically as seen with longitudinal survey. The population of the study comprised of 8746 teachers and 1217 principals from secondary schools in the South West Region of Cameroon. The sample population for the study was made up of 426 teachers and 29 principals. The purposive and simple random sampling techniques was adopted for the study. The instruments use for data collection were a questionnaire (closed and open ended questions) for teachers and an interview guide for principals. Data from close ended questions was analysed using SPSS 23.0, with the aid of descriptive and inferential statistical tools while open ended questions were analysed thematically. The Pearson Product Moment Correlation was used to test the research hypotheses formulated in the study. The finding shows that with reference to foreign aids, 67.5% of teachers accepted that the principal makes use of foreign aids and with reference to community/PTA levy, 61.1% of teachers accepted that the principal makes use of community/PTA levy. Hypothetically, the result of the analysis revealed that the calculated Гxy -value 0.289 is higher than the critical Гxy -value 0.0978 at .05 level of significance and degrees of freedom 426. Furthermore, the p-value of 0.000 is less than 0.05. With the result of this analysis, the null hypothesis was rejected and the alternative hypothesis accepted. This result implies that the use of community financial resources by principals do have significant impact on the management of secondary schools although the impact is moderate. The positivity of the correlation value 0.289** implies that management of secondary schools is more likely to be enhance when principals adequately make use of community financial resources. Therefore, it is generally recommended that, that using community financial resources to pay part time teachers will help the school to attain it goals and objectives, community financial resources will greatly help the schools attain their goals and objectives since we hardly given sufficient finances for the running of the school.