Public Secondary School Principals Administrative Strategies under Economic Meltdown in Ebonyi State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study assessed the administrative strategies principals in Ebonyi State public secondary schools adopt to cope with the economic meltdown. Two research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. The study adopted descriptive survey design. The population of the study comprised six thousand one hundred and sixty-five (6,165) principals and teachers from two hundred and twenty-six (226) public secondary schools in Ebonyi State. The sample of the study was 376 principals and teachers from 135 public secondary schools in Ebonyi State. Taro Yamane sampling formula was used to determine the sample size of 376 principals and teachers because the population is finite. The instrument for data collection was researchers-made questionnaire, titled, “Principals Administrative Strategies Questionnaire” (PASQ). The instrument was validated by three (3) lecturers; two lecturers from Educational Administration and Planning option of the Department of Educational Foundations and one lecturer from the Measurement and Evaluation option of the Department of Science Education, all in Ebonyi State University Abakaliki. The reliability measures of internal consistency using the Cronbach Alpha which yielded an overall reliability index of 0.90. Mean and standard deviation were used to answer the research questions, while a t-test of the independent sample was used to test the hypotheses formulated for the study at a 0.05 level of significance. The finding of the study revealed that prioritizing financial allocation according to school needs, ensuring that all funds are saved in school account, among others were the financial management strategies of principals in economic recession for administration of secondary schools in Ebonyi State. The implication of this finding is that financial resource is scarce hence the principals must be able to budget and utilize the accrued funds judiciously based on the prioritize needs of the school to avoid wastage of school fund through reckless spending on irrelevant activities. The study recommended that financial organisations like Banks, Boards of Revenue should be periodically imitated in conferences or seminars to educate the principals and other stakeholders in secondary schools on the financial management coping strategies needed in the period of economic recession for administration of secondary schools in Ebonyi State.