A study to explore the bases of power of school district chief executive officers in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

• Main Author: Jacobs, Willis C.
• Format: Thesis
• Language: unknown
• Published: University of Ottawa (Canada) 1992
• Subjects: Education; Administration; Newfoundland
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10393/7854; https://doi.org/10.20381/ruor-7008

This study examines the power bases of school district chief executive officers using a modified version of a conceptual framework of power proposed by French and Raven (1959). Their bases or sources of power are coercive, reward, legitimate, expert and referent. These five bases are extended to include information power and connection power. Significant differences exist among the three self-perceived power profiles, and among the perception-of-other power profiles for five of the independent variables. In the self-perceived power profiles, superintendents perceive themselves to use significantly more coercive power in their working relationships with school principals. In the perception-of-other power profiles, significant differences are found when data are classified according to (i) superintendents' years of experience in their current positions, (ii) age of subordinate personnel, (iii) age of superintendents, (iv) size of school districts, and (v) career-bound and place-bound superintendents who have 10 years or less experience. No significant differences exist for the independent variables (i) type of subordinate personnel, (ii) experience of subordinate personnel, (iii) gender of subordinate personnel, (iv) distance from central office, and (v) type of school district (Catholic or Integrated). No significant differences exist among the three self/other power profiles that compare the superintendent's self-perception with the perceptions of the three subordinate groups. The more experienced superintendents receive a significantly lower rating for legitimate power. The youngest superintendents receive a significantly lower rating for the information power, the older superintendents receive a significantly lower rating for the legitimate power, and the medium age superintendents in comparison to the younger receive a significantly lower rating for expert power. The oldest subordinates perceive superintendents to have significantly more legitimate power but significantly less referent power. Superintendents in the larger districts are perceived to use significantly less connection power and significantly more legitimate power. When district size is based on the number of schools, superintendents in the larger districts use significantly less connection power and significantly more expert power. For the perceived power bases of career-bound and place-bound superintendents with 10 years or less experience, the career-bound superintendents use significantly more coercive power. Expert and legitimate power bases always receive ratings that are higher than any of the other five power bases; the three intermediate bases are information, referent and reward power; and coercive and connection power always receive the lowest ratings. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)