MANAGERIAL COMPETENCIES OF PRINCIPALS OF FEDERAL GOVERNMENT COLLEGES IN NORTH CENTRAL, NIGERIA

ABSTRACT

Federal Government Colleges were established as model schools with world class standard that will set a pace for other states and private secondary schools in Nigeria to emulate and a pride for the Nation. Unfortunately the reverse seemed to be the case in most schools because the Principals in North Central Nigeria seems not to be measuring up to expectations due to poor performances of the students in external examinations, inadequate maintenance of structures and facilities in the schools, poor motivation of staff for capacity development among others. It becomes necessary to investigate the extent to which school principals were competent in the management of Federal Government Colleges in North Central, Nigeria. Five research questions and five null hypotheses guided this study. Descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. The total population for the study was 2060. A sample of 412 respondents representing 20% of the total population of 2060, which were made up of 24 principals, 72 vice-principals and 316 teachers drawn from the total number of 1966 teachers using random sampling technique were used. A 50-item structured competency questionnaire was developed by the researcher for the study. Three experts validated the instrument. The data collected were analyzed using mean and standard deviation to answer the research questions, while the Analyses of Variance (ANOVA) statistics was used for testing the five null hypotheses. The overall findings of the study revealed that, to a high extent the principals were competent in; financial management and school community relationship. To a low extent the principals were competent in supervision of instruction; personnel management and school plant maintenance. It was recommended that Federal Ministry of Education should organize regular training such as conferences, seminars and in-service training to empower principals of Federal Government Colleges on skills that would make them competent in all the areas of school management where they are competent to a low extent for efficiency. Federal Ministry of Education should set up a monitoring committee apart from federal evaluators that will from time to time supervise principal’s activities to make sure that they are competent in school management to a high extent. The Federal Ministry of Education should organize competency examination to the principals before confirming them to the managerial positions. This will enhance principals’ competency in skills acquisition to a high extent and will make Federal Government Colleges to be model secondary schools worthy of emulation by other secondary schools in Nigeria.