The intersection where teachers’ commitment, school administrators’ leadership behavior, and student academic performance converge is frequently explored and investigated in academic studies. Doing so is necessary in order to improve the quality of education. We must find ways to make teaching and learning more effective and efficient.

In my paper published recently, I revisited that intersection.  I examined the relationships between the said variables. In the said study, I hypothesized that a correlation exists between teachers’ commitment and leadership behavior, teachers’ commitment and academic performance of students, and leadership behavior and academic performance of students.

  Studies conducted on students’ performance in the classroom examined or evaluated how certain factors or variables related to school, teachers, school administrators, or students and their environment affect academic achievement. Some studies focus only on one variable, and some combine two or more. While numerous variables could potentially affect students’ academic performance as presented in various studies, mine focused only on constructs that are perceived to affect students’ academic performance directly, namely, teachers’ commitment (to their work and organization) and the leadership behavior of school administrators.

In the investigation I conducted, the aforementioned constructs were defined or referred to as follows: academic performance as the results of standardized tests students took in the following subject areas: math, science, and English; teachers’ commitment as their dedication and attachment to their profession and their loyalty to their school as an organization; leadership as a process in which an individual influences a group to achieve and commit to a common goal. Teachers’ commitment is categorized into commitment to job and commitment to organization and leadership behavior into consideration (people-oriented) and initiating structure (task-oriented).

We say that teachers play the most crucial role in student achievement, and it is unfortunate that teachers usually take the blame when students fail to meet academic expectations. It is almost impossible for teachers to escape from the notion that “when students did not learn, the teacher did not teach.” But if teachers are held responsible when students are not performing well, should somebody take responsibility when teachers are not teaching the way they should, thus resulting in poor academic performance on the part of the students? This is where leadership behavior comes into focus. School leaders’ primary duty is to inspire and motivate teachers to work towards improving students’ academic performance.

Academic performance is the result of learning produced by the student and prompted by the activities of teachers. How well the students perform academically depends on how committed the teachers are to their chosen profession. On the other hand, whatever activities teachers do in a school are supposedly imposed and overseen by the school administrator. Thus, the level of commitment to job and organization the teachers manifest hinges on their supervisors’ leadership behavior. Student learning is affected by teaching and teaching by management and supervision performed by school leaders.

My study yielded some surprising results.

The overall computed mean for teachers’ commitment indicates that the teachers who participated in my study are committed to both their jobs and organization, although their commitment to their jobs is higher than their commitment to their organizations. As regards leadership behavior, most of the school administrators, as perceived by the teacher-respondents, exhibit behaviors attributed to structured leadership. This implies that the leaders supervising them are high in initiating structure but low in consideration. The results divulge that the correlation between both aspects of teachers’ commitment and the initiating structure dimension of leadership behavior is positive. With the consideration dimension, the correlation is negative. This inverse relationship implies that the less committed teachers to their job and organization become when the heads of their schools manifest a more people-oriented behavior than task-oriented.

We expect that teachers will be more committed to their job and organization if they are supervised by people-oriented leaders and less inspired when they are led by task-oriented school administrators. One probable reason for teachers becoming more committed to their job and organization when the school leader is task-oriented is clarity. Leaders who are strong in initiating structure are arguably more precise and specific with their expectations and goals than their people-oriented counterparts. In this study, the teacher-respondents may happen to prefer leaders who are task-oriented more than those who are people-oriented. The teachers respond more positively to a structured style of leadership.

However, as previously articulated, being task-oriented does not necessarily mean that the leaders are not concerned about the well-being of those they lead. As the findings of this study have shown, the teachers perceive the school managers as “dynamic,” which means that they scored above average in both dimensions of leadership behavior only that they manifest more strongly in the leadership behavior initiating structure. Scoring above average in both dimensions indicates flexibility for the school leaders. They were able to adapt their strategies and approaches based on the needs and circumstances, which is crucial in helping maintain or enhance teacher commitment. Thus, in this study, teachers were found to be committed to both their job and organization.

The correlation analysis for the students’ academic performance was also unexpected. It is only with the student’s performance in math, not in science and in English, that teachers’ commitment is correlated. And the correlation is negative. Most similar studies’ findings show a positive correlation between students’ academic performance and teachers’ commitment. Rarely was in studies that a negative correlation between teachers’ commitment and student performance was shown. That negative relationship was established in this study. However, the size of the (negative) correlation coefficient between the abovementioned variables is considered negligible.

Despite the rarity of seeing a negative correlation between teacher commitment and students’ academic performance, its occurrence is still disconcerting. It is counterintuitive to find that when teachers show commitment to their job, students’ academic performance suffers. What could be the reason?

Certain circumstances or strategies committed teachers apply could negatively impact students’ academic performance. Teachers could overly commit to academic undertakings and high standards that inadvertently create excessive pressure and stress for students, possibly leading to burnout and anxiety. Such could result in reduced performance on the part of the students. Additionally, when teachers become overly committed, they may fail to strike a balance between work and life. Such may lead to them experiencing burnout, consequently diminishing their ability to deliver quality instruction and engage students more productively.

The next set of findings may also be considered surprising.

Students’ performance in all subject areas is negatively correlated with leadership behavior-initiating structure and has no significant relationship with leadership behavior consideration.  A negative correlation exists between students’ academic performance in math, science, and English and school administrators’ initiating structure leadership behavior. Although the size of the (negative) correlation coefficient is considered negligible also, it is interesting to note that while the initiating structure dimension of leadership behavior is positively correlated to teacher commitment, it is the other way around with the academic performance of students and not only in one subject area but all. One possible reason for such an inverse relationship is that the task-oriented approach of school leaders can indirectly put too much burden on students, thus negatively impacting their performance. They can overly emphasize strict academic goals that could create high-stress environments in the schools they supervise. It may have positively impacted teacher commitment but negatively affected the students’ performance. The academic pressure created when students are forced to adhere to the strict standards that task-oriented heads of schools set could negatively impact their well-being. They may experience burnout, which could affect their academic performance.

Additionally, when school heads are task-oriented, they tend to focus more on curricular activities and less on non-academic ones. Extracurricular activities are known to benefit students. They can positively impact the students’ academic performance, mental health, and well-being. The “all work and no (or less) play” that task-oriented heads of schools tend to implement may not be helping students perform better academically.