WORK-RELATED HAZARDS ENCOUNTERED BY PRINCIPALS IN ENFORCING DISCIPLINE IN PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN ORLU EDUCATION OF IMO STATE.

ABSTRACT

School principals encounter series of hazards while performing their tasks especially in instilling and maintaining discipline in schools. This study investigates work-related hazards encountered by principals in enforcing discipline in public secondary schools in Orlu education zone of Imo state. The descriptive survey design was adopted to examine the work-related hazards which range from loss of lives, loss of properties, and loss of jobs to suffering from some health challenges and ways of curbing them. Five research questions were raised and answered while three hypotheses were formulated and tested at 0.05 level of significance. The entire population of 106 school principals in all the 106 public secondary schools in Orlu education zone of Imo State were sampled. A 46 item questionnaire was the instrument used for data collection. The data were analyzed using frequency counts for the moderator variables, the mean and standard deviation for research questions and hypotheses tested using the t-test and one way ANOVA. The findings of the study indicated that the male principals are more affected than their female colleagues irrespective of school location and years of job experience. The identified remedies among others include legislation for empowering of school principals to use corporal punishment, letters of undertaking by parents and students and occasional in-service training and workshops for school principals. The findings have important implications on the goals of education. The researcher recommended that both the government agencies, the school principals, the parents, students and the host-communities have serious part to play to stamp out these work-related hazards encountered by school principals.