Abstract:
The purpose of this study was to explore the influence of servant leadership style
of head teachers on the teachers’ job satisfaction in Primary Christian schools of
Gasabo district-Rwanda. Specific objectives of this study were; (i) To investigate
head teachers’ servant leadership practices in Christian primary schools in Gasabo
district, (ii) To evaluate the level of teachers’ job satisfaction in Christian Primary
schools of Gasabo district and (iii) To establish the relationship between head
teachers’ servant leadership practices and teachers’ job satisfaction in Christian
primary schools in Gasabo district.
It has been proved through research that leadership can influence teacher job
satisfaction either positively or negatively. Among many leadership styles,
servant leadership is well suited for Christian schools. This leadership style
primarily focuses on serving and growing people. The study used Green Leaf’s
(1970, 1999, 2012) 10 servant leadership principles as the independent variables
and Job satisfaction indicators as the dependent variables. 41 schools were
selected from Gasabo district to take part in this study and 299 teachers were the
participants. Servant leadership questionnaires were given to the teachers to
assess their leaders’ level of servant leadership practices, and then a job
satisfaction questionnaire was also given to the teachers to do a self-assessment of
their level of job satisfaction due to servant leadership practices.
Results from this study supported the previous research findings that servant
leadership does influence teacher job satisfaction. This may have implications
that school leadership might consider to use servant leadership style in order to
better serve their teachers.
