The Principal's Role in Recognizing Teacher Performance and Teachers' Job Satisfaction in Public Secondary Schools in Bungoma South Sub-County, Kenya

: As part of their managerial assignments, Principals are expected to play a central role in enhancing teacher job satisfaction so as to achieve the desired results. The study sought to establish the principal’s role in recognition of teachers’ performance and teachers’ job satisfaction in public secondary schools in Bungoma South Sub-county. The study adopted a descriptive survey research design. The target population was 969 respondents and 61 public secondary schools in Bungoma South sub-county. Simple random sampling technique was used to draw a sample of 272 teachers and 19 principals. Self-administered questionnaires for Principals and teachers were used to collect data. Experts in the Department of Educational Planning and Management at Kibabii University ascertained content validity of the research instruments. Piloting of the instruments was conducted in two schools in the neighbouring sub-county that did not participate in the actual study. Test retest was used to ascertain the reliability of study instruments. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics which included mean, t-tests, range and standard deviation and inferential statistics which included person regression coefficient. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 26 was used for data analysis. The findings were presented in tables, figures and thematic discussions. The study revealed that there was a strong positive correlation between principal recognizing the value of teacher’s hard work and teachers job satisfaction levels [r=0.657, p<0.05]. Meanwhile, principal recognizing teachers hard work, principal praising teachers for good performance and principal providing financial benefits for good performance had statistically significant positive effect on teacher job satisfaction levels [ β=0.204, p<0.05), (β=0.147, p<0.05) and ( β= 0.196. p<0.05) respectively.


Introduction
Relevant studies indicate that the most common problem in most learning institutions currently is lack of inclusion of recognition as a component of compensation (Fulton & Leech, 2014).Teachers' recognition allows the individuals to know and understand that their work is valued and appreciated, provides a sense of ownership and belongingness, improves morale, enhances loyalty and increases teachers' retention rate in the institution.

Suggested Citation
Teachers' recognition is viewed as one of the key dependent variables of teachers' job satisfaction because it is understood to have a direct impact on learners.A positive impact is felt when one feels valued, satisfied and more engaged in an organization.This definitely trickle down to learners hence boosting their performance.Muhamad & Nawaz (2017) carried out a study in commercial banks to prove the implications of numerous rewards in particular promotion, pay and recognition among the bankers of all age groups on job satisfaction.Questionnaires and review of past literature were used to collect data.The target population was 358 employees.The study revealed that recognition exhibited a strong correlation with job satisfaction.The current study was different from the previous one in such a way that current one was conducted among secondary school teachers whereas the previous one was conducted among bankers which had different environments.Mabaso & Dlamin (2018) carried out a study in South Africa on total rewards versus organizational commitment in higher education institutions.Semi-structured questionnaires were used to collect data with a target population of 279 participants.The study established a positive correlation between rewards and organizational commitment.There was a contextual gap since the study was done in South Africa but the current study was done in Kenya among secondary school teachers.Benolial & Barth (2017) did research in Israel to study the influence of participative leaders on teachers' outcomes of job satisfaction and burnout.A survey collected data from a sample of 367 teachers in Israel.It was found that teachers who participate in pedagogical and organizational decisions are more satisfied, and they have become committed teachers with feelings of empowerment.
The study also revealed that participative leadership is a valuable management practice in Western societies, primarily multi-cultural societies.However, the researchers believe that this situation may be different in Eastern societies.In this process, flexible leadership qualities of principals are essential to understand the school cultural values when getting the teachers for the decision-making process.The study used survey as a method of data collection with a sample of 367 whereas the current study used questionnaires with a sample of 291.
Musambi & Juma (2020) conducted a research on how promotion impacts on job satisfaction of workers in Kakamega county government.The study targeted 381 employees who were working in the revenue department and data was collected using questionnaires.
Data was analysed using percentages and statistical results tabulated for easy interpretations.The study established a significant positive correlation between promotion and job satisfaction.The study differed from the previous one since it used a sample of 291 in Bungoma County.
The study of Thevanes & Jathurika (2021) suggested that happiness is also a factor that significantly increases job satisfaction.Employee happiness and job satisfaction have been found to have a significant and positive relationship.This was different from the current study which dealt which general principal recognition of teacher performance.
Fozia & Sabir (2016) investigated the impact of teachers' financial compensation on their job satisfaction at higher secondary level in both public and private sectors of Islamabad.The study revealed that when teachers feel there is an opportunity for recognition, decision power about their work, planning of task, receive helpful suggestion and guidance from their supervisor then they were more satisfied.The compensation practices and job satisfaction were found to be highly correlated with each other.In Fozia & Sabir (2016), male and female teachers had no significant difference as well as there is no significant difference between teachers who have different qualification and age groups while teachers who have different teaching experiences have significant difference towards job satisfaction.There was a contextual gap since the two studies were conducted in different countries.Arokiasamy, Tat, & Abdullah (2018) conducted a study on reward system versus job satisfaction among academic staffs in private colleges in Malaysia.Primary data was collected by a closedended questionnaires.The findings concluded that compensation, motivation and promotion had a significant effect on job satisfaction.There was a contextual gap since the two studies were done in different countries and more so the current study was conducted among secondary school teachers in public schools whereas the previous study was conducted among academic staffs in private colleges.

Research Design
The study used a descriptive survey design on the principal's role in teachers' job satisfaction in Bungoma South Sub-County.Mugenda & Mugenda (2003) noted that surveys are the excellent vehicles for the measurement of characteristics of large population.The design was appropriate because it helped the researcher to obtain information that describes phenomenon by asking individual teachers and principals about their perceptions, attitudes, behavior or values related to teachers' job satisfaction.The survey design in this study adopted the descriptive research model which aimed at discussing the principal's role on teachers' job satisfaction.

The Study Area
The study was conducted in public secondary schools in Bungoma South Sub-County.Bungoma South Sub-County is one of the 10 sub-counties in Bungoma County in western region on an area of 318.8 km2.The other subcounties are Bumula, Kabuchai, Sirisia, Kimilili, Mt.Elgon, Tongaren, Webuye East, Webuye West and Cheptais.The main physical feature in the sub-county is Sang'alo hills with 'sikele sia mulia' cultural site.
The main industry in the sub-County is Nzoia Sugar Company.The sub-county has arable land for crop production with food crops including maize, beans, sweet potatoes, bananas, finger millet and assorted vegetables and the main cash crops are sugarcane and coffee.The sub-county is mainly inhabited by Bukusu, Tachoni, Batura of Luhya community and other Kenyan communities.It experiences two rainy seasons, long rains between March to July and short rains between August to October with the annual temperature varying between 0-320C.It is traversed by the Mombasa-Nairobi-Eldoret-Webuye-Malaba highway which is a major link for trade and commerce.
It is prone to climate related disasters like lightening effects, floods and landslides which leads to destruction of schools, houses, bridges and loss of lives.It hosts the county education offices and major businesses like banks and supermarkets.It has a total of 61 public secondary schools, 92 public primary schools and ECDE centres, one public technical college and one public and only university in the county.Mugenda & Mugenda (2003) define a sample as a group obtained from the accessible population.They observe that 30% of the target population is a good representation thus for a population of 908 teachers, according to the table, 272 teachers are recommended to be appropriate while for a population of 61 principals, 19 is appropriate, refer to Table 1.  ; varb1, varb2, varb3, varb4, varb5, varb6, varb7, varb8, varb9 and varb10.

Sampling Procedure and Sample Size
Multiple regression also allowed that study to determine the overall fit (variance explained) of the model relative to the contribution of each of the ten predictors to the total variance explained.
For instance, the study sought to establish how much of the variation in teachers' job satisfaction (VarE) can be explained by principal recognizes teachers hard work (Varb1) and principal praises teachers for good performance (Varb2 as a whole but also the relative contribution of each independent variable in explaining the variance. Table 2, Model 1 shows that variable tAGE (teachers age) had a positive effect on teacher's satisfaction with the teaching job (β=0.098,Std.Error=0.007*;p<0.05).This could be interpreted to mean that a one-unit increase in the age of the teacher in years would lead to 0.098 increase in the teacher's job satisfaction.In other words, as the teacher became older, he or she was likely to become more satisfied with the teaching job.This contradicted with the study by Fozia and Sabir (2016).

Conclusion
Based on the findings of the study, it can be concluded that the school Principal's role in recognition of teachers' performance predicted teacher's job satisfaction.

Table 2 . Regression Models for Effects Principal's Role in Recognition of Teacher Performance and Teachers Job Satisfaction Note
: Obs.=Observation, Std.Errors in parenthesis ()

Table 2 ,
Muhamad and Nawaz (2017)t the eleven variables that were included in the model, and only six predicted the variation in teachers' job satisfaction.The six variables combined accounted for 76.6 % [Adjusted R 2 = 0.766] of teachers' job satisfaction.This agreed with the findings byMuhamad and Nawaz (2017)that recognition has a strong correlation with job satisfaction.However, the six variables under the Principal role in recognition of teacher's performance are seen to account for 71.1% of the variation in teacher's job satisfaction.Model 4 suggests that when as long as the Principal is not involved in recognizing teachers' good performance, on a scale of 1-5, where 1= extremely dissatisfied and 5= extremely satisfied, teachers job satisfaction was predicted to remain at α = 1.661From the results presented in Model 4 under Table2, the study went further to develop a regression equation model: In Model 4, all the three covariates (tAGE, tLEN and tCAT) and the eight independent variables that had exhibited statistically significant correlation with the outcome variables are now brought into the model.In this model, the results show that only four variables were statistically significant at p< 0.05[varb1, β=0.204,Std.Error= 0.052; varb2,  β=0.147,Std.Error= 0.065; varb3, β=0.196Std.Error= 0.069 and Var b10, β=0.257,Std.Error=0.062].The results presented in