The Relationship of Principals’ Distributive Leadership towards Professional Learning Community Practices in Gombak District (Malaysia) Secondary Schools

Abstract

Leadership in education state that it is a key factor in the development of a school. Thus, leadership in education is now more focused on distributive leadership which emphasizes on how to form a culture of leadership responsibility among leaders to assist in the implementation of professional learning community practices. The local Professional Learning Community is described as a local community that forms a culture that shows all school children learn and become a learner. The study aims to identify the relationship of principals' distributive leadership towards professional learning community practices in Gombak district secondary schools. The population of the study is 3189 teachers that working in secondary schools across Gombak district. From the said population, 346 teachers are chosen as the research sample. The research instrument used was a questionnaire and the results were analysed through the SPSS. The research finding highlighted that the level of distributive leadership practices of principals in schools were at high level and findings also show that the level of professional learning community practice among teachers in schools also is at high level as well. Research outcome also found that there is a very strong and significant a relationship between head teacher distributive leadership and professional learning community practices among school teachers. Findings can also be used as a basic guide by the district education and state education department as one of the things that can be shared with leaders or other principals during the monthly meeting. Future researcher can expand their finding to primary schools, or focus on specific schools such as cluster schools or highperforming schools and study can also be extended to Universities as well as colleges or should also be extended from one district to state and even to several specific states to the whole of Malaysia.