The Role of School Leaders in Facilitating Continuous Professional Development to Empower Teachers in Private Schools in Dubai

Abstract

Building a collaborative culture and empowering schoolteachers; could have a significant positive impact on the quality of learning and promote the progress of the school education in the UAE. Sharing leadership by the heads with schoolteachers permits teachers to become highly responsible, leading to higher fecundity and impacting students' achievement. School teachers in the recent decade regularly upgraded their skills, attitude, and knowledge to meet the demands of 21st-Century learners. Education reforms have generated an urgent need for a stronger emphasis on developing strong leadership skills for promoting well-qualified teaching for students and the progress of school education in Dubai. The study illustrated the role of school leaders in CPD to empower schoolteachers in Dubai through a mixed-method approach using a semi-structured questionnaire. The study enunciated quantitative and qualitative method analysis by examining the impact of school leadership and identifying the school leadership's role in enhancing teachers' performance. The study examined the behaviours of leadership aid in the development and promotion of positive capabilities of teachers and a positive ethical learning environment in Private Schools in Dubai. It obtained the respondents through a purposive sampling technique consisting of School teachers, middle leaders, SEND specialists and two principals working in different schools in Dubai. The observations of the responses in quantitative and qualitative approaches were made to reflect the changing paradigm in leadership competencies to handle the issues of teachers and promote professional development. The outcomes of quantitative assessment by One-ANOVA analysis explicated that the leadership role had significant impacts on the professional empowerment of teachers through CPD implementation. The correlation test enunciated a stronger correlation between the teacher's competencies and leadership role for the school's progress and student quality learning. The inferences of the qualitative approach imply that the impact of leadership attributes paves the way to enhance the professional development of the teachers, concerning staff support, CPD organisation, pedagogy practices improvisation, innovations, and rectifying the aspects of teaching. The study commenced by insisting that teachers' competencies changes with CPD implementation provide them with sufficient avenues to upgrade quality teaching practices by monitoring and timely support through the vital role of leadership.