The Administrator’s Views on Critical Skills and Knowledge Affecting School’s Education Quality

Abstract

          The purposes of this research aimed to identify the school administrator’s views on necessary skills and knowledge and to determine which of these skills and knowledge have an impact on the school’s education quality.The research framework is based on the documentary study concerning the necessary skills and knowledge for basic education school administrator and UNICEF’s concept on school’s education quality. Five school principals were also interviewed to gather insight information regarding the skills and knowledge for school administrator. The research sample included 379 school administrators of primary and  secondary schools under the Office of Basic Education Commission, Thailand.The instruments of the research were a semi-structuredinterview and a opinionnaire, which was tested for content validity and reliability by Cronbach’s alpha coefficient, which was 0.979; the opinionnaire was then sent to primary and secondary school administrators across the country. The statistics used to analyze the collected data were frequency, percentage, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, exploratory factor analysis, stepwise multiple regression analysis, and content analysis.The research findings revealed that the five critical skills for the school administrators comprised talent management skills, social intelligence skills, self-management skills, intellectual and communication skills, technology and information skills.  As for the three critical knowledges for school administrator were knowledge in educational administration, knowledge in school administration, and knowledge in curriculum and research. The skills and knowledge for school administrator affected the education quality at .05 level of statistical significance. These skills and knowledge, which have an impact on the school’s education quality, were knowledge in educational administration, knowledge in school administration and conceptual and communication skills.