Efficacy beliefs of high school managers and teachers in São Paulo

Author(s)

Daniela Couto Guerreiro Casanova

• Document type: Doctoral Thesis
• Press: Campinas, SP.
• Institution: Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Faculdade de Educação
• Defense date: 2013-09-27

Examining board members

Roberta Gurgel Azzi; José Aloyseo Bzuneck; Roberto Tadeu Iaochite; Selma de Cássia Martinelli; Soely Aparecida Jorge Polydoro

• Advisor: Roberta Gurgel Azzi

Abstract

The personal and collective efficacy beliefs of school managers and teachers have been associated with school success. These beliefs, based on the social cognitive theory, refer to the judgments of people regarding their own capacities or the collective capacities of the groups they are a part of. In the school context, amongst other domains, research has been dedicated to investigate the self-efficacy of school managers, teachers and the school collective efficacy beliefs. These verified that those beliefs help school managers and teachers to deal with the social adversities in which schools are imbedded and promote better instructional conditions, which could contribute to students' achievement. This research has as a hypothesis that personal and collective efficacy beliefs of school managers and teachers contribute to explain high school IDESP from the São Paulo State public education system. As general objective, this research is dedicated to identify and analyze the explanatory relationship between school manager's selfefficacy beliefs, teachers' self-efficacy beliefs and school collective efficacy in relation to IDESP from the school researches, considering the contributions of personal variables, teaching activities variables and contextual variables. The sample was composed by 21 school managers and 180 teachers from 11 public schools of the São Paulo State educational system, located in the cities of São Bernardo do Campo and São Caetano do Sul. The data was collected during the pedagogical meeting by using the Participant Characterization Questionnaire, the School Characterization Questionnaire, the School Managers Questionnaire, the Teachers Beliefs Scale and the School Collective Beliefs Scale. Also, The State of São Paulo's Education Development Index- IDESP - and the State of Sao Paulo at Risk Index- IPVS - related to the participants schools were used. The data were analyzed by descriptive and comparative statistics and by analysis of univariate and multivariate linear regression, using the SAS program, version 9.2. The main verified results were: (1) teacher's formation contributes to explain teacher's self-efficacy and the school's collective efficacy; (2) teacher self-efficacy and the infrastructure could be an explanatory variable of the IDESP when considered per se; (3) the managers self-efficacy , the school collective efficacy and the IPVS together are explanatory variables of the IDESP. The school manager's self-efficacy and the school collective efficacy beliefs show positive contributions and they are bigger than the IPVS negative contribution. These results show that: strong efficacy beliefs can minimize the social vulnerability and inadequate infrastructure effect on the index score on the IDESP; the formation curricula and structure require the development of efficacy beliefs partnered with necessary abilities to teaching. Those and other results are discussed and articulated in the school context, in a way to enable knowledge which can contribute to rethink the aspects involved in school tasks. (AU)