TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP QUALITIES OF FLORIDA COMMUNITY COLLEGE ...

173 Pages·2005·1.18 MB·English

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP QUALITIES OF FLORIDA COMMUNITY
COLLEGE STUDENT GOVERNMENT ADVISORS

by

THOMAS KENNARD RATH
B.A. Binghamton University, 1988
M.S. College Misericordia, 1999

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of Doctor of Education
in the Department of Educational Research,
Technology and Leadership
in the College of Education
at the University of Central Florida
Orlando, Florida

Fall Term
2005

Major Professor: Jess House
© 2005 Thomas K. Rath

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ABSTRACT
College student government organizations (SGOs) have the important
responsibility for achievement of purposes that serve students and the college
community. They are also the student voice in higher education governance. Effective
student leadership is vital to the effective fulfillment of these purposes, as is the role of
the student government advisor in ensuring the success of student leadership and
leadership development. Transformational leadership (Bass, 1985) is seen as a way of
reaching higher levels of leadership effectiveness and organizational performance, and it
has been advanced for use in SGOs.
This study examined the extent to which community college student government
advisors who exhibited transformational leadership qualities had an influence on the
organizational outcomes of community college student governments. Several research
questions were formulated to guide this examination. Surveys which included an
instrument to measure the effectiveness of reaching organizational outcomes and the
Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire for Research (MLQ 5X) (Bass & Avolio, 1995,
2000) were given to Florida community college student government executive board
members and their respective student government advisors. Anticipated findings included
increased levels of organizational outcomes in those community college SGOs in which
advisors exhibit greater levels of transformational leadership qualities.

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Analysis of the data yielded advisor and student government member
demographics, and a strong level of fulfillment of organizational outcomes. Statistically
significant positive correlations were found between student reported transformational
leadership qualities of advisors and student ratings of achievement and importance of
organizational outcomes. A statistically significant correlation was also found between
student ratings of importance of organizational outcomes and student ratings of the
achievement of organizational outcomes. This indicates the existence of a relationship
between the transformational leadership qualities of Florida community college student
government advisors and the perceived importance and achievement of student
government organizational outcomes. Secondary results were also given.
Results of this study suggest that Florida community college student government
advisors who exhibited higher levels of transformational leadership qualities engendered
higher levels of organizational outcomes in Florida community college student
governments. Implications were discussed for the study findings, and recommendations
for future research were made.

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Dedicated to the memory and ongoing presence of my beloved friend, Freud.
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
All due credit goes to my dissertation chair, Dr. Jess House, for his guidance and
encouragement throughout these interesting, calamitous, challenging, yet fulfilling days.
Thanks also to my dissertation committee, Dr. Murray, Dr. Rivers, and Dr. Tubbs for
their supportive partnership in this process, and to the student government leaders and
advisors of Florida’s community colleges. Much unadulterated appreciation and thanks to
the members of Cohort III, who were invaluable to renewing my faith in community and
friendship, and to my coworkers at Edison College, who sacrificed for me in many ways.
Lastly, I wish to express gratitude to my parents, Lisle and Jean, and my friend Kim, for
without them, this and many other things good in life would not be possible.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF TABLES............................................................................................................. xi
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION................................................................................. 1
Introduction..................................................................................................................... 1
Problem Statement .......................................................................................................... 2
Limitations and Delimitations......................................................................................... 3
Definition of Terms......................................................................................................... 4
Assumptions.................................................................................................................... 5
Significance of the Study................................................................................................ 6
Conceptual Framework................................................................................................... 6
College Student Governments .................................................................................... 6
Leadership Theory ...................................................................................................... 8
Transformational Leadership ...................................................................................... 9
Methodology................................................................................................................. 13
Research Type........................................................................................................... 13
Population and Sample ............................................................................................. 14
Instrumentation and Other Sources of Data.............................................................. 14
Research Questions................................................................................................... 15
Data Collection ......................................................................................................... 16
Anticipated Findings..................................................................................................... 17
Justification for the Research........................................................................................ 17
Summary ....................................................................................................................... 18
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CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................... 20
Introduction................................................................................................................... 20
College Student Governments ...................................................................................... 21
Student Government Advising.................................................................................. 24
Organizational Outcomes in College Student Government...................................... 26
Transformational Leadership ........................................................................................ 28
Components of Transformational and Transactional Leadership............................. 29
Idealized Influence (Attributed and Behavioral) .................................................. 29
Inspirational Motivation........................................................................................ 30
Intellectual Stimulation......................................................................................... 30
Individualized Consideration ................................................................................ 31
Contingent Reward ............................................................................................... 32
Management-by-Exception (Active) .................................................................... 32
Management-by-Exception (Passive) ................................................................... 32
Laissez-Faire Leadership ...................................................................................... 33
Research on Transformational Leadership ............................................................... 34
Leadership and Student Development .......................................................................... 37
Research on Student Leaders .................................................................................... 40
Summary ....................................................................................................................... 41
CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY ......................................................................... 45
Statement of the Problem.............................................................................................. 46
Population and Sample ................................................................................................. 47
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Instrumentation ............................................................................................................. 48
Instrument Reliability and Validity .............................................................................. 51
Data Collection ............................................................................................................. 53
Data Analysis ................................................................................................................ 53
Summary ....................................................................................................................... 54
CHAPTER FOUR: DATA ANALYSIS........................................................................... 56
Population and Sample ................................................................................................. 56
Research Questions....................................................................................................... 57
Research Question 1 ................................................................................................. 58
Research Question 2 ................................................................................................. 60
Research Question 3 ................................................................................................. 69
Research Question 4 ................................................................................................. 75
Research Question 5 ................................................................................................. 80
Research Question 6 ................................................................................................. 83
Secondary Findings....................................................................................................... 86
Qualitative Data ............................................................................................................ 92
Summary ....................................................................................................................... 93
CHAPTER FIVE: Discussion of fIndings and Recommendations................................... 97
Review .......................................................................................................................... 97
Conceptual Framework................................................................................................. 98
College Student Governments .................................................................................. 98
Transformational leadership ..................................................................................... 99
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Summary of Results.................................................................................................... 102
Research Question 1 ............................................................................................... 102
Research Question 2 ............................................................................................... 103
Research Question 3 ............................................................................................... 106
Research Question 4 ............................................................................................... 109
Research Question 5 ............................................................................................... 113
Research Question 6 ............................................................................................... 113
Secondary Findings..................................................................................................... 115
Implications................................................................................................................. 119
Recommendations for Further Research..................................................................... 121
APPENDIX A: ADVISOR SURVEY............................................................................ 123
APPENDIX B: STUDENT SURVEY............................................................................ 130
APPENDIX C: STUDENT QUALITATIVE DATA..................................................... 137
APPENDIX D: ADVISOR QUALITATIVE DATA..................................................... 146
APPENDIX E: IRB APPROVAL FORM ...................................................................... 149
APPENDIX F: COPYRIGHT PERMISSION LETTER................................................ 152
LIST OF REFERENCES................................................................................................ 154
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