Description
stakeholders in education in Nakuru County have expressed great concern over high levels
of students’ on conformity to school rules. Student conformity to school rules is critical to
achievement of academic goals. This study sought to assess the relationship between principals’
transactional leadership style and students’ conformity to school rules in public secondary schools in
Nakuru County, Kenya. The objective of the study was to determine the relationship between
principals’ Transactional leadership style and students’ conformity to rules in Public Secondary
Schools in Nakuru County, Kenya. The study was underpinned on the Social Control Theory by
Hirschi (1969). The study adopted a correlational research design. The target population was 338
Principals, 338 Deputy Principals, 3426 teachers in 338 public secondary schools in Nakuru County.
Stratified random sampling was used to select 100 schools. Purposive sampling was used to select
100 Principals, 34 Deputy Principals and 346 teachers. Questionnaires were used to collect data
from Principals, teachers and students while interviews were used to collect data from Deputy
Principals. Test – retest reliability returned a coefficient above 0.70 indicating that the instruments
were reliable. The finding revealed that there was evidence of a positive relationship between
transactional leadership style and students’ conformity to rules(r=0.410; p=0.000).This implies that
when transactional leadership style was used by principals it enhances students’ conformity to school
rules. It was concluded that principals’ transactional leadership style significantly related to students’
conformity to school rules. Therefore, it is important for school principals to provide rewards and
recognition constantly to students who conform to school rules. in handling students’ misconduct
by using transactional leadership style though use of rewards to the students who conform and
withdrawal of privileges or use of punishment for those who do not conform to school rules.
Key words: Transactional, leadership, style, Conformity, school, Rules
