Date
4-17-2024
Department
Rawlings School of Divinity
Degree
Doctor of Education in Christian Leadership (EdD)
Chair
Mary Lowe
Keywords
Christian, academic leaders, self-care, stress, burnout, middle school, coping strategies
Disciplines
Christianity | Educational Leadership
Recommended Citation
Purchase, Rhonda Grider, "Burnout Prevention in Christian Public and Private Middle School Leaders: A Qualitative Study" (2024). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 5378.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/5378
Abstract
There is a momentous problem in academic settings today regarding stress and burnout among academic school leaders (Francis et al., 2017). The focus of this study was to examine the prevention of professional stress in the lives of middle school academic leaders. The purpose of this qualitative phenomenological study was to explore the lived experiences of what the selected participants believed was the prevention of stress and burnout in middle school leaders in Newton County, Georgia. For this study, school leaders were defined as certified principals who hold a bachelor’s level or above degree and contribute to the academic environment within the 6th and 8th grade public or private school with experience in education. Also, for the purposes of this study, burnout was generally defined as a state of emotional, physical, and mental exhaustion caused by excessive and prolonged stress (Winefield & Pignata, 2013; Maslach & Leiter, 1997). Self-care was defined as the process of taking care of oneself with behaviors that promote health (Santana & Fouad, 2017). The theory guiding this study was Maslach’s burnout theory, which utilized the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) to assess a psychological syndrome involving emotional exhaustion via a 22-symptom inventory pertaining to occupational burnout (Maslach et al., 2021). It included three dimensions of burnout: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment (Maslach et al., 2021). Nine middle schools in Newton County, Georgia were examined. Seven participants were selected. To gather the data needed for this study, interviews and observations were conducted. Data analysis was based on the discussions and reflections of direct perceptions and experiences of the researched phenomena.
