IJECE Published Articles

Abstract This phenomenological study explored the lived experiences of school heads managing low-performing public schools in the Surigao City Division. It examined the challenges encountered by school heads, the leadership strategies and interventions they used, their perceptions of role, motivation, and accountability, the support mechanisms that sustained school improvement efforts, and the insights that may inform policy and leadership development. Anchored on Husserl's descriptive phenomenology and operationalized through Colaizzi's descriptive phenomenological method, the study involved ten purposively selected school heads assigned in low-performing schools. Data were gathered through in-depth interviews and analyzed through familiarization, extraction of significant statements, formulation of meanings, clustering of themes, development of emergent themes, exhaustive description, identification of the fundamental structure, and member checking. Findings yielded five emergent themes: intersecting instructional and organizational challenges, visible manifestations of systemic underperformance, strategic leadership practices and capacity building, collaboration and stakeholder engagement, and resilient and human-centered leadership. These themes show that leadership in low-performing schools is not merely a technical or administrative task but a contextual, relational, and emotionally demanding practice. School heads navigated literacy gaps, learner underachievement, teacher-related concerns, limited resources, stakeholder expectations, and accountability pressures through data-informed decision-making, instructional supervision, teacher capacity building, stakeholder collaboration, communication, resilience, empathy, and recognition of incremental progress. The study concludes that managing low-performing schools requires context-responsive leadership development, sustained instructional support, stronger stakeholder partnerships, and institutional mechanisms that protect the well-being and resilience of school leaders. Keywords: Low-Performing Schools; School Heads; Instructional Leadership; Phenomenology; Colaizzi Method; Stakeholder Engagement; Resilience; School Improvement