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The purpose of this study was to examine whether the levels of cultural intelligence (CQ) of principals and teachers influence Latino students’ achievement. The study first tested the applicability of Ang and Van Dyne’s (2008) Cultural Intelligence Questionnaire (CQS) for the measurement of principals and teachers’ CQ levels by construct validating this instrument. Later, it investigated whether the CQ levels of principals and teachers explain the achievement levels of Latino students in mathematics and language arts.

A naturalistic relational research design was used to study the relationships between the study variables. Participants included a cluster random sample of 86 principals and 311 teachers in a southern state. The convergent validation was used to establish the construct validity of the CQS by correlating CQS subscale scores with several measures of principal and teacher multicultural exposure. A series of hierarchical multiple regression analyses were conducted to investigate the association between the principal and teacher CQS subscale scores and the Latino student achievement scores on state standardized tests.

The four-factor structure of the CQS scale was found to be valid in the educational settings. Principals’ level of CQ significantly predicted Latino students’ achievement scores of eight grade math and eight grade language arts. On the contrary to the expectations, there was no evidence to suggest that teacher-level CQ as measured by the CQS is predictive of Latino student achievement. Further analyses showed that multicultural exposures of teachers, such as being multilingual and visiting other countries, significantly predicted Latino students’ language arts performance.

This study has policy and research implications toward understanding and eliminating achievement gaps of Latino student populations. It sheds empirical light on whether this gap can be explained with the multicultural intelligence levels of principals and teachers, the two most influential actors in schools. By construct validating CQS, the study methodologically contributed to the pertinent educational research, which lacks instruments for the measurement of CQ levels of educational workforce.

Organizational environment where the organizational behavior takes place and the task roles employees need to perform have become increasingly complex in today's organizations. To respond to this complexity, modern organizations need willing, flexible, and proactive employees who go beyond narrow task requirements and who approach work proactively by showing personal initiative (Crant, 2000; Ohly, Sonnentag, & Pluntke, 2006; Parker, 2000; Sonnentag, 2003). In an era where the responsibility and decision making have shifted downward through transformational leadership and shared decision-making, employees have started taking part in both decision making and implementation process without constant close supervision (Frese & Fay, 2001; Sonnentag, 2003). They are expected to demonstrate discretionary behaviors that may go beyond their formally identified job descriptions to carry out the current expectations and comprehensive and complex tasks. Discretionary behavior refers to the employee behavior that is not directly or explicitly recognized by the formal reward system, and in the aggregate promotes the efficient and effective functioning of the organization (Organ, Podsakoff, & MacKenzie, 2006; Van Dyne, Cummings, & McLean Parks, 1995). Employee discretionary behaviors contribute to maintenance and enhancement of the social and psychological organizational context which supports task performance and organizational effectiveness (McBain, 2004; Organ, 1997). As Den Hartog and Belschak (2007) stated, employee discretionary behaviors are crucial for organizations to be able to stay competitive in today's global economy.

The purpose of this study was to examine factors affecting teachers’ work performance (i.e., task performance and discretionary performance) and career aspirations (i.e., remaining a teacher, seeking promotion to a principalship, and career change). Applying an inclusive social-cognitive perspective, the study integrated the personal, organizational, and leadership domains to explain teachers’ task performance, discretionary performance, and career aspirations. The three domains, represented by the independent variables of self-efficacy, collective efficacy, perceived organizational support, and principal leadership styles, predicted teachers’ work performance and career aspirations. Participants included 897 public school teachers in a southern state in the United States. The data gathering instrument incorporated several previously validated scales on study constructs. The analyses indicated that teacher self-efficacy, collective efficacy, POS, and principal transformational leadership all significantly predicted the teachers’ task performance, discretionary performance, and career aspirations. Study findings suggest directions for future research on factors influencing teachers’ work performance and career aspirations.

Yahya Altınkurt holds Ph.D. from Anadolu University, Turkey. He is assistant professor at Dumlupınar University Faculty of Education in Kütahya. Dr. Altınkurt's research focuses on strategic planning, organizational justice, organizational citizenship, and leadership in schools. His most recent books include Assessment of Researches of School Administration (2008, Anadolu University Publishing coauthored with E. Ağaoğlu, M. Ceylan, E. Kesim, and T. Madden). Dr. Altınkurt's research has appeared in various journals including Educational Sciences: Theory & Practice, Education and Science, Educational Administration: Theory and Practice, International Journal of Human Sciences, Academic Sight.

This study focuses on assistant principals, the “forgotten future workforce” of educational leadership. We explored the current landscape of assistant principalship within the context of work performance, including both task and discretionary performance, and the future career aspirations of assistant principals from a cross-national perspective. Specifically, the study aimed to fulfill the following objectives: (a) to identify the factors affecting the task and discretionary performance of assistant principals, (b) to identify the factors affecting three future career aspirations of assistant principals, and (c) to determine whether the influences of these factors differ by national origin. Personal initiative and perceived organizational support (POS) were the independent variables. This study also examined the demographic attributes of the participants and their schools. Two randomly selected samples, which composed of 227 Turkish and 144 American assistant principals were the participants. The data-gathering instrument incorporated the revised versions of the Personal Initiative Scale (Fay & Frese, 2001), the Perceived Organizational Support Scale (Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchison, & Sowa, 1986), and the School Organizational Citizenship Behavior Scale (DiPaola & Tschannen-Moran, 2001). The findings of the study showed that personal initiative and POS significantly predicted the task performance, discretionary performance, and certain future career aspirations of assistant principals. National origin appeared to be a significantly differentiating factor of the assistant principals' task performances, discretionary performances, and future career aspirations. We drew conclusions and provided suggestions for future research.