A Referential Activity Analysis of the Perceptions of School Principals’ Sample of the Roles and Challenges They Faced during the COVID-19 in the Sultanate of Oman

The aim of the research is to analyze the reference activity of the perceptions of a sample of school principals of the challenges and roles they faced during the Covid 19 pandemic in the Sultanate of Oman. The study used the qualitative descriptive approach by analyzing the reference activity, and the interview was used as a tool through interviewing (27) principals of schools that applied compulsory attendance for twelfth grade students, and using the measures of analyzing the reference activity on the interview materials. The study concluded that school principals' perceptions of roles and dealing with challenges during the Covid 19 pandemic show a decrease in reference activity, and this was evident through the arithmetic averages of the responses on the measures of reference activity, as the sample average showed (4.30), and it is a clear decrease in the tangible measures that define their roles and guide them in dealing with challenges, which is an average at the low-simple level. As for the definition, it was with an arithmetic mean (4.38), which is at the low-simple level. Clarity was with an arithmetic mean (5.04), which is at the high-simple level. Imagining was with the arithmetic (3.29), which is at a moderately low level. As for the results of the research related to the difficulties encountered by school principals, the results of the reference activity analysis indicated that the difficulties mentioned were represented in the weakness of the communication process, inflexible management by the principals, weak future outlook, weak human relations, and weak planning and follow-up, which negatively affects the management of pandemics. The arithmetic averages for the analysis of the reference activity for the difficulties came from the principals' awareness of the dimensions of the scale as follows, where the sample ones have an arithmetic average of (4.30), which is located in the simple low level of their awareness of the burden of dealing with difficulties, and the determination was an arithmetic average of (4.65), which is at the simple low level, clarity was with an arithmetic average of (5.27), at the simple high level, and the perception was with an arithmetic average of (3.87) at the moderately low level, which gives indications that realizing challenges and roles in light of pandemics needs more training and awareness in order for principals to be in the Sultanate at the cognitive level appropriate to the challenges and roles required during the pandemic