Servant Leadership in Iranian Higher Education: Graduate Student Perspectives

In universities, instructors play a significant role in the teaching and learning process of students. They can help students progress throughout their studies or cause problems such as decreased motivation, decreased self-confidence, and dropping out of school.  This research investigates the servant leadership behavior of Iranian university professors from the perspective of their students.  I designed the action research to explore this question: What are the perceptions of Iranian graduate students from a small, private, Canadian university on servant leadership in their higher education experience in Iran?  Knowing the student’s perception of their instructor’s behavior and its effect on their learning process can lead to improvement in the educational system.  The purpose of this study is to explore the perspectives of Iranian students about their higher education experience in Iran based on the principles of servant leadership. In this study, five students from a small, private, Canadian university who graduated from Iran and have a history of higher education in Iran participated.  Questionnaires were emailed to them, and narrative text data was generated from the submitted answers.  Finally, the qualitative analysis of the answers found some Iranian instructors exhibited servant leadership characteristics, while others did not.  According to the responses, some Iranian instructors focused solely on covering the syllabus during the semester and did not pay attention to the well-being of the students nor empathized with them.  The results indicate Iranian students perceived the educational environment less supportive than desired.  Future research could focus on different methods to enhance the graduate students’ experience in Iranian higher education.