Examining the relationship between the effects of formal education and the police manager's leadership style through the full range leadership dimensions

In recognizing that education serves as the centerpiece for professionalizing police and law enforcement, this study examined the effects of education with the observed differences in the police leaders' leadership style, as rated by their subordinates. The sample of convenience consisted of 347 sworn police officers and civilians of a large Metropolitan police department in the state of Texas. All the volunteer participants were administered a researcher prepared demographic data questionnaire along with the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire 360-Form 5X (MLQ-5X: Bass & Avolio, 2000) rater form. The MLQ-5X stands as a tested and validated measuring instrument respected for its ability to provided measures for transformational, transactional, and passive-avoidant leadership styles identified within the Full Range Model (Bass & Avolio, 2000). Subsequently, the MLQ-5X was the measuring instrument employed to identify behaviors associated with leadership styles within the leadership deminsions of the full range model. The participants produced ratings for each leadership style employed by the 65 police leaders identified for this study.;This study provided statistical measures by examining the participants MLQ ratings and comparing those ratings with the level of education for the 65 police leaders identified by the participants. A Multiple Analysis of Covariance (MANCOVA) produced the measures used for analyzing the followers' and leaders' level of education with the effects on leadership style when controlling for age, ethnicity, gender, and time of service. The statistical analysis revealed that level of education was a significant predictor of follower's perception of leadership styles employed by police leaders.