School Head Leadership Practices, Organizational Job Embeddedness, and Teacher Retention Intentions in Public Elementary Schools: An Explanatory Sequential Mixed-Methods Study in the Schools Division of Davao del Sur

This study examined the relationships among school head leadership practices, organizational job embeddedness, and teacher retention intention among public elementary school teachers in the Schools Division of Davao del Sur, Philippines. An explanatory sequential mixed-methods design was employed, involving 300 teachers from 15 purposively selected schools and 18 interview participants representing contrasting retention profiles. Data were collected using a 35-item questionnaire and semi-structured interviews, analyzed through descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation, hierarchical regression, and thematic analysis. Findings revealed high perceived leadership practices (M = 4.161), very high organizational job embeddedness (M = 4.377), and high retention intention (M = 3.901). Organizational job embeddedness demonstrated a stronger significant relationship with retention intention (r = .687, p < .001) than leadership practices (r = .200, p < .001). Embeddedness contributed an additional 9.6% to explained variance beyond leadership domains, although this increment was sensitive to respondent composition. Qualitative findings emphasized collegial relationships, workload fairness, community attachment, family circumstances, and career opportunities as important retention considerations. The study concluded that retention intention reflects interconnected organizational and personal circumstances rather than leadership practices alone. School administrators should strengthen participative decision-making, equitable workload distribution, mentoring, and professional support. Cross-sectional data, nonprobability sampling, and measurement limitations restrict causal interpretation and generalizability. The findings provide context-specific evidence for developing integrated leadership and workforce-support strategies that may strengthen institutional stability and sustainable educational management.