Does Humor Influence the Development of School Culture? A Phenomenological Inquiry

Institutional progress, stability, and viability require a firmly established culture, through which the distinguishing features of enduring school traditions, customs and practices remain congruent with existing educational demands. This phenomenological inquiry attempts to explore the individual and collective lived experiences of thirteen (13) purposively selected private school principals in the Philippines relative to the significant effects of humor which render the institution stable and viable, and its members -- creative, productive, reliable, and united. Through individual, semi-structured and in-depth interview, present findings yielded the Brick-Layering Model of Humor Use in the Building of School Culture that identified six distinctive effects of humor use on culture-building, namely: leveling, adapting, linking, unifying, prompting and perpetuating, which correspond to the six important contributory factors in the development of school culture, namely: demographics, environment, external support, heritage, leadership and core values. The emerged model can guide school leaders in formulating guidelines, implementing principles, initiating meaningful activities, adopting relevant practices and optimizing the use of both tangible and intangible resources to advance the development of a positive school culture.