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FACTORS INFLUENCING SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHERS’ INTENTION TO LEAVE THE TEACHING PROFESSION IN FAVOR OF OTHER OPPORTUNITIES IN NIGERIA

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1     BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

The teacher turnover rate in education sector is higher than for any other sectors (Liu & Meyer, 2005). Ingersoll and Smith in (2003) stated that between 40% and 50% of all beginning teachers usually leave this profession after five years of teaching. The consistent teacher’s turnover result into teacher shortage for increased student populations. Many studies of the West have provided evidence of teachers shortage issues in schools of various countries, i.e, U.S, (Edgar & Pair, 2005; Ingersoll, 2003; Liu & Meyer, 2005), Netherlands (Tigchelaar, Brouwer, & Korthagen, 2008), and Hong Kong (Choi &Tang, 2009). Many researchers of other countries like Australia have also highlighted this issue in schools (Goddard, O’Brien, & Goddard, 2006).

Across the US, nearly half a million teachers leave their schools each year (Boyd et al., 2011; Alliance for Excellent Education, 2008). Many researchers investigated the factors that impact turnover of permanent and temporary teaching staff in the context of U.S (DeAngelis & Presley, 2007; Johnson, Berg, & Donaldson, 2005). According to (Boyd et al., 2011), the teacher retention research can be done by exploring the relationship between teacher turnover and teachers’ own characteristics, student body characteristics, and school characteristics. However, the research on teacher attrition and turnover is based on two separate aspects.

One perspective emphasizes on teacher demographics, individual characteristics, and salary (Boe, Bobbitt, Cook, Whitener, &Weber, 1997; Shen, 1997; Stinbrickner, 1998). While the other aspect of research focuses on school characteristics, governance and working conditions (Liu, 2007). The above factors should be considered seriously to avoid the turnover issues of teachers. Because these factors lead to job teachers job satisfaction which results to superior performance and retention of school teachers in the long run. Also it is very important to motivate teachers to perform well. According to Mary (2010), both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation leads to teacher’s superior performance.

The role of teachers is very important in the entire education system. This role is envisioned clearly in National Education Policies of Pakistan. Despite of teachers due role in the education system, the situation in practice is quite different. Unfortunately, the social acceptability and position of teachers in Pakistan is deteriorating day by day. Khan (2005) states that the professional standing of teachers in Pakistan is going down day by day. Due to appointments and transfers of teachers on political basis, the status of teachers started declining rapidly. Teachers in Pakistan hardly enjoy academic freedom, autonomy and authority than any other professions. On the other hand, the civil society and media is continuously lamenting the performance of teachers. These situations are creating disappointments and fatigue among teaching force in the province of Sindh. With regard to status of teachers and their continuously decreasing level of motivation and satisfaction from teaching profession calls for immediate attention for researchers to investigate. The area of job satisfaction (JS) has become the topic of immense investigation since the emergence of organizational studies. JS is an attempt to investigate links to worker’s efficiency and organizational effectiveness. In education, teachers’ job satisfaction is said to be a multifaceted concept that is important for teacher enthusiasm, commitment. JS raises retention level of school employees and therefore a potential contributor to school effectiveness and improvement (Shann, 1998).

There is no doubt that teachers are the change agents. Their main responsibility is to prepare younger generation. These youngsters are future harbingers of our country. Teachers prepare them for advanced education. If teachers are not properly given incentives and rewards for their work, their satisfaction level decrease and they will not be in a position to perform their duties diligently. Bavendam (2000, Cited in Ali, Zaman, Tabassam, Iqbal, 2011) says that teachers’ job satisfaction is very significant because teachers attitude towards job have an effect on the teaching- learning process and ultimately on students’ achievement. Only properly satisfied teachers can do teaching well in the classrooms and their quality of teaching get better as their satisfaction level improve.

For some time now, within basic and secondary education, there have been reports of poor pass rates, low throughput rate, and insufficient infrastructure. These often manifest in a dissatisfied band of teachers. Reports of this nature are common in sub-Saharan Africa (Richardson 2014). The worst hit based on most accounts is Nigeria (Adesulu et al. 2015). The case of Nigeria is mostly fuelled by a number of factors namely a continuously downward economy (Edet 2014), bad governance (Ogunnubi and Okeke-Uzodike 2016), a pervasively high scale of dilapidated infrastructure (Iwu and Iwu 2013), a massive disregard of the teaching profession by successive governments who refuse to pay teachers’ salaries (Abayomi et al. 2015; Teacher Solidarity 2016; Ololube 2006) and several other factors.  These factors often drive Nigerian teachers to seek alternative means of livelihood (Akyeampong and

Bennell 2007) which we argue will lead to high rate of teacher absenteeism, inability to adequately prepare lesson materials and consequently ill-prepared classes. To shine a light in this supposedly gloomy picture of the Nigerian teacher’s current state requires a number of elements. Several studies have pointed in the direction of a willing and committed government program of action that takes into consideration the relevance of basic and secondary education, the need for empowered and motivated teaching staff and well-equipped schools. Many other studies (such as Oyeleke 2012) have argued nonetheless that “effective teaching can only occur when teachers promote excellence and are motivated to perform at a high level”.

1.2     STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Teachers are having low performance due to the insufficient motivational factors that lead to their high turnover intentions as well. This bad or poor performance impacts the student’s education as well. The poor performance of teachers is a global phenomenon that cannot be ignored in Western as well as Eastern context. The poor teacher’s performance lead to several problems for schools such as low students satisfaction from their schools, students turnover intentions, hiring cost of new staff, delay in delivery of education. All such poor performances of teachers lead to poor quality of students that become useless for their societies. And may become a burden on their country in future. Also the leaving intentions of teachers destroy the good reputations of a school as well. Due to turnover issues, the students’ education and time suffers a lot that lead to their dissatisfaction from their studies and school as well. Both poor teachers’ performance and high turnover issues impact on school performance as well.

Macdonald, (1999) states that most of the secondary school teachers leaving teaching profession are those, who are the most qualified (Gatalica, 2013). Based on this, there is a need to know the intention of secondary school teachers who intend to leave the teaching profession so that, measures can be taken to minimize their numbers by improving working environment so as to improve the quality of education.

1.3     OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY  

The general objective of this study is to examine the factors influencing secondary school teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria. The specific objectives of this study include the following:

1.     To find out the level of teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria.

2.     To ascertain the influence of job satisfaction on teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria.

3.     To examine the impact of motivation on teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria.

4.     To investigate the effect of career development on teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria.

5.     To determine the impact of incentives on teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria.

1.4     RESEARCH QUESTIONS

The relevant research questions related to this study include the following:

1.     What is the level of teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria?

2.     What is the influence of job satisfaction on teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria?

3.     What is the impact of motivation on teachers’ intention to leave the teaching profession in favor of other opportunities in Nigeria?

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