Volume 8, Issue 1, September 2014, Pages 149–157
Thembinkosi Tshabalala1 and Alfred Champion Ncube2
1 Faculty of Arts and Education at the Zimbabwe Open University, Zimbabwe
2 Pro-Vice Chancellor-Academic at the Zimbabwe Open University, Zimbabwe
Original language: English
Copyright © 2014 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
It is an indisputable fact that expert teachers are perhaps the most fundamental resource for improving student learning. Therefore, the need for the retention of qualified teachers particularly in specialist areas cannot be overemphasized. In many developing countries, Zimbabwe included, teacher turn-over has been a problem especially since the outbreak of HIV/AIDS where during the early 1990s, a large number of professionals, teachers included, succumbed to the epidemic in large numbers. Other factors like retirement and resignations have also played a role towards teacher turn-over. However, the most common form of teacher turn-over is whereby qualified teachers leave poor rural schools to better schools particularly in urban areas. Thus, most rural schools fail to attract qualified mathematics and science teachers and resort to using the unqualified and under qualified teachers thereby creating a dilemma, where the least prepared teachers teach the most educationally vulnerable children. As a result, the pass rate of pupils in rural secondary schools at public examinations, particularly in mathematics and science is consistently low. This study draws on a quantitative inquiry to investigate teachers' perceptions on the causes of high-turnover of mathematics and science teachers from rural secondary schools in Zimbabwean secondary schools. The study adopted the descriptive survey design. The target population comprised all secondary school teachers from Nkayi District in Matabeland North Province. The sample consisted of 120 teachers randomly sampled. All the information was collected through a questionnaire which largely had close-ended questions and two open-ended questions. The study revealed that the majority of teachers felt that poor conditions of service forced many mathematics and science teachers to leave rural secondary schools if not the teaching profession altogether. The high teacher turn over caused high failure rates in mathematics and science in the rural secondary schools. The study recommends that Government should allocate more resources to rural schools in order to improve the working conditions of teachers. The study also recommends that there should be a specific rural allowance for mathematics and science teachers to attract and retain more expert teachers in these subject areas.
Author Keywords: Teachers, Rural secondary schools, Turn-over, Mathematics, Science, District.
Thembinkosi Tshabalala1 and Alfred Champion Ncube2
1 Faculty of Arts and Education at the Zimbabwe Open University, Zimbabwe
2 Pro-Vice Chancellor-Academic at the Zimbabwe Open University, Zimbabwe
Original language: English
Copyright © 2014 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
It is an indisputable fact that expert teachers are perhaps the most fundamental resource for improving student learning. Therefore, the need for the retention of qualified teachers particularly in specialist areas cannot be overemphasized. In many developing countries, Zimbabwe included, teacher turn-over has been a problem especially since the outbreak of HIV/AIDS where during the early 1990s, a large number of professionals, teachers included, succumbed to the epidemic in large numbers. Other factors like retirement and resignations have also played a role towards teacher turn-over. However, the most common form of teacher turn-over is whereby qualified teachers leave poor rural schools to better schools particularly in urban areas. Thus, most rural schools fail to attract qualified mathematics and science teachers and resort to using the unqualified and under qualified teachers thereby creating a dilemma, where the least prepared teachers teach the most educationally vulnerable children. As a result, the pass rate of pupils in rural secondary schools at public examinations, particularly in mathematics and science is consistently low. This study draws on a quantitative inquiry to investigate teachers' perceptions on the causes of high-turnover of mathematics and science teachers from rural secondary schools in Zimbabwean secondary schools. The study adopted the descriptive survey design. The target population comprised all secondary school teachers from Nkayi District in Matabeland North Province. The sample consisted of 120 teachers randomly sampled. All the information was collected through a questionnaire which largely had close-ended questions and two open-ended questions. The study revealed that the majority of teachers felt that poor conditions of service forced many mathematics and science teachers to leave rural secondary schools if not the teaching profession altogether. The high teacher turn over caused high failure rates in mathematics and science in the rural secondary schools. The study recommends that Government should allocate more resources to rural schools in order to improve the working conditions of teachers. The study also recommends that there should be a specific rural allowance for mathematics and science teachers to attract and retain more expert teachers in these subject areas.
Author Keywords: Teachers, Rural secondary schools, Turn-over, Mathematics, Science, District.
How to Cite this Article
Thembinkosi Tshabalala and Alfred Champion Ncube, “TEACHERS' PERCEPTIONS ON THE CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF HIGH RATE TEACHER-TURNOVER OF MATHEMATICS AND SCIENCE TEACHERS IN RURAL SECONDARY SCHOOLS – A CASE STUDY OF NKAYI DISTRICT,” International Journal of Innovation and Applied Studies, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 149–157, September 2014.
