AN STUDY ON HOW TEACHING EFFICACY IS INFLUENCING AFFECTIVE ORGANISATIONAL COMMITMENT OF SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHERS IN MASHONALAND CENTRAL PROVINCE OF ZIMBABWE.

AN STUDY ON HOW TEACHING EFFICACY IS INFLUENCING AFFECTIVE ORGANISATIONAL COMMITMENT OF SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHERS IN MASHONALAND CENTRAL PROVINCE OF ZIMBABWE.

Rittah Kasowe

Prof Ignatius I. Dambudzo

In Zimbabwean secondary schools, performance of school pupils accelerated in a declining manner since 1984 to date. Although much has been done to improve conditions of the teacher since the teachers are at the helm of students learning, students’ performance has continued to decline. Despite training obtained from teachers colleges, what is contributing to their effectiveness has not been well researched. Affective organisational commitment of secondary school teachers in Zimbabwe still remain an inadequately researched area. Prior research has indicated that teaching efficacy determine teacher performance. Whereas teachers could be motivated by employers, the gendered outcomes of their teaching efficacy to their performance and level of affective commitment in Zimbabwean secondary schools has not been adequately investigated. The primary purpose of the study was to make a critical analysis of teaching efficacy factors influencing secondary school teachers’ affective organisational commitment in Zimbabwe. Stufflebeam(1971)’s Context Input Process and Product decision facilitation model of evaluation approach was used to analyse the factors. The approach specified the imbalances in each phase of evaluation focusing on teaching efficacy factors and how they contributed to affective organisational commitment of secondary school teachers. The study used qualitative
data gathering methods to generate data from 26 participants purposively sampled. The sample included 12teachers,3Heads of departments, 2 Deputy heads, 4 School heads, 4 Provincial Education inspectors, and 1 Deputy Provincial Education Director using Semi structured face to face interviews and focus group discussions were used as data gathering instruments in order to triangulate the evidence obtained. Generated data was analysed using NVivo to come up with three themes. The study established that factors such as professionalism, teacher competence, age, teaching experience, recognition, staffing of teachers, subject specialisation, centrality of passion within the teacher and lack of ownership of educational policies determine teacher efficacy of secondary school teachers and their level of affective organisational commitment hence impacting negatively on pupils’ and schools’ performance. The study recommended that Educational planners need to stay abreast of the formal and informal impulse of teacher commitment by providing support, constant supervision, staffing of teachers, staff development workshops, chat platforms and continual refocusing of selection and recruitment policies in teachers’ colleges. Future researchers might wish to expand this study to Private schools to determine whether results presented here reflect the general situation in all schools, since this study was conducted in schools owned by Public Service Commission only.

ZOU

2014

Zimbabwe Open University

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