School enrollment rates in developing countries have increased substantially over the past few decades. However, due largely to budget constraints, hiring contract teachers has become an ad hoc, yet a popular solution to teacher shortages in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Studies concerning contract teachers have primarily focused on their performance, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness. In light of the literature on precarity associated with contractual employment, this article seeks to explore how contractual employment affects teachers in India. The study analyzes narrative data obtained through semistructured interviews with 17 contract teachers employed in government-run schools in Odisha, a state in eastern India. According to thematic analysis of the data, participants experience precarity in six dimensions: prioritisation of non-teaching work over teaching, financial hardships, sense of inferiority, anxiety about transfer, experiences of discrimination and desire for course correction. We argue that these six dimensions contribute to the demoralization and disempowerment of teachers. We also explore possible explanations for why Odisha continues to employ contract teachers despite criticism. It is recommended that policymakers be sensitized to the plight of contract teachers and reconsider the policy of contractual employment.

The Indian education system has remarkably improved in some respects in the last two decades. With the rapid expansion of educational facilities and increased enrolment of children in schools, the issue of access and participation has been addressed to a large extent. The problem of quality, however, still persists. Even after spending several years in school, many children are not acquiring basic literacy and numeracy. Reports indicate that children of the poor learn the least, and unsurprisingly, most of them study in government-run schools. While there are many factors of learning crisis, teachers are often held responsible for the deteriorating condition of government schools. A discourse of teacher criticism has emerged which portrays teachers as poorly trained, frequently absent, work-shy, hard-to-please, inefficient, ineffective, and occasionally corrupt. How does this discourse impact teachers’ self-understanding? This study analyses narrative data collected from seventeen early career teachers to understand their professional self-understanding. With the help of in-depth interviews and focus group discussions, the study concludes that the popular perceptions of being work-shy, inept, and incompetent are contested by the teachers. On the contrary, there is some evidence to suggest that negotiating a positive professional identity has become a struggle for the participating teachers in the quest for becoming better teachers. While they tend to assert their effectiveness and commitment, they also experience helplessness, vulnerability, and humiliation. This research is expected to pave ways for further explorations of whether the discourse of teacher criticism negatively impacts experienced teachers as well and how teachers’ struggle for positive professional identity influences children’s learning outcomes.

After the enactment of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 (popularly called RTE) teachers working in governmental schools in rural areas face the challenge of educating millions of first-generation learners, most of whom belong to socially and economically weaker sections. The education system of India has succeeded to some extent in enrolling these students in accessible schools. The quality of education provided in government schools, however, still remains a matter of concern. As reflected in several studies, most students do not have grade-specific learning levels. In popular discourse teachers are held responsible for the deteriorating condition of government schools. Usually portrayed as poorly-trained, frequently absent, work-shy, hard-to-please, and occasionally corrupt, teachers are going through a kind of identity crisis in contemporary India. Thus, on the one hand, we have the “quality problem”- the learning crisis prevalent in elementary schools, and on the other hand we have the “teacher problem”- the popular perception that the performance of teachers in government schools is substandard. These two sets of problems are entangled in such a way that one cannot to be addressed without grappling with the other. This paper seeks to explore efficacy beliefs of teachers. Previous research on teachers’ efficacy beliefs suggests that teachers with high sense of efficacy are likely to perform better than teachers with low self-efficacy. The strength of efficacy beliefs is also positively correlated with students’ learning levels. The data suggest that the participants of this study feel confident of their effectiveness but they do not refer to students’ learning outcomes while evaluating themselves as teachers. The source of their efficacy beliefs lies in their familiarity with students, experience of positive behavioural change in students and their own personality traits.