The causes and effects of English teachers’ turnover: A case from Afghanistan

Abstract

One of the challenging issues that educational organizations in developing countries face in staffing classrooms with qualified teachers is the high rate of teachers' turnover. It creates problems for schools, which eventually leads to substandard instruction and low student achievement. This research explores the causes of English teachers' turnover in a Non-Government Educational Organization in Kabul, Afghanistan. The results indicate that lack of teachers' motivation, low salary, communication gap between management and teachers, market opportunities for English teachers, workload, absence of career path and weak recruitment processes are the major factors contributing to teachers' turnover in Afghanistan. The high teachers' turnover leads to such negative effects as interruptions in learning process, behavioural adjustment of students with new teachers, continuous exposure of students with novice teachers, emotional detachments of students with their teachers and negative effects on students' learning. The article concludes that educational organizations should deal with their teachers more humanely. Teachers retain and perform in an organization when they are valued, motivated and satisfied with their jobs and their professional status. In the absence of such environment, it is likely that educational organizations in Afghanistan would continue to struggle to attract and retain qualified teachers, which will eventually compromise on the achievements of their students. Considering the findings, creation of covenantal bond rather than contractual bond is suggested as a strategy that could be augmented by a transformational leadership, which can motivate the teachers to remain committed to their profession.

Transformational school leadership as a key factor for teachers’ job attitudes during their first year in the profession

“…Marks and Printy, 2003) and developing countries (e.g. Khawary and Ali, 2015;Nguni et al, 2006;Tesfaw, 2014) have already found evidence for the direct relationship between transformational leadership and several teachers' job attitudes. This supports the argument that transformational leadership is important across various societies and as such should receive attention.…”

“…In the case of developing countries, the collection of data concerning teacher attrition is often poor and not always reliable (Mulkeen and Crowe-Taft, 2010 in their review of the literature on Sub-Saharan Africa). The available data indicate that in developing countries, there is a teacher retention problem to some extent (Khawary and Ali, 2015;Mulkeen and Crowe-Taft, 2010;Rinke, 2008) and that, as in other countries around the world, this attrition is concentrated in teachers' first years in the profession (Mulkeen and Crowe-Taft, 2010). In general, the early attrition rates have led to several consequences such as teacher shortages (Ingersoll, 2001) and deteriorating student performance (Ronfeldt et al, 2013).…”

“…These job attitudes are believed to promote positive outcomes for both the individual and the organisation in which they work (Struyve et al, 2016). In an educational context, these job attitudes were found to reduce early drop-out rates (Arnup and Bowles, 2016;Khawary and Ali, 2015;McInerney et al, 2015;Skaalvik and Skaalvik, 2011;Struyve et al, 2016). Subsequently, several international studies both in the educational field (e.g.…”

School Culture and School Effectiveness: The Mediating Effect of Teachers’ Job Satisfaction

“…However, those teachers who were not satisfied, due to some factors, as a lack of career advancement opportunities, low motivation, low salary, or ineffective communication with leaders, were more likely to leave the school. Such high rates of teacher turnover led to less successful outcomes with regard to school effectiveness as well as issues with students, such as emotional instability and poor learning behaviour (Khawary & Ali, 2015).…”

Teachers’ Experiences of a District’s Transformational Leadership Design Program: A Qualitative Study

“…In summary, transformational leadership helped to establish a conventional bond between teachers and the management team. Such a connection led to a firm commitment with a shared vision and purpose for school reform for higher achievement (Khawary & Ali, 2015). In other words, transformational leadership helps to build trust and respect in an inclusive relationship that effectively facilitates the organizational improvements needed for student success.…”