Antecedents of teacher performance in government aided secondary schools in Maracha district, Uganda

Abstract

This study sought to investigate whether recognition, opportunity for promotion and advancement, and working conditions were antecedents of teachers' performance in government aided secondary schools in Maracha District. The study was guided by the following objectives: to find out whether recognition is enhances teacher performance, to establish whether opportunity for promotion and advancement is enhances teacher performance, and to examine whether working conditions is enhances teacher performance. All the six government aided secondary schools in the district were involved in the study. Using a correlational survey design, data were collected by the use of self-administered-questionnaire from 117 teachers. Descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation test and multiple regression analysis were used to analyze data. The study findings revealed that, there was positive and significant relationship between recognition and teacher perf01mance, opportunity for promotion and advancement and teacher performance, and strong positive and significant relationship between working conditions and teacher performance. Further, recognition, opportunity for promotion and advancement, and working conditions, were strong antecedents, of teacher performance (Ho 1-Ho3 were rejected). The influence mainly came from task performance recognition (~ = 0.375, p < 0.05), promotion speed (~ =0.340, p< 0.05) and workload (~ =0.474, p < 0.05). Hence, when schools appreciate teachers for expending their skills, knowledge to do their work, let teachers know they will be promoted at the right time and give teachers opp01tunity to freely plan their work so that they remain with additional time to care for their personal life, teachers develop the zeal to do their jobs well. Thus, the Ministry of Education and Sports should strengthen task performance recognition, opportunity for promotion speed and provide workload clarity in schools by giving them clear guidelines to implement them uniformly. A model of appropriate recognition, promotion and working conditions for secondary schools should be investigated. Still, further, studies should be conducted by other researchers on other Antecedents of teacher performance in secondary schools using both quantitative and qualitative methods so as to improve the overall performance of teachers.