A study on trained teachers and their retention in secondary schools in Tanzania: implications of Education and Training policy (ETP) and Secondary Education Development Programme (SEDP) Strategies

The purpose of this study was to examine the trained teachers and their retention in secondary schools following the implementation of ETP/SEDP strategies. The research focused on assessing the state of availability of qualified teachers both in public and private secondary schools; determining the state of teacher shortage and teacher retention, and find reasons that caused movement of teachers from public to private secondary schools and vice versa. The study was guided by theories of motivation and job satisfaction advanced by Hezbergy, Maslow, Festinger and Vroom. Sampling process involved both purposeful and random sampling, sample size comprised of 202 respondents from Mwanza region. Methods for data collection applied included questionnaires for 149 teachers; interview which was administrated to 1 Regional Education officer, 6 District secondary education coordinators and 22 Heads of secondary schools and focused group discussion for 24 teachers. Other methods were documentary study and observation. Both quantitative and qualitative approaches were utilized to analyse the findings from the field. The data were subjected to statistical treatment and content analyses respectivity; this led to formation of tables of frequencies and percentages that helped to get meaningful relationship among variables. The study findings indicated the following firstly, public secondary schools had more inadequacy of qualified trained teachers than private schools due to the fact that there were inadequate rewards both financial and non-financial compared to private secondary schools. Secondly, public secondary schools had higher attrition and lower retention rates, especially in rural areas which are caused by higher attrition and lower reporting rates of trained teachers, than private secondary schools. Private secondary schools used both financial and non-financial rewards to attract and retain quatified teachers. Thirdly, teachers in public secondary schools were generally dissatisfied by work conditions and incentives such as lower salaries and poorer work environment than teachers in private secondary schools who were generally motivated and satisfied. The findings further revealed that shortage of teachers affects academic performance of schools more seriously in rural public secondary schools than private secondary schools. From the findings it was concluded that the ETP/SEDP objectives were not fully achieved for training and retention of secondary schools’ teachers. Implementations of ETP/SEDP strategies on the other hand were characterized by political sentiments which override the use of technical knowledge and skills. Recommendations given include reviewing of the ETP/SEDP strategies by training more teachers both pre- and in service, increasing the salary scale, improve teachers work conditions and status of work. Education policy planners and decision makers are urged to allocate more resources in the national budget for education.