Teachers Turnover among Private Schools in Cabanatuan City: Basis for

Management Action

Teaching is considered as the noblest profession for it takes a lot of responsibility to

impart knowledge, sharpen one’s mind, touch learners’ lives and help them build their future. In

this view, teachers serve as fuel in an institution because of their utmost dedication in catering

the needs of the learners. The quality of education relies on the teachers’ competence and

capability which strengthens institutions competitive advantage. Teachers also serve as a key to

the attainment of the institution’s mission, vision, and goal.

Thus, most of the private school teachers leave their institution after gaining an

experience and try to look for better opportunity which leads to turnover. One of the most

pressing concerns confronting school administrators is employee retention, a shortage of

competent people, economic growth, and significant employee turnover (Michael, 2018). This

issue had been confirmed by a 2019 study of National Center for Education Statistics (NCES),

that there is an annual turnover rate of 16% among the private schools.

Similarly, Philippines faced concerns when it comes to retention of teachers in private

school. The country experiences high rate turnover among private teachers especially in the basic

education level (Martson, 2014). This demonstrates the problem that education sector faces on a

regular basis. Given this scenario, employers or heads must conduct an exit interview in order to

know the reasons why private teachers decided to leave the job which will benefit their

institution on retaining private teachers.

who leave and move to other school have several reasons. Teachers are quitting their jobs due to

low pay, lack of administrative support, workloads, and frustrations, according to Curtis (2012).

With the reasons being mentioned, financial aspect is one of the reasons why teachers tend to

transfer to government schools knowing that there is a big difference in salary and more benefits

await them. Aside from this, lack of administrative support let the private teachers to 3 be

demotivated in their field of work knowing that no matter what they do, employers would not

appreciate it. Lastly, workload and frustrations make the private teachers’ burnout which they

feel unhealthy.

Teacher burnout is a global issue, according to Aloe, Amo, and Shanahan (2014), and it

is particularly prevalent among young and unmarried teachers. Teachers who have higher

burnout or who feel burned out are more likely to leave the job. According to Santoro (2011), it

is difficult for teachers to feel that their work is being done properly when f aced with a large

task.

Based on the 2018 Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) report, the country faced a net

loss of 132 teachers every year which meant that more individuals left the profession as

compared to the ones entering it. Thus, retaining teachers in school after the end of their contract

calls for a celebration on the part of school administrators.

Conversely, while there are teachers who leave for greener pasture, there are also

teachers who decide to renew their contract and remain committed in the private school. Despite

the longstanding reasons to leave, they became resilient in their field of work. Resilience was

defined by Ledesma (2014) as "the ability to bounce back from adversity, frustration, and

misfortune." It was a dynamic capacity influenced by socio-cultural factors that built or eroded
the ability to perform as knowledgeable, committed, enthusiastic teachers (Day & Gu, 2014).

Being teacher is not easy, therefore, it is a must to find the courage to overcome the adversities in

order to stay in the profession which is to be called as retention.

According to Sumipo (2020), retention refers to a teacher's decision to remain at a school

after their contract has ended. Teacher’s decision of staying in a private school has reason behind

it. This statement was supported by Gu and Day (2013), teachers' career decisions are influenced

by a complex interplay of personal, emotional, relational, and organizational elements. As a

teacher, these factors really matter to stay in an institution. 4 Teachers’ turnover had always been

the concern of researchers, hence, there is a scarce on why the teachers stay in the institution.

Mansfield et al. (2012) suggest that it is worthwhile to investigate what makes teachers stay

instead of investigating attrition and why teachers leave. With the reasons mentioned above on

why teachers leave, the researcher believed that those should be converted into a positive ones in

order to retain private teachers. If those will be converted, private teachers’ will be satisfied and

motivated. This was strengthened by Kosi et al. (2015) as he identified that there are four factors

that influence teacher work satisfaction.

These factors include compensation, advancement, supervision, and the work itself. With

the high turnover rate reported among the private schools in the Philippines, there are private

schools in Arayat, Pampanga where turnover is less of concern for there are teachers who stayed

for more than three years. In the researcher’s four years of teaching in a private school, the

researcher witnessed that most of her colleagues decided to renew after the 3-year contract

ended. Given their abilities, skills, and competence, the researcher knew that they would be

highly qualified for government-funded schools and deserve a high-paying job.

drove private teachers to stay in an institution. As many would argue, teachers’ will stay in their

jobs if they are well compensated. But, apart from the monetary considerations, what else could

there possibly be? What made the private teachers stay long in the institution? This prompt the

researcher asks question, “What makes the private teacher motivated and satisfied to stay in the

institution?”

Different studies show that employee retention is related to job satisfaction. In this

regard, this researcher supposed that the Herzberg theory is anchored as a method to explore job

satisfaction among employees. (Lundberg et al., 2009). In 1959, American psychologist

Frederick Herzberg, who was interested in people's motivation and work satisfaction, developed

a theory known as "The Two Factor Theory," sometimes known as the Motivation- 5 Hygiene

Theory or the Dual-Factor Theory. He carried out his research by interviewing a group of people

about their positive and negative job experiences.

On the basis of this, he established the hypothesis that people's job happiness is

determined by two types of elements. These variables include Motivators, which may inspire

employees to work more, and Hygiene factors, which will lead employees to get unmotivated if

they are not there.

The presence of motivating factors causes the employees to work harder. These factors

are found in the job itself. Motivating factors include achievement, recognition, work itself,

responsibility, advancement and personal growth. On the other hand, Hygiene factors will cause

employees to work less hard. These factors are not present in the actual job itself but surround

the job. Hygiene factors include the work conditions, co-workers relation, policies and rules,

supervisor quality, and salary.

presupposes those employees may be unsatisfied with their occupations. This has something to

do with what are known as hygiene considerations, such as pay and working conditions.

Employee happiness, on the other hand, is related to the so-called incentive variables. These

factors have to do with development opportunities, responsibility, and appreciation.

To further strengthen this study, this part provides a review of the literature on why

teachers enter the profession and why they stay in it, as these two factors together reveal how

motivations change over time. A study was done in the Philippines at the Lyceum of the

Philippines University, Batangas City, on the job satisfaction of teaching and non-teaching

personnel. In terms of maintenance/hygiene factors and satisfiers/motivation factors, the results

suggested that LPUBatangas had a high degree of job satisfaction.

Teachers are more likely to be motivated and happy at work when they get rewards, have

the opportunity to apply their abilities, are assigned an interesting and difficult assignment, and

work in a pleasant and relaxed atmosphere. Indeed, according to Jobstreet.com's 2017 Job

Happiness Index, the Philippines' job satisfaction rating fell to 4.97 points this year from 5.25 in

2016. When asked to evaluate their happiness on a 10-point scale, the country's employees

slipped to third-happiest in the area, down from first position in 2016. Respondents rated

interpersonal relationships (colleagues, immediate superiors, work culture); logistics (work

schedule, work location); growth and stability (career development, job security, training and

skill development); compensation and benefits (benefits and perks, basic salary); and company

profile as important factors (company values, reputation and leadership team).

improvement of their students, a teacher's impression of their abilities improves (Mart, 2013).

Collaborations could include (a) having a post-class processing and feedback session about their

teaching performance, (b) collaborating to provide educational supplies for their students'

learning needs, and (c) developing and evaluating newer and better teaching methods to

complement students' learning needs (Mart, 2013). As a result, one method for schools to

reinforce teacher enthusiasm for teaching is to encourage them to collaborate in discovering

more effective ways to improve their school environment.

To sum it up, co-workers relation has really an impact for teachers to remain committed

in the institution for they have chance to collaborate with ideas and at the same time they feel

happy on working with one another. This statement was attested by the researcher herself for she

had good relation towards her co-teachers.

Furthermore, Sumipo (2020) revealed that opportunity for promotion is one of the most

powerful motivational aspects in the workplace. Consequently, if a teacher wishes to advance 7

in rank and be promoted to a higher position, he or she must pursue higher educational degrees.

At the end, private teachers who sees the opportunity for promotion and professional growth will

likely to stay. An institution who tend to encourage its teachers to pursue higher educational

degrees has the capability to retain employees since they are concerned on the success of each

one.

According to the study of Hilmi, Ali, and Nihal (2016), majority of the teachers of high

schools in district Isparta, in their overall response to hygiene variables, realized that their

satisfaction comes from the Hygiene factors on their jobs. Their feeling of satisfaction with

Hygiene factors was the disapproval of Motivation -Hygiene theory in respect of hygiene factors,
because Herzberg’s theory regarded satisfaction at workplace is the outcome of motivators, not

of hygiene factors. The research reveals that high school teachers’ motivation was mostly

dependent on both the fulfilment of Hygiene and Motivator factors. Nevertheless, high school

teachers’ motivation was more at the mercy of Hygiene factors rather than motivator factors. The

high school teachers were satisfied with the hygiene factors such as relation with administration

or supervision, relation with colleagues, pay factor or salary and security and also they were very

pleased with motivation factors such as responsibility, advancement, recognition and work itself.

In their research, Hilmi, Ali, and Nihal (2016) concluded that the high schoolteachers’

motivation was relied on both the fulfilment of hygiene and motivator factors and the teachers’

job satisfaction and school climate levels were significantly higher. The development of effective

and planned teacher policies in Turkey depends upon careful consideration of the motivational

factors and hygiene factors involved in engagement upon close hearing to the voices of the

teachers.

The listed theory of Herzberg highlighted how private teachers could be satisfied and

motivated in their field of work. In which, it will let the administrators and heads to identify 8

what are the implications of these factors to the retention of their teachers. By identifying if it is

the Motivational Factors or Hygiene Factors that affect the employees the most, private schools

can make a new or adjust their retention strategies. This study will suggest which one should be

improved or removed, and which one should be maintained to increase employee retention.

Based on the presented literature reviews, it was clearly shown that there are several factors

which could make the teachers quit the job. Hence, these factors must be reinforced by the

administrators and heads to make teachers stay.

This research paper employs the IPO (Input-Process-Output) model in order to come up

with the objective of the study. The input shows the factors outlined by Herzberg. These factors

are motivation and hygiene factor. Under the motivation factor, it includes the achievement,

recognition, work itself, responsibility, advancement, and personal growth. While the hygiene

factor includes the work conditions, co-workers relation, policies and rules, supervisory quality,

salary. This aims to figure out which of Herzberg's Motivation and Hygiene variables have an

impact on employee retention. The second box depicts the data collection using the research-

made questionnaire as well as analysing the gathered data through the use of statistical tools such

as frequency, percentage, mean and Pearson r. When it comes to the third box, once the major

variables have been identified, private school managers can develop retention strategies that

emphasize on raising Motivation Factors or increasing Hygiene Factors. Increased employee

work satisfaction and, as a result, higher staff retention can be achieved by improving any of

these two factors.

Factors of Data gathering

Teachers’ through research -

Resilience made questionnaires

Motivation Factors Data Analysis strategies to increase

Hygiene Factors Frequency Percentage employee retention

Weighted Mean
Retention level of
Pearson R
private school

teachers

Figure 1. Schematic Paradigm of the Study

This study aims to identify what could make teachers retain in the organization for long

period of time. Two sets of factors namely, Hygiene Factors and Motivation Factors will be the

focus of this study. The researcher wants to help private school managers to improve their

retention strategies and increase their private teachers’ retention rate.

Moreover, the study seeks to answer the following questions:

1. How may the demographic profile of the private teachers’ be described in terms of:

1.1 age;

1.2 sex; and

1.3 years of stay in the school?

2. How may the retention of private school teachers’ be described in terms of:

2.1 motivation; and

2.2 hygiene?

3. How may the retention level of private schools be described?

4. Is there a significant relationship between the hygiene/motivation factor and private teachers’

retention?

5. Based on the findings, what retention strategies could be proposed?

The following alternative hypothesis were tested:

1. There is a significant relationship between the motivation factor and private teachers’

retention.

Significance of the Study

The researcher believes that the result of the study will be of great benefit to the

following:

Management of Private Schools. This study will help the management of private schools to

identify the factors that affect employee retention. Also, they can be able to craft programs or

adjust retention strategies to increase employee retention and lessen employee turnover.

Employees of Private Schools. This will also be beneficial to employees as this study could

serve as their voice to tell the factors that keep them satisfied and motivated to remain at work,

and what kind of retention strategy and management they intend to have to stay in an

organization.

Private Schools. This will be beneficial to the private school as a whole as this can serve as a

tool in improving their overall retention strategies and retention rate, which will in turn, increase

employees’ work satisfaction, motivation, performance, and productivity.

Future Researchers. The result of this study will help the future researchers who are willing to

address same issue regarding employee retention. Also, this will be a helpful guide in designing

related research work in their own field.

The study focuses on identifying the factors which affects teachers’ resilience in

private schools. The research-made questionnaire will be administered to the private teachers in

schools located in Cabanatuan City in year 2022. The research-made questionnaire will be

composed of the demographic profile of the respondents such as age, sex and years of stay in the

school. Also, it will include the dimensions of the Two-Factor theory of Herzberg.

Definition of Terms

A term may have multiple or complicated meaning, in order to have a clear definition to

understand the specific word better, it should require the definition of terms. With that, the

researcher have presented below a list of terms that can give the readers the accurate information.

Employee Motivation - the level of energy, commitment, persistence, and creativity that a

company's workers bring to their jobs.

Employee Retention - is a phenomenon where employees choose to stay on with their current

company and don't actively seek other job prospects; refers to all those practices which let the

employees stick to an organization for a longer time.

Employee Turnover - or employee turnover rate, is the measurement of the number of

employees who leave an organization during a specified time period, typically one year.

Hygiene Factors – elements of life or work that do not increase satisfaction but that can lead to

dissatisfaction if they are missing.

Institution – a society or organization founded for a religious, educational, social, or similar

purpose.
Motivating Factors – something that makes someone happy with their job and their employer:

when they exist, motivator factors actively create job satisfaction.