The analysis of perception levels of elemantary school teachers with regard to organizational commitment: Şırnak / İdil case

Abstract

The study aims to investigate the organizational commitment levels of the teachers that work in primary schools regarding different variables. In the context of this aim, the answers to the question below were investigated; do the ideas of primary school teachers about organizational commitment show a meaningful difference according to the variables below: according to gender, according to marital status, according to years spent at the job, according to age, according to their subject matter, according to employment status?

The universe of the study was made up of teachers in the 6 central primary schools in the Şırnak/İdil district and primary schools of its 66 neighboring villages in 2008-2009 educational year.

The results in the light of the findings of the study are as follows: There were no meaningful differences between gender and affective (willing), continuance (due to necessity) and normative (due to obligation) commitment teachers expressed.  The perceptions of teachers related to affective, normative and continuance commitment had no relation to their marital status. Although years of experiences of teaching indicated a meaningful difference in the affective commitment felt by the teachers, it did not show any meaningful differences on continuance and normative commitment dimensions.

EXTENDED ABSTRACT

Introduction:
In the school organization, the teachers who feel committed to their institutions strongly believe in the mission and vision of their school and willingly follow the orders and expectations. They also exert more effort than the minimum requirements in order to implement the mission of the school and show determination in staying among the staff. Organizational commitment is the most important element that holds the school organization intact and that can further the institution in its efforts to establish an effective organization.

When teachers feel an earnest and ethical commitment to being a member of their schools and see themselves as a part of the school while accepting the school as a part of them, they will be more ambitious in continuing this membership and staying in the staff (Aydın, 1993). It will also decrease the occurrence of unforeseen and unexpected situations in the organizations. The decrease in the number of unexpected situations as a result of organizational commitment stands out as an important element in securing the effective running of the school and its continuance.

The Aim of the Research:
The study aims to investigate the organizational commitment levels of the teachers that work in primary schools regarding different variables.
In the context of this aim, the answers to the question below were investigated;
1.    Do the ideas of primary school teachers about organizational commitment show a meaningful difference according to the variables below:
a.    according to gender
b.    according to marital status
c.    according to years spent at the job
d.    according to age
e.    according to their subject matter
f.    according to employment status

Methodology:
Survey model was used in the study to investigate the levels of primary school teachers' perceptions on organizational commitment. Survey model is a research approach that aims to describe and identify a past or existing situation as it appears ( Karasar, 2000). The universe of the study was made up of teachers in the 6 central primary schools in the Şırnak/İdil district and primary schools of its 66 neighboring villages in 2008-2009 educational year. The universe consists of 710 teachers. These 710 teachers were given questionnaires but only 463 of them had been returned. Due to the problems in the area during the period of the study, the teachers in the distant villages were contacted via postal mail and because of this reason; some of the questionnaires were not received back. The personal characteristics of the teachers that participated in the study can be seen below:

49.7% of the teachers that participated in the study were males and 50.3% were females. When the age brackets of the participants were examined it was seen that 90.9% was in the 21-30 age bracket and 9.1% was in the 31-40 age bracket. The marital status of the participants showed that 66.3% was married whereas 33.7% was single. According to employment status, 47.1% of the teachers were in permanent staff while 32.8% worked on a contractual basis. 5.8% of the teachers were teaching assistants and 14.3% worked on pay-per-hour basis. 92.4% of the participating teachers had seniority of 1-5 years and 7.6% of the teachers had seniority of 6-10 years. 55.3% of the participating teachers were classroom teachers whereas 44.7% taught various subjects. 89.0% of the participants had associate degrees, 8.9% had two-year degrees and 2.2% had graduate degrees.

The assessment tool used in the study consisted of two parts. The first part is the personal information form that was developed in order to collect information about the participants. The form includes 7 items that cover the gender, age, marital status, status of employment (permanent staff, contractual basis, teaching assistant- contracted), seniority, teaching field and level of education of the individual participant. Second part includes questions.

'The Organizational Commitment Questionnaire: OCQ' which was developed by Meyer and Allen (1984) and adopted to Turkish by Boylu, Pelit and Güçer (2007) was utilized in order to assess the teacher perceptions related to organizational commitment. The organizational commitment scale of Meyer and Allen was designed according to 5-point Likert system. The grading of the expressions in this scale is:
1.  Strongly disagree,  2. Disagree, 3.  Neither agree nor disagree, 4.  Agree and    5.Strongly agree.

The organizational commitment scale consists of 17 questions. The first 6 questions aim to assess the affective commitment of the teachers, questions 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 aim to assess continuance commitment felt by the teachers and questions 13, 14, 15, 16 and 17 are oriented towards assessing the normative commitment of the teachers.

The research undertaken by Boylu, Pelit and Güçer (2007) showed that the scale in general had Cronbach Alpha 0,85 as reliability co-efficient. This study sets this value as Cronbach Alpha 0.77.

The data gathered in the context of the research was analyzed by utilizing SPSS package program (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences). Mean, standard deviation, t-test and ANOVA were used in the analysis of the data. Post Hoc analysis was used to determine the source of the difference between the participants when there are differences.

Conclusion:
The results in the light of the findings of the study are as follows:
There were no meaningful differences between gender and affective (willing), continuance (due to necessity) and normative (due to obligation) commitment teachers expressed. 
The perceptions of teachers related to affective, normative and continuance commitment had no relation to their marital status.

Although years of experiences of teaching indicated a meaningful difference in the affective commitment felt by the teachers, it did not show any meaningful differences on continuance and normative commitment dimensions. Although age variable created a meaningful difference on affective and normative commitment, it did not affect the continuance commitment dimension. According to the findings of the study, there were no meaningful differences on affective and normative commitment levels between the ideas of classroom teachers and teachers that taught other subjects. It was seen that affective and normative commitment levels of branch teachers were higher than those of classroom teachers. There were no meaningful differences on the level of continuance commitment.

There was a statistically meaningful difference between the employment status of the teachers and their ideas related to affective, continuance and normative commitment. The teachers who worked on pay-per-hour basis were found to display a higher level of affective commitment compared to the teachers on permanent staff and assistant teachers. The assistant teachers were found to display higher levels of continuance commitment compared to teachers on permanent staff and teachers who worked on a contractual basis. Teachers on permanent staff were seen to display a higher level of normative commitment compared to teachers who worked on a contractual basis.