THE INFLUENCE OF WORKING CONDITIONS ON TEACHERS’ RETENTION IN RURAL PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN SUMBAWANGA DISTRICT

The purpose of this study was to investigate “the influence of working conditions on teachers’ retention in rural public secondary schools in Sumbawanga District, Rukwa Tanzania.”. The study was guided by Herzberg’s Motivational Theory. This study adopted mixed research approach and convergent parallel research design. Questionnaire and interview were used as research tools to collect data from 93 respondents, whereby 87 teachers were sampled through stratified and simple random techniques, 5 heads of rural public secondary schools and 1 District Educational Officer was selected through purposive sampling technique. The quantitative data was analyzed through SPSS Version 20 and presented using tables, percentage, figures and frequencies, while qualitative data was analyzed through thematic analysis. The finding of this study showed that retention of teachers in Sumbawanga District was very low due to poor working conditions such as lack of professional development, high workload, poor accommodation along with safety and security, lack of social services and lack of enough teaching and learning materials. Also, the study recommends the need for the government through Ministry of Education and other educational stakeholders to cooperate in order to improve the retention rate of teachers in rural areas through creating a good working condition that will enable teachers to conduct the responsibilities effectively. Also, the government need to establish different motivational package to rural teachers which will motivate them to work in rural areas, by doing that they will not feel isolated.