An Assessment of the Causes of Persisting Teachers’ Professional Malpractices in Kilwa District

Abstract

This study assessed the causes of the persisting teacher’s professional malpractices in Kilwa District Council. Specifically, the study aimed to identify the types of professional malpractices commonly practised by teachers in secondary schools, and to explore the causes of teachers’ professional malpractices in secondary schools. The study employed descriptive design whereby qualitative and quantitative approaches were the means of data collection and analyses. The study sample comprised 5 secondary schools and a total of 60 respondents. Specifically, the respondents were 45 teachers who were randomly selected to respond to the questionnaires while 5 heads of schools, 5 discipline masters, 1 District Education Officer, 2 TSD Officials, 1 Ward Education Officer and 1 Human Resources Officer were purposively selected and interviewed. The findings showed that the most dominant malpractices in Kilwa District were absenteeism, the use of Swahili language in English language classes during teaching and negligence. Moreover, teachers’ absenteeism seemed to be the common problem above all in urban and rural schools. Teachers' absenteeism and duty negligence were associated with teachers' low status that seemed associated with their low salaries. Teachers tended to neglect and skip classes, as they had to engage in extra-curricular activities to increase their purchasing power to meet human livelihood. The causes for professional teacher malpractices include bad working conditions, poor management and stress. This situation had managerial implications that if teachers’ needs are not fulfilled, not provided with good working environment, welfare and wellbeing are not maintained per government regulations on teaching conditions, the malpractices would persist.