Initial Motivations for Teaching, Professional Engagement, and Career Development Aspirations: Indonesian Students' Perspectives

• In Event: Pathways to Teaching: Motivations and Deliberations When Entering the Profession

Abstract

This paper reports on a study investigating Indonesian students’ motivations to enter teacher education and their career aspirations measured by the Factors Influencing Teaching Choice scale (FIT-Choice; Watt & Richardson, 2007), the Professional Engagement and Career Development Aspirations scale (PECDA; Watt & Richardson, 2008) and the Religious Commitment Inventory-10 (RCI-10; Worthington et al., 2003). Participants were 802 Indonesian final-year student teachers from four universities (M age=21.61 years, SD=2.31, 83.16% women). Interests and enjoyment in teaching, desire to help disadvantaged youth, religious beliefs, perceptions about the expertise of the profession and satisfaction with teaching as a career choice positively impacted the effort future teachers planned to put into their teaching. These findings are critical to improve the quality of future teachers.

Author

• Anne Suryani, LIFT Foundation