Causes of stress in public schools and its Impact on work performance of educators

Abstract

This article reports on educator stress in public schools. In doing so, the article sets the objectives of identifying the causes of stress in public schools of educators in KwaZulu-Natal. The data were collected by means of a stratified random sample drawn in a cross-sectional survey design of educators employed in public schools in four districts in KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. A total of 368 questionnaires (of which 350 were usable) were received from 1500 distributed questionnaires The theory on the causes of stress were empirically postulated and analysed by means of data employed exploratory factor analysis. In total seven key causes (factors) of educator stress were identified. These factors explain a favourable cumulative variance 69%, and are (in declining order of importance) Organizational support, Overload, Remuneration, Control, Job insecurity, Relationship opportunities and Growth opportunities.