Assessing the level of job satisfaction of some educators in the Vaal Triangle

Abstract

A country’s education system is a vital component of the country’s success. Without an excellent education system, our social, economic and financial positioning becomes threatened. At the heart of our education system lie our educators. Good educators are the key to an excellent education system. The loss of educators to the education system is significantly more than the current influx of qualified educators into schools. A great concern is why the South African education system is losing such large quantities of qualified and experienced educators. The literature review of this study focused on the factors contributing to job (dis)satisfaction and how it impacts on educators. Various sources were used to complete the literature study. The empirical study was done by means of quantitative research by distributing questionnaires to participating schools in the Vaal Triangle District. The educators at each of these schools were asked to complete a questionnaire that focussed on the issues that may contribute to job (dis)satisfaction and were divided into different sub-sections. The results were analysed and interpreted and certain recommendations were made in terms of the direct results and conclusions raised by the empirical study. The primary objective of this study was to determine the level of job satisfaction among some educators in the Vaal Triangle schools. The researcher looked at various trends in the education system and collected data relating to the determinants of job (dis)satisfaction in the school environment. The study showed that educators within the study population were not satisfied with their working conditions and should these issues be addressed by Department of Education, it could lead to fewer educators leaving the education system to seek work elsewhere.