Career choice in teaching among engineering graduates: a study of the altruistic, extrinsic and intrinsic factors

Abstract

The Indian higher education system is the third largest in the world producing immensely talented manpower, winning accolades all across the world. But the system faces faculty crunch majorly in the engineering education sector failing to attract this huge talent pool towards teaching professions. The study analyses the effect of altruistic, extrinsic and intrinsic factors pertaining to the choice of teaching career using survey research-based statistical analysis and analytic hierarchy process (AHP). The results of AHP reveal Intrinsic factor as the highest ranked factor affecting teaching career decisions which is supported by the consistency ratio (CR) value (0.033 <= 0.10). The effect of age, gender and program of study is also studied which reveal that age and program of study has significant effect on the intrinsic factor. The paper finally recommends policy amendments relating to the intrinsic factor so that more students could be attracted towards teaching profession.