Level of Stress and Coping Strategies of Public-School Teachers During COVID-19 Pandemic: The Case of Offshore and Philippine Teachers

Abstract

Studies have shown that teaching is a highly stressful profession. Teacher stress negatively affects classroom performance, job satisfaction, and the teacher’s ability to do their job. However, limited research has identified the role of stress management and coping mechanisms in the education community. The purpose of this study is to find the correlation between the levels of stress and coping strategies of Filipino public- school teachers, both local and off-shore, during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Purposive sampling was used to select 215 respondents in the United States and Sanchez-Mira, province of Cagayan in the Philippines. Levels of Stress questionnaire adapted from the Teacher Stressor Questionnaire of Center and Steventon (2001) was used to determine the respondents’ stress level, and BRIEF COPE adapted from Carver (1997) was utilized to measure the respondents’ level of coping. The 2-way ANOVA was applied to determine the significant differences between respondents’ demographic profiles, stress levels, and coping mechanisms. Pearson r was used to find out the relationship between the said variables. Differences between stress and subjects taught and grade level taught were found to be significant, as well as differences between coping and educational attainment. A weak correlation was established between the respondents’ stress levels and coping. A relationship between levels of stress and respondents’ subjects taught was found to be statistically significant. The relationship between coping and respondents’ educational attainment was also statistically significant.