Threats to Building a Gender-Balanced Teaching Workforce: Insights from Prospective Male Students on Considering the Teacher Training Course in Manicaland Province, Zimbabwe

Abstract

The qualitative study explored the views of prospective male students on considering teacher training and joining the teaching profession in the study area. A group of ten male participants was chosen through purposive and snowballing sampling techniques. All the participants had five Ordinary Level passes including English Language, Mathematics and Science. An interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) was done to the collected data after administering a questionnaire with qualitative questions and unstructured interviews. Findings from the study reveal that the teaching profession has lost its glitter and is no longer regarded as a noble profession owing to high learner-teacher ratios and insurmountable workloads. The respondents surveyed also bemoaned poor remuneration which leads to teacher incapacitation in meeting survival and work needs. This had a ripple effect on low morale and loss of dignity which often end in male teachers considering abandoning the profession for greener pastures. The study recommends that the employer should improve the working conditions for the male teachers so as to keep the profession attractive for the new entrants. The schools are encouraged to adopt the system of income generating projects to assist these struggling teachers in order to attract more teacher trainees in future.