QUALITY OF BEGINNING TEACHERS OF A TEACHER TRAINING INSTITUTE: A SURVEY FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the degree of satisfaction of school administrators towards Postgraduate Course and Diploma in Teaching Course beginning teachers produced by a teacher training institute in Malaysia. These beginning teachers began their teaching as school teachers for the first six months they were posted to schools throughout Malaysia. The research design used in this study was the survey method. The instrument used to collect data was the Customer Satisfaction Questionnaire. Systematic random sampling was employed in this study. A total of 105 sets of questionnaires were posted to schools where the beginning teachers were teaching throughout Malaysia. A total of 83 (79.1%) sets of questionnaires were returned by the school administrators. This paper will discuss the level of satisfaction of school administrators with respect to four aspects as follows: (i) qualities of the beginning teacher; (ii) implementation of teaching and learning in the classroom; (iii) implementation of co-curriculum activities in school and (iv) tasks management in school. Some issues, challenges and expectations as voiced out by the school administrators regarding the beginning teachers will also be discussed.