The status of morale of faculty members at West Visayas State University: Its predictors and association with their perception of their immediate supervisors’ leadership style

Abstract

The main purpose of this research was to describe the status of morale of faculty members at West Visayas State University, La Paz, Iloilo City, during the second semester of school year 1993 — 1994. It also sought to determine whether the status of their morale was associated with their perception of the leadership style of their immediate supervisors. Likewise, it aimed at ascertaining how the status of their morale might be associated/correlated with their age, sex, marital status, financial remuneration, and length of teaching experience. Moreover, this study determined which of these variables, namely: age, sex, marital status, financial remuneration, length of teaching experience, and leadership style, could serve as good predictors of status of morale of the faculty members under study. The respondents of this investigation included all the 136 faculty members doing full-time classroom teaching in the College of Arts and Sciences, College of Education, Elementary Laboratory School, Secondary Laboratory School and College of Nursing, during the time of this research. Faculty members who were on-leave, part-time teachers, nonteaching personnel, and faculty members in the Graduate School, College of Medicine, PESCAR (Physical Education, Sports, Cultural, and Recreation) Insitute and those in Lambunao and Tigbauan campuses were excluded from the study. To describe the status of morale of the faculty members, the Morale Questionnaire — Adopted (MQ—A) was used while the Task-Person Orientation Questionnaire was utilized in determining the leadership style of their immediate supervisors as perceived by the faculty members. Statistical tools employed in the study were means, percentage, standard deviation, Pearson r, chi-square, Eta, Partial r, Multiple Regression Analysis, and Multiple Classification Analysis. The significance level of the relationships was set at .05. The findings showed that of the 136 teacher— respondents, only thirty-seven or 27.2 percent were males while ninety—nine or 72.8 percent were females. The respondents were in their early forties, their mean age being 40.87 years. Ninety—nine or 67.6 percent were married while only forty-four or 32.4 percent were single. The mean financial remuneration of the respondents was P 5,739.69 per month while their median income was P 5,201.00. The lowest income received was P 3,000 while the highest was P 17,770. More than one-third (38.2 percent) had been teaching from 10 — 18 years. The respondents’ mean number of years in teaching was 16.06 years. On the whole, the respondents had moderate morale. Those in the College of Arts and Sciences, College of Education and College of Nursing tended to have moderate morale. On the other hand, the teachers in the Elementary and Secondary Laboratory Schools tended to have high morale. Relative to the various aspects of morale, namely: cooperation with others, confidence in self, respect for and consideration for each other's ideas, opinions and suggestions, enthusiasm for work, loyalty to and pride in work, unity in doing or accomplishing a task, and capacity to endure difficulties, it was found out that the teachers had high morale in terms of (a) cooperation with others, (b) unity in doing or accomplishing a task, and (c) capacity to endure difficulties. On the other hand, the respondents had moderate morale in terms of (a) confidence in self, (b) respect for and consideration for each other's ideas, opinions and suggestions, (c) enthusiasm for work, and (d) loyalty to and pride in work. The faculty members in all the five groups studied perceived their immediate supervisors as Idiographic. The findings further showed that status of morale was not significantly correlated/associated with age, financial remuneration, length of teaching experience, sex, marital status, and the teachers' perception of their immediate supervisors' leadership style. Of the variables studied as predictors of status of morale, only marital status was found out to be a good predictor of status of morale. The researcher recommends that the findings of this study should be presented to the faculty members' immediate supervisors and administrator as basis for discussion of other personal and work-related concerns of the teachers which might have some bearing on the status of their morale. These administrator and supervisors could create committees to survey the personal and work-related concerns of the teachers and they could discuss the pressing ones as revealed by the survey. After this, the administration and the faculty can plan and decide on the activities/programs that they can jointly undertake in improving the socio-psychological environment or the so-called "climate" or "spirit" in the university. It is further recommended that sessions between deans/principals and teachers on assessing the latter's problems in teaching and working, especially in inter—personal relationships, should be done in each school/college at least once every semester. The result of these should be confidentially reported to and discussed with the school president so that appropriate measures and sound policies on human resources development could be formulated and implemented. To raise morale it is recommended that without neglecting organizational goals, the educational leaders in the university should evaluate and modify their approach in satisfying the faculty members' work-related needs, with the hope of enhancing the latter's level of morale. Moreover, items in the morale questionnaire in which the teachers scored very low should be looked into. This measure may yield procedures to be instituted in order to improve morale. The immediate supervisors should constantly monitor and strictly supervise the classroom and school activities of the teachers in order to balance the person—orientation and task—orientation of these supervisors. This monitoring and supervision could be done through observations of teachers' school work routine and interviews with them. These supervisors should make a survey of work-related problems and needs of their teachers, with special attention to those of the married teachers, knowing that these teachers have lower morale than the single teachers. Likewise, the immediate supervisors should make conscientious effort to follow up the reactions or responses of teachers to their courses of action so that they can take appropriate actions to solve any problem that might arise. The immediate supervisors and the school administrator should continuously provide more incentives like commendations to the faculty members who have outstanding/commendable performance in the university and/or the community that have brought honor to the University. Finally, it is recommended that further studies be conducted on: (a) the status of morale of faculty members in the College of Medicine, Graduate School, and those on Lambunao campus; (b) the status of morale of the members of non-teaching staff; (c) correlation studies on faculty members' status of morale and immediate supervisors' leadership style as perceived by themselves; (d) the status of morale of faculty members of other state colleges and universities; (e) the relationship between status of morale and job performance; and (e) the relationship between morale and other personal and work—related factors not included in this study which might influence status of teachers' morale.