Linking School-Based Tangible Non-Monetary Incentives For Teachers With Students’ Academic Performance In Public Secondary Schools In Kisumu West Sub-County, Kenya

Abstract

Over-time, tangible non-monetary incentives have been used in teacher motivation in internal school settings with the aim of improved students’ academic performance. In this regard, Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education varies from school to school despite generally similar teacher training background giving rise to corresponding scale-wise pay packages. Kisumu West sub-county continuously trails the neighbouring Kisumu Central and Kisumu East and Kisumu North with an average mean of more than 1.0 over the period 2013 to 2015. In addition in 2015 for instance, the best two schools in Kisumu West Sub County had mean scores of 10.94 and 8.99 respectively while the last two had 2.55 and 3.10 respectively. This disparity raises concerns among the education stakeholders in the Sub- County. Motivation theorists believe that performance is a results from some reward-induced effort. The purpose of this study was therefore to establish school-based tangible non-monetary incentives for teachers’ influence on students’ academic performance in public secondary schools in Kisumu West Sub County. Holistic Operation Model (Abagi and Odipo, 1997) guided the study. The study adopted descriptive survey and correlational research design. The target population consisted of 30 public secondary schools with 354 teachers and 30 Principals. Through Yamane’s formula, 187 teachers, 27 Principals, and 4 CSOs were selected as the study sample. Questionnaire was used to collect data from teachers and principals, while interview schedule was used to collect data from CSOs. Qualitative data obtained from interviews and document analysis was analyzed through thematic analysis and grouped into thematic areas. Quantitative data from questionnaire was analyzed by correlation. The study found that tangible non-monetary incentives, according to teachers at (M=2.18; SD=0.90) and principals at (M=2.39; SD=0.94) are moderate. However, tangible non-monetary incentives have an insignificant influence at r=.805 at p-value of 0.5. Therefore, the study concludes that tangible non-monetary incentives motivate teachers to insignificantly influence students’ academic performance in public secondary schools. This study may be useful to school managements and administrators in guided investment in teacher motivational activities that influence academic performance.