Motivations for choosing the teaching profession in students entering higher education

Abstract

Several research studies have highlighted the importance of the teacher’s work in the academic success of students. An important aspect within this scenario of multiple incident factors associated with teachers would be, among many others, the characteristics of their pedagogical practice, the resources they use and, not least, the motivations they have had and that led them to enter an academic teacher training program. It is in this sense that this research is oriented, through which it is intended to identify the interests and motivations that have led a group of 119 high school graduates to choose a Bachelor’s degree program as their life and work project. This program has been offered in a public university for three semesters and has proven to be highly relevant in the social environment given the high volume of applications for admission that have been presented during this time. For this purpose, an ad hoc questionnaire was designed with four sections where general motivations, intrinsic motivations, transcendent motivations and extrinsic motivations are evaluated. In all four categories of analysis, a Likert scale with five levels of acceptance is considered. The results allow us to identify as the main motivation the pleasure of working with children together with their teaching vocation, but they lack pedagogical competencies that are expected to be solved as they advance in their professional training process.