Professional Commitment and Professional Marginalism in Teachers

Abstract

The article reviews teachers' attitudes towards the teaching profession which can be expressed both in professional commitment and in professional marginalism. The dominance of professional marginalism could affect destructively the students as well as the teacher’s personality, hence the issues related to the content of personal position of a marginal and the rate of marginalism among teachers. It was suggested that marginalism could be revealed in the study of professional commitment. The study involved 81 teachers of Sverdlovsk secondary schools aged 21—60 years with work experience ranging from 1 month to 39 years. The Professional Commitment Questionnaire was used as the study technique. The results showed that negative emotional attitude towards the profession and reluctance to leave the profession were grouped as a separate factor. The dispersion factor was 12,5%. The factor loadings ranged from 0.42 to 0.84. The study proved that professional marginalism in teachers includes dissatisfaction with work, feelings of resentment against profession and an unwillingness to leave the profession.

Keywords

• professional commitment
• professional loyalty
• professional outcast
• professional identity