Farah n Izzwandy, Managing Absenteeism Among Teachers at One Selected School

MANAGING ABSENTEEISM AMONG TEACHERS AT ONE SELECTED SCHOOL

PROBLEM STATEMENT Teacher absenteeism has figured prominently as the culprit in the wastage of education investments. A local daily newspaper, Daily Express dated 20th April 2006 published a report on absenteeism which is the main disciplinary problem affecting the Federal civil service. The Public Service Commission (PSC) of Malaysia Secretary, Mohd Yasin bin Mohd Salleh said that the General Orders terms absenteeism in the public sector as being absent from work without leave or permission or without giving any valid reason and there are many types of misconduct stated in the General Orders where disciplinary action can be taken by the disciplinary board of the respective Federal departments and agencies. He also said that the most common one is disappearing from the workplace without applying for any leave or getting permission or without good reasons. To overcome this problem, he said that the first move is to issue advice and guidance either orally or in writing to the teacher. And if the preliminary steps are ignored, action will be taken against the person concerned. Issuing warning will be the first step followed by imposing fines, revoking salary rights, withholding salary increment, salary reduction, demotion, and dismissal. Teacher absenteeism was rampant in Sabah's rural schools and there was no action had been taken against the teachers involved. Numerous reports were received from parents of students in rural schools that many teachers including principals are absent from classes for

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weeks in a given month. The explanation given by the teachers was that they had to attend meetings in the towns but the problem continues for months. Government and the Ministry of Education need to solve the issue once and for all in order to improve the conditions of rural school. INTRODUCTION Rates of employee absences and the effects of absences on productivity are topics of conversation in many organizations. One reason is that high rates of employee absence may signal weak management and poor labor-management relations. In the education sphere, employee absenteeism is a special problem, not only in terms of the cost to the school (payment to substitute teachers) but also the wasted education-time that is liable to impair the sense of confidence that the general public has in the schools. Students may eventually lose their desire to learn if the regular teacher is frequently absent and the curriculum is delivered by an array of substitute teachers. In essence, teacher absenteeism has important implications for school reform, teacher training, educational leadership, and issues related to social justice aimed at promoting equity and excellence in the schools (Bruno, 2002). Teachers who take time off from work, due to sickness, present problems for school principals, who must arrange for their work to be covered. Their absence has an impact on students and other teachers, as well as on the funds available to schools (Bowers, 2001). Teacher absenteeism is related both to student absenteeism and achievement. When a qualified educator is away from the classroom, student achievement is negatively affected. Teachers are the educational leaders in the classroom, and their roles cannot be compromised (Whitaker, 2001).

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DEFINITION OF ABSENTEEISM There are many variations to the definition of absenteeism. Defining absenteeism has not changed much in recent years and one simple definition that is being used is that of organizationally excused versus organizationally unexcused absences (Blau, 1985). The definitions of excused absence include categories such as personal sickness, jury duty, religious holidays, and funeral leave and transportation problems. Meanwhile, the unexcused absence meaning absenteeism without an official or recognized (excused) reason, that occurs when an employee fails to provide a satisfactory explanation for the absenteeism, or gives no reason at all (Walfin, 1981). Below are the working definitions of absenteeism: •

Based on Martocchio & Jimeno (2003), Absence constitutes a single day of missed work.

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Absence occurs whenever a person chooses to allocate time to activities that compete with scheduled work, either to satisfy the waxing and waning of underlying motivational rhythms (Fichman, 1984), or to maximize personal utility (Chelius, 1981).

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An individual’s lack of physical presence at a given location and time when there is a social expectation for him or her to be there (Martocchio & Harrison, 1993).

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Absenteeism refers to the non-attendance of employees for scheduled work (Gibsson, 1966; John, 1978; Jones, 1971).

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Hill and Thrist (1953; 1962) contributed a theory of absence as withdrawal from the stress of work situations, claiming as evidence for this proposition certain patterns of absence and accident rates recorded over a four-year period in a large steel company.

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Based on Chadwick-Jones, Brown, Nicholson, and Sheppard (1971), there are seven indices of absenteeism were used namely: 1. Absence frequency; 2. Attitudinal absence; 3. Other reasons – number of days in a week for any reason other than holidays, rest days, and certified sickness; 4. Worst day – difference score between number of individuals absent on any week’s ‘best’ and ‘worst’ days; 5. Time lost – number of days lost in a week for any reason other than leave; 6. Lateness – number of instances of tardiness in any week; 7. Blue Monday – number of individuals absent on a Monday minus number of individual absent on Friday of any week.

OBJECTIVES This research was done base on true experience as a teacher who are being placed in one of the school in Penang Island. Below are the objectives of this study: (a) To understand the phenomena of work absenteeism among teacher (b) To relate the factors contribute to teacher absenteeism (c) To investigate the impact of teacher absenteeism (d) To discuss the solution and how to manage teacher absenteeism

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LITERATURE REVIEW Teacher absenteeism is a serious problem for school systems. According to Eby & Freeman (1999), low commitment resulted in higher absenteeism rate. When employees are absent, employers have to bear the costs associated with absenteeism at the workplace. According to Zakaria (1988), absenteeism can be dysfunctional and financially costly. Firstly, it could upset and disrupt the daily operations of an affected unit or organization. Then, organizations have to bear the extensive cost of absenteeism, which includes both direct and indirect cost such as lost of productivity, use of contingent workers, and overtime cost. Although, there is no estimate on the cost implications of absenteeism in the educational field in Malaysia, however, when teachers are absent from work, not only are replacement teachers sought but these teachers have to be burdened with the workload of the absent teachers. Problems also arise when the replacement teachers are not skilled or unfamiliar with the subject taught giving rise to frustrations on the part of the students and the teachers concerned. Eventually, they felt angry, exhausted and stressed giving rise to lower motivation, increased job dissatisfaction and poor job performance. Thus, this kind of escape-avoidance behavior would not be beneficial to any profession.

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ORIGINS OF ABSENTEEISM Harrison and Martocchio (1998) indicated five loosely defined classes of variable hypothesized to be origins of absence which are: a) Personality Porter and Steers (1973) proposed that employees with extreme levels of emotional instability, anxiety, low achievement orientation, aggression, independence, and sociability were likely to be the most frequent absentees. b) Demographics The demographic variables were gender, age, tenure, education level and family characteristics. The individual’s demographic characteristic (personal factors, family characteristics) indirectly influence absenteeism through sets of medial variables such as expectations and job satisfaction and proximal constructs which is attendance motivation and ability to attend. c) Attitudes The main conceptual paradigm for absenteeism was to treat absence taking as individuallevel avoidance or withdrawal from a disliked work situation (Harison & Martocchio, 1998). However, Steers and Rhodes (1978) predicted that the effects of all other jobrelated and organizational variables on absence would work their way through job satisfaction. d) Social contact The influence of social context on absence is embodied in their conception of an absence culture which is defined as “the set of shared understanding about absence legitimacy and the established ‘custom and practice’ of employee absence behavior and its control”.

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There are two factors shape absence cultures: (a) the values and beliefs of the larger society and its subcultures, and (b) the unique set of beliefs bout shared by virtue of membership in an organization. e) Decision-making Researchers have depicted absence as the result of a daily choice process. Employees are assumed to make work attendance decisions in a way that strives toward utility maximization, making themselves as happy as possible, given finite resources of time and money (Ehrensberg & Smith, 1985).

CORRELATES OF TEACHER ABSENCE What factors are correlated with teacher absence? I.

Teacher Characteristics In our country, salaries are highly correlated with the teacher’s age, experience,

educational background, and rank such as head teacher status. Previous research reported that there is little evidence to suggest that higher salaries are significantly associated with lower absence. Head teachers are significantly more likely to be absent, and point estimates suggest better-educated and older teachers are on average absent more often. The coefficients on teacher characteristics suggest that along a number of dimensions, more powerful teachers are absent more. Men are absent more often than women, and head teachers are absent more often than regular teachers. In a number of cases, better-educated teachers appear to be absent more. These teachers may be less subject to monitoring.

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Theoretically, teachers from the local area might be absent less, because they care more about their students or are easier to monitor, or absent more because they have more outside opportunities and are harder to discipline with sanctions. Empirically, the previous research found that teachers who were born in the district of the school are more likely to show up for work. Local teachers are less likely to be absent and the coefficient for the combined sample is also significantly negative. II.

School Characteristics Working conditions can affect incentives to attend school, even where receipt of salary is

independent of attendance and hence provides no such incentive. School environment also affects absences; elementary schools, larger schools, and higher-poverty schools tend to have higher teacher absence rates. The size of a workplace seems to matter outside of education, too, and researchers believe that the extent of interdependence among workers, which falls with the size of a workplace, explains this relationship. And teachers are more likely to have more absences if their colleagues are absent more often. The lower teacher absence rate provides support for the idea that monitoring could affect absence. For example, the intensity of administrative oversight by Ministry of Education officials will give effect to the teacher attendance. Based on the previous study, it is proven that the schools which are closer to a Ministry of Education office have significantly lower absence. King and Ozler (2001) suggested that local control of schools may be associated with better performance by teachers. One measure of the degree of community involvement in the schools is the activity level of the Parent Teacher Association (PTA).

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FACTORS CONTRIBUTE TO TEACHER ABSENCE Why are teachers absent? There are various reasons given for teacher absence. Prominent stated reasons include teacher participation in educational workshops, in-service training sometimes lasting for several weeks, personal

problems,

traveling to administrative centers for salary compensation, and casual leave. Pregnancy and housework may affect female teachers.

Sometimes the absences were due to teachers having to perform official duties away from the school. For example in South Asian, teachers who are pulled away from classrooms to take part in all sorts of government duties ranging from helping to conduct population census to immunization campaigns, to assisting local politicians in various capacities. Regarding the issue of being away “on official-leave”, even if these teachers are genuine on leave; it is surprising that so many teachers would be on leave while school was in session.

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absenteeism. Another aspect of absenteeism is refusal to take up postings in desirable locations. For example, a significant number of newly trained teachers every year refuse posting to rural schools, and many of those who accept eventually will ask for a transfer to urban schools or quit teaching.

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Besides, work related stress is a major cause of occupational ill-health that may cause sickness absence, high turnover and poor performance in school. The personal illness was not the foremost reasons used when calling in sick. Family issues headed the list of all unscheduled absence, followed by personal illness and personal needs. Moreover, teachers who engage in private tutoring as a side occupation are less likely to be absent. This might reflect the fact that teachers might be using class time to recruit clients for their private sessions. However, the stated causes for teacher absenteeism often make the fact that the institutional environment does not really require teachers’ constant presence. At the root are limited authority by schools, lack of interest in enforcing sanctions, and the lack of parental involvement. Absenteeism is often lower among female teachers, among teachers born in the district where the school is located, among teachers who work in schools with better infrastructure, and among teachers of children whose parents are more literate. However, few studies have explicitly explored the linkages between accountability and absenteeism. Occupational stress has a more significance on the teachers’ professionalism, Stress level among technical teachers in technical schools in three states, which are Johor, Malacca, and Negeri Sembilan, there were five teacher stress sources that included in this study: pupil misbehavior, teacher workload, time and resources difficulties, interpersonal relationships, and recognition. Stress is one of the major factors contribute to teacher absenteeism.

IMPACT OF TEACHER ABSENTEEISM

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The impact is educationally significant. Research shows that teachers are the most important factor determining student achievement. Teachers’ absences affect student learning. Teams of researchers from Duke and Harvard found that teacher absences significantly reduce student achievement. To put the detrimental effects of teacher absence in terms of the welldocumented relationship between initial teaching experience and effectiveness, every 10 absences achievement lowers mathematics achievement by the same amount as having a teacher with one year to two years of experience instead of a teacher with three years to five years of experience. Teacher absences hinder learning in important ways. Substitute teachers or relief teachers are less qualified, on average, than regular teachers. In fact, most of the substitute teachers do not require a bachelor’s degree. When the regular teacher is absent, academic instruction is almost simply less intense. In fairness, substitutes are often constrained by low expectations and weak organization on the part of the regular teacher. Other problem is, when teachers are absent from work, not only are replacement teachers sought but these teachers have to be burdened with the workload of the absent teachers. Problems also arise when the replacement teachers are not skilled or unfamiliar with the subject taught giving rise to frustrations on the part of the students and the teachers concerned. Other teacher or relief teacher also busy with their subject or work and they are not able to give full attention to the replacement class. Sometimes the relief teacher just come to the class and monitors the class but not teaching. On the other hand, when there are no sufficient teachers at that moment, the class will be abandon and any unwanted thing and tragedy can happen inside the class such as bullying, out of control, vandalism, fighting and truancy problem.

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Teacher absences also disrupt the routines and relationships that support learning. A teacher may need to reallocate instructional time to review classroom rules and procedures upon returning from an absence, perhaps in addition to having to perform a full re-teaching of the lesson that was meant to occur on the day of the absence.

MANAGING TEACHER ABSENTEEISM Teacher absenteeism is not a healthy practice and steps should be taken to manage it effectively. There are few steps of keeping absenteeism to a minimum. •

Increase salary: Salary increases may improve teacher attendance. Thus, they may no longer have to work part-time or engaging in private tutoring as a side occupation and are not being burdened with the workload, exhausted and stressed which eventually giving rise to lower motivation and poor job performance.

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Motivation: Keeping the teacher motivated and try making the school a fun place to work is of the best way to encourage the teacher and reduce absenteeism.

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Rewards or incentives schemes: Combinations of incentives could reduce levels of teacher absence enough to pay for themselves. Teachers in Aldine, Texas, for example, receive a bonus for excellent attendance record over a school year, defined as two or fewer days of absence.

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Create an Absenteeism Policy: Teachers respond to changes in absence-control policies. For example, teachers who are required to report absences directly to their principal by telephone are absent less often than teachers using impersonal

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reporting systems. These insights show that while the causes are multidimensional, policymakers do have the power to reduce absence rates. •

Introduce a co-payment scheme: In America, teachers have to pay co-payments for absences over and above the standard allocation, suggests that a more complete implementation of co-payments could reduce students’ exposure to teacher absences without costing districts more and without taking money out of the average teacher’s pocket.

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Bonuses: Teachers are also

absent less often when bonuses are given for

exceptionally high attendance or schemes in which districts buy back unused sick leave are available. •

Counseling: The headmaster or the counselor should concern about the teacher at the school especially those who are more often absent from work. They also should give attention to all teachers in the school. These approaches can help the school management solve the problem.

CONCLUSION Teacher absences can cause financial difficulties. There is no easy solution to the problem of supply cover costs, but more effective management can reduce negative impacts. Absenteeism also a series issue that requires immediate attention by teacher, headmaster and school management. Besides, new approach and improved policies around absence could reduce students’ exposure to teacher absences while generating a net savings for employers. Teacher absences also have a negative effect on student achievement.

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Blau, G. (1985). Relationships of extrinsic, intrinsic, and demographic predictors to various types of withdrawal behaviours. Journal of Applied Psychology, 70, 442-450.

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Bowers, T. (2001). Teacher Absenteeism and Ill-Health Retirement: A Review. Cambridge Journal of Education 31.2

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Bruno, J.E. (2002). The geographical distribution of teacher absenteeism in large urban school district settings: Implications for school reform efforts aimed at promoting equity and excellence in education. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 10 (32).

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Chadwick-Jones, J.K., Brown, C.A., Nicholson, N., and Sheppard, C. (1971). Absence measures: Their reliability and stability in an industrial setting. Personnel Psychology, 24, 463-470.

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Chelius, J.R. (1981). Understanding absenteeism: The potential contribution of economic theory. Journal of Business Research, 9, 409-418.

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Daily Express (accessed April 20, 2006)

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Eby, L.T., & Freeman, D.M. (1999). Motivational bases of affective organizational commitment. A partial test of an integrative theoretical model. Journal of occupational & Organizational Psychology, 72(4), 463-484.

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Ehrensberg, R.G., & Smith, R.S. (1985). Modern labor economics (2nd ed.). Glenview, IL: Scott Foresman.

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Gibsson, J.O. (1966). Toward a conceptionalisation of absence behavior of personal in organizations. Administrative Science Quarterly, 2, 107-133.

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Harison, D.A., & Martocchio, J.J. (1998). The time for absenteeism: A 20-year review of origins, offshoots, and outcomes. Journal of Applied Psychology, 25, 305-350.

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Hill, J.M.M., and Thrist E.L. (1955). A consideration of industrial accidents as a means of withdrawal from the work situation. Human Relations, 6, 357-380.

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John, G. (1978). Attitudinal and non-attitudinal predictors of two forms of absence from work. Organizational Behaviour and Human Performance, 22, 431-444.

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Jones, R.M. (1971). Absenteeism: Manpower papers no. 4. London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office.

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King, E.M., and Ozler, B. (2001). “What’s decentralization got to do with learning endogenous school quality and student performance in Nicaragua.” World Bank.

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Martocchio, J.J., & Harrison, D.A. (1993). To be there or nor to be there? Questions, theories, and methods in absence research. Research in Personal and Human Resources Management, 11, 259-329.

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Martocchio, J.J., & Jimeno, D.I. (2003). Employee absenteeism as an affective event. Human Resources Management, 11, 259-329.

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Porter, L.W., and Steers, R.M. (1973). Organizational, work, and personal factors in employee turnover and absenteeism. Journal of Applied Psychology, 72, 275-286.

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Press release entitle “PBS: Solve Teacher Absenteeism in Rural Schools” (accessed April 17, 2000)

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Steers, R.M., & Rhodes, S.R., (1978). Major Influences on Employee Attendance: A Process Model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 63 (4), 391-407.

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Walfin (1981). The connection between absence and substitutions in Israeli industry. Masters thesis, Tel-Aviv University (Hebrew).

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Whitaker, C.S. (2001). The management of sickness absence. Occupational and Environmental Medicine (58), 6, 420.

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Zakaria, I. (1988). A study of factors affecting performance and absenteeism among employees of a public service organization in Malaysia. Journal of Management, 6&7, 45-55.

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