Hvilke faktorer påvirker avgangselever ved videregående skoler sin intensjon om å søke, eller ikke søke, på barnehagelærerutdanning? : En kvantitativ spørreundersøkelse basert på Teorien om planlagt atferd

Abstract

Despite the fact that the kindergarten teacher education is a university course that has grown in the number of applicants in the recent years, there is still a need for more educated kindergarten teachers. The topic that I have chosen for this thesis is therefore “Which factors influence graduate high school students’ intention to apply, or not apply, for kindergarten teacher education?” This survey employs a quantitative research method, and the theoretical basis for this survey is based on the Theory of Planned Behavior. 120 graduates from various high schools in Vest-Agder participated in the survey, which was conducted using an online questionnaire. Concepts related to the theory of planned behavior that the questionnaire measured were related to the respondents' Attitude (A), Subjective Norm (SN), Descriptive Norm (DN), Perceived Behavioral Control (PBC) and Intension. The data was then processed in the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS 24). The analysis techniques used were regression- and correlation analyzes, in addition, the mean values were analyzed. This thesis emphasizes placing the results of this survey into the already existing kindergarten research. The results of this survey show that factors that to the greatest extent affect the respondents' intention to apply to, or not apply to, kindergarten teacher education are: (A) TPB-factors that mostly affect the respondents’ intention to apply, or not apply, for kindergarten teacher education concern expectations and social pressure from the respondent’s significant others (subjective and descriptive norms). (B) The kindergarten teacher’s salary level is the factor that to the greatest extent contributes to the respondents opting out of applying for the kindergarten teacher education. This factor also proved to be of greater importance to men than to women. (C) The ability for both further professional development and varied working days were factors that proved to be of importance to the respondents' intention to choose the kindergarten teacher education. Respondents stated that they considered there to be few opportunities for this working as a kindergarten teacher. This thesis can provide useful information in regards to for instance recruitment purposes for educational institutions and kindergartens. Gender-based inequalities in the results may also be of particular benefit in terms of recruitment of more men to the kindergartens.