An Investigation into Collaborative Stakeholder Engagement’s Effect on Teacher Professional Development Implementation in Kenya

Abstract

Quality education is attributed to the quality of teaching. Teacher Professional Development (TPD) is vital towards improved quality of teaching in Kenya. To achieve this, Teachers Service Commission (TSC) rolled out TPD, whose successful implementation is at risk due to criticism from various stakeholders. This study sought to investigate the effect of stakeholder collaboration on implementation of TPD in Kenya. It adopted a descriptive survey study design. The study targeted a population of 327349 teachers from public schools and 188 TPD coordinators from accredited TPD service providers. Using the Krejcie and Morgan Table of 1970, a sample of 384 teachers, and 8 TPD coordinators was adequate for the study. However, to increase the statistical power of the study, the researcher used a sample of 404 respondents. Simple random sampling was used to identify one institution accredited to offer TPD. Each accredited institution enrolled teachers across Kenya. Exponential non-discriminative snowball sampling was used to select teacher respondents. TPD coordinators were selected by purposive sampling. Cluster sampling was used to ensure all the regions were included in the study. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected using questionnaires and interviews respectively. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics by way of frequencies, mean and standard deviations as well as inferential statistics including Pearson correlation and simple linear regression. The findings showed a significant positive effect of stakeholder collaboration on implementation of TPD. Effects of stakeholder collaboration explained a significant proportion of variation in implementation of TPD with, (t=2.536, B =.285, p<.0001). The study concluded that an increase in stakeholder collaboration positively influenced implementation of TPD. It recommended establishment of an institution mandated to conduct TPD-related activities in Kenya and work in collaboration with relevant education sector stakeholders in order to effectively implement TPD.