A Case Study of Early Career Teachers’ Challenges and Coping Strategies in Higher Education
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.63075/t7daw014Abstract
With the growth of the higher education systems all over the world, the burden become 2-fold as early career teachers (ECTs) continue to frame their professional identities on one hand, and become exposed to complicated academic settings on the other. The paper examines nursing problems in the ECTs present in institutions of higher learning and coping mechanisms ECTs utilize to balance their workload, institutional stresses, and pedagogic roles. The qualitative case study design was used, with 10 early career faculty studies in 3 public universities as its focal point. Semi-structured interviews and the analysis of institutional documents were used to gather data, and NVivo software was used to analyze the data thematically. The research problem of the study is that ECTs in university are under specific stressors not only teaching-related, but also those associated with teaching research, administration, and role confusion. Some of the notable results include that ECTs tend to have emotional burnout, poor time management, and inadequate mentorship. They however cope with informal peer networks, reflective practices in teaching, and adaptive time structuring. The results are consistent with foreign research, but they also provide some locally particular issues including academic ranks cultures and inaccessibility to professional development. The research finds that institutions need an orderly induction program, a mentoring system, and even a flexible models of workload to assist early career faculty retention and achievement. Prospective studies ought to analyze the long-term effects of the institutional support on career paths and ECT development.
