Manpower or Relationships: An Empirical Study on Early Childhood Teachers’ Job Seeking (original) (raw)

2010

Abstract

ABSTRACT Chinese society values relationships; thus, this study attempts to discover if relationships are effective during job seeking. Due to a lower birth rate, many kindergartens in Taiwan have encountered difficulties in operation. This study investigates the following question: When recruiting teachers, will kindergartens focus on selecting candidates with higher education and professional certificates, in order to increase competitiveness, or will kindergartens focus on selecting candidates who have a relationship with the school? This study collected 1058 valid samples of teachers in 23 counties and cities in Taiwan, using stratified cluster random sampling. Results of statistical analysis showed that teachers with higher education, teaching experience, and professional certificates tend to acquire teaching positions with higher salaries. Moreover, educational factors significantly influence opportunities to acquire jobs in public early childhood education institutions, indicating that human capital is a priority. However, teaching positions secured using relationships tend to be in private institutions with lower salaries. Nowadays, in Taiwan, people need to invest in human capital in order to acquire ideal teaching positions in early childhood education, and not rely on relationships. The findings can serve as a reference for other countries influenced by Chinese culture.

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