Teaching as a Career Choice: English Department Students’ Motivation (Study at Tarbiyah Faculty UIN Ar- Raniry)

This study reports on findings from an investigation into the motivation for pursuing teaching as a career choice for English student teacher from at Islamic University of Ar-Raniry. The study was carried out qualitatively and 18 students participated from Islamic University of Ar-Raniry responded to in-depth interview in order to identify motivation and factors that influence someone to choose teaching as a career. It is considered that there are some motivations why student teachers choose teaching as a career. Identified factors influencing the choice of teaching including an influence of others, motivational influences (including intrinsic, altruistic and extrinsic motivation), and socio-cultural influences. This research is primarily based on the FIT-Choice Model which includes a specific set of pre-defined motivational influences of respondents rank adhere to content analysis of the emergent data revealed some reasons which were broadly categorized as intrinsic, extrinsic, and altruistic. The findings depict mostly participants of this study seemed to be interested in the teaching career chiefly due to intrinsic and altruistic motivation than extrinsic motivation . The student teacher consider about the intrinsic value of teaching were being more important career motivation for them which were followed by perceived ability. Both male and female participants were more intrinsically and socially motivated. Given the significant numbers of females who choose teaching as a career, a greater focus on influences on the choice of teaching for both males and females would be expected.