Teachers' Sense of Efficacy and Commitment to Teaching

The present study examined the degree to which teachers' sense of efficacy, as well as other hypothesized influences on commitment to teaching, pre dicted 170 teachers' responses to the question, "Suppose you had it to do all over again: In view of your present knowledge, would you become a teacher?" General and personal efficacy emerged as the two strongest predictors of teaching commit ment, along with teacher-student ratio, school climate, and sex. In short, greater teaching commitment tended to be expressed by those teachers who were higher in both general and personal efficacy; who taught in schools with fewer students per teacher; and who worked under a principal regarded positively in the areas of in structional leadership, school advocacy, decision making, and relations with stu dents and staff. Teaching commitment also was higher for female teachers. DURING THE 1980s and into the current decade, educational researchers have demonstrated a keen interest in the construct of teacher efficacy,1 or "the extent to which teachers believe they can affect student learning" (Dembo & Gib son, 1985, p. 173). As is the case with such constructs as locus of control and self-efficacy, teacher efficacy refers to one's beliefs rather than to observable be