Correlates of Commitment to Career Choices of Pre- Service Education Students in Selected Universities in Kenya

Petronila N. Mwangi
University of Eastern Africa, Baraton
Email: mwangip@ueab.ac.ke

Abstract: The study attempted to establish the correlates of commitment to career choice of pre-service education students in six public and private universities in Kenya. The third and fourth year pre-service education students were the respondents in this study. Correlational research design and concurrent mixed method approach was employed in this study. Purposive, cluster and convenience sampling methods were used. Data were gathered by the use of questionnaires and interviews. In data analysis, frequencies, means, standard deviation, linear regression and Pearson product moment correlation coefficient were used. The pre-service education students were found to be moderately committed to their career choice and that intrinsic motivation, self-concept, status of the teaching profession, fallback and socio-cultural beliefs were correlated to career choice. Fallback however had an inverse correlation to the commitment of career choice. The study recommends that factors which motivate pre-service education student’s choice of teaching as a career should be clearly understood, so that only students motivated by those factors which were found to promote commitment, like intrinsic motivation, self-concept, status of the teaching profession and social cultural beliefs are the ones placed to train as teachers.