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Ho 4: There is no significant difference among the categories of special

school teachers’ perception in terms of the special needs children (disability groups) they teach and retention of special education teachers in Southern Ghama.

The hypothesis sought to find out if there were any significant differences among the category of teachers in specials needs schools (Deaf, Blind and Mentally Challenged) in terms of the children they taught (disability groups)

and their retention. To test the hypothesis, data on special education teacher’s retention were collected from the responses of the three groups of teachers. One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) statistical method was used to compare the means of the three different groups of special education teachers with regard to their retention. Tables 4.17 show the output of the data from the One-Way ANOVA analysis.

Table 4.17: One – Way ANOVA Source of

Variation

Sum of Squares

df Mean Square F Sig.

Between Groups 29.604 2 14.802 .353 .703

Within Groups 5748.532 137 41.960

Total 5778.136 139

Table 4.17 clearly revealed that, no significant differences were found with regards to retention among the three groups of teachers namely teachers of the Deaf, teachers of the Blind and teachers of the Intellectually Challenged (F = 0.353; df = 2, 137, p > 0.05). This may be due to the fact that their conditions of service remained the same. The implication of this finding was that the hypothesis should be accepted, so the null hypothesis stating that there was no significant difference among the three different categories of teachers with regard to their retention was accepted. Therefore, the ANOVA test was not statistically significant. The evidence from Table 4.16 was enough to infer that the means of the three teacher groups did not differ significantly. Hence, it was deduced with 95% confidence that the perception on teacher retention

among the three different categories of special needs education teachers studied was the same.

From the descriptive analysis of the responses regarding the differences in special needs education teachers’ perception on quitting special education, it could be concluded that though teachers from various categories had slightly different opinions on retention, there was no significant differences relating to the type of school they taught. According to the findings of the study, as revealed in Table 4.16, all the teachers showed their dissatisfaction with their job and that demonstrate their intention to quit special needs education profession. This is indicated by their respective mean values. The results from Table 4.16 showed that teachers of the Deaf had a grand mean score of 2.41 with a standard deviation of 1.14 and teachers of the Blind had a grand mean score of 2.48 with a standard deviation of 1.23 whilst teachers of the Intellectually Challenged scored a grand mean value of 2.32 and a standard deviation 1.05. These mean values were all below the average mean of 2.5 and were very close to each other, thus differences in the mean values are not significant. The test statistics also revealed that there were no statistically significant differences among the teachers in these three school types in relation to their job satisfaction and retention.

The present study has revealed that majority of the special education teachers from the three different schools had similar negative perception about their job satisfaction and wished to leave the profession at the least opportunity. Furthermore, the result of this study is unique in that the majority of the

research studies focus on different categories of teachers in the mainstream education and not in the special education sector. This finding was a departure from the finding by Otube (2004) who investigated job motivation of teachers educating learners with special needs in four provinces in Kenya and found that teachers serving in special schools and integrated schools were almost equally positively motivated by similar factors.

Bruster (2014) also compared the perceptions of general and special education teachers and found a significant difference between high school general education teachers and high school special needs education teachers’ overall perceptions on inclusion. In a related study, Luckner and Hanks (2003) examined the perceptions of a national sample of teachers of students who are deaf or hard of hearing to assess how satisfied or dissatisfied they were with their jobs. The results of the study found that teachers of students who were deaf or hard of hearing were in general satisfied with their jobs. These findings contradict the finding of the present study. However, the possible reasons for these varied and sometimes contradicting findings could be due to the fact that the studies were undertaken in different countries and different times. Moreover, the working conditions for the teachers may differ across space and time. Additionally, the use of different methods and sample populations may account for the differences in the findings.

Despite the finding that there was no significant differences in relation to teacher types, the finding of the present study is in line with Sheldrake (2013) who compared administrator and special education teacher perceptions of

special education teacher attrition and retention in the Mountain Park School District, Northwest United States. The results of the surveys from the two sub- groups concluded that there was no statistically significant difference between the perception of administrators and special education teacher with regards to their perception of the causes of high special education teacher attrition. Furthermore, the current had been supported by the finding of Ngimbudzi (2009) who investigated job satisfaction among secondary school teachers in Njombe District of Tanzania and found no significant differences in relation to teacher type.

4.7 Challenges Facing Special Needs Schools in Relations to Retention of