Title: Organisational factors influencing teachers' inner sense of affective commitment to their schools in high- and low-accountability environments

Authors: Knut-Andreas Christophersen; Eyvind Elstad; Are Turmo

Addresses: Department of Political Science, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1097, Blindern, 0317 Oslo, Norway ' Department of Teacher Education and School Research, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1099, Blindern, 0317 Oslo, Norway ' The Norwegian Centre for Science Education, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1106, Blindern, 0317 Oslo, Norway

Abstract: Affective commitment to a school organisation is a psychological link between a teacher and his or her school. The purpose of the article is to compare the statistical associations between organisational variables in a steering environment with assessment-based school accountability and in a steering environment without any assessments. We explore the link between the level of accountability and teachers' affective commitment. The results indicate that accountability has an indirect effect on commitment via its effect on leadership. The results indicate that principal-teacher relationships play an important role in fostering commitment in both low- and high-accountability environments.

Keywords: management in education; affective commitment; high accountability; low accountability; informal learning; job autonomy; school leadership; educational management; teachers; organisational variables; organisational factors; psychological links; steering environments; assessments; principal-teacher relationships; head-teacher relationships; secondary education; high schools; Norway.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMIE.2015.066352

International Journal of Management in Education, 2015 Vol.9 No.1, pp.111 - 128

Published online: 21 Jan 2015 *

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