Motivational school climate and teachers' achievement goal orientations: A hierarchical approach

Teachers' achievement goal orientations are known to affect teachers' beliefs and behaviour. In contrast, we know relatively little on how school climate is associated with teachers' achievement goals, even though theoretical ideas can be derived from self-determination theory and empirical research on the impact of goal structures. The few studies that exist on the issue are limited as analyses were only conducted at the individual level and subsequent findings can, thus, not be interpreted as climate effects.

We aimed to overcome this shortcoming by analysing associations between teachers' perception of school motivational climate and their achievement goal orientations at individual and at school level. We postulated that at school level a school's learning goal structure, autonomy-supportive leadership, positive feedback culture, and a collaborative climate would be associated with teachers' learning goal orientation, whereas a school's performance goal structure was supposed to align with teachers' performance (approach and avoidance) goal orientation.

A total of 532 teachers from 40 different schools filled out questionnaires on their achievement goal orientations and aspects of their work context.

We used hierarchical linear modelling to analyse effects at individual and at school level.

Teachers' learning goal orientations and their performance avoidance goal orientations varied significantly across schools. Positive perceptions of schools' feedback culture at school level corresponded positively with learning goal orientations, and collaborative climate was negatively associated with performance (approach and avoidance) goal orientations.

The results underline the importance of schools' motivational climate for teacher motivation and provide a starting point for developing strategies of workplace development.