A qualitative study on incentive failure for college students in volunteer teaching programs

Area of Science:

• Education
• Sociology
• Psychology

Background:

• Volunteer teachers are crucial for education in underdeveloped areas.
• Challenges include low retention, enthusiasm, and high turnover rates among volunteer teachers.
• Effective incentive strategies are needed to sustain volunteer participation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the reasons behind incentive failure among volunteer teachers.
• To construct a theoretical model explaining the mechanism of incentive failure.
• To identify strategies for improving volunteer incentive mechanisms.

Main Methods:

• Qualitative research employing grounded theory methodology.
• In-depth interviews with 36 volunteer teachers.
• Participatory observation of 11 volunteer teachers' daily work.
• Constant comparative analysis and three-stage coding (open, axial, selective).

Main Results:

• Extrinsic factors for incentive failure: insufficient organizational vitality, institutional deficiencies, and imbalanced societal attention.
• Intrinsic factor for incentive failure: difficulty in self-worth identity.
• A mechanism model of incentive failure for volunteer teachers was developed.

Conclusions:

• Findings highlight the need to enhance organizational vitality and institutional frameworks.
• Recommendations include balancing societal attention and supporting self-worth identity.
• Strategies focus on improving the overall volunteer incentive mechanism in education.