In the Government run colleges, the turnover of teachers, i.e, movement of teachers from one to the other takes place because of the transfer policy of the Government; but in most private colleges, turnover of employees, especially the teachers turnover is due to several reasons. A zero rate of labour turnover is impossible to find since in any organization some compulsory separation, will always occur due to unavoidable reasons. Whatever may be the causes of labour/teachers turnover, the high turnover of teachers has a great impact on the quality of higher education. The private management must play a very important role in this regard. They should try to find out the reasons for the high rate of turnover and then take appropriate steps to remove the causes of faculty turnover or at least try to mitigate it.
Seeking for government jobs followed by better job opportunities and salaries are found to be the major reasons for teachers leaving their jobs in the college they are teaching in.
Labour turnover represents serious financial loss to the educational institutions too. When separation occurs, replacements have to be selected, recruited and trained to fill up such vacancies at various intervals.
The cost of teacher turnover is made up of some of the following components:
1. Loss of time while replacement is being found
2. Quality of teaching is affected
3. Students’ understanding capacity is affected
4. Cost of selection, recruitment and training of the replacement
5. Lower quality during the learning period of the replacement
6. Administrative and other incidental cost of removing the leaver and adding the replacement to the payroll
Some of the suggestions that can improve the situation are:
1. Government can grant fund for library development, office up gradation, amenities for sports and other co-curricular activities at least in their initial period of development.
2. University can help the constituent colleges getting financial aid from the UGC by examining their academic performances, as first priority.
3. Management of Private colleges can facilitate teachers to avail UGC sponsored programmes such as Refresher Courses, Orientation Programme, Summer Institutes, Seminars, Workshops, etc. which are short duration courses and futuristic that comes under the Faculty Improvement Programme (FIP), emphasized by the UGC.
4. Private colleges in Nagaland can be brought under the Deficit Aided Scheme on fulfillment of certain laid down criterias by concerned colleges as implemented in some states.
5. Framed out Service Rules for security and permanency of the employees.
6. Regular increments at various stages, EPF, gratuity, medical and other employment benefits to employees.
Private colleges in Nagaland constitute about 80% of the Total Colleges in the state. There are all together 57 Private Colleges (38 Secular and 19 Non-Secular) and 19 Government Secular Colleges (including technical education). Among the private Colleges some are proprietoral and others are either run by societies, churches, community or other such organizations. In enrolment strength too, the private colleges feed 80% of the total students’ admissions out of which private Colleges produce much better results than the Government run colleges do.
In spite of this fact, private colleges do not get adequate financial support. Salaries of private colleges teachers are governed by the private managements, which differs from college to college. Turnover of private teachers from one to the other are more common and frequent because of the different pay structure in the colleges. The government college teachers are paid 4-5 times higher for the same amount of workload. Unless this higher rate of turnover of private teachers are checked by taking appropriate measures and brought at par with the Government teachers, the quality of higher education in Nagaland would remain jeopardized for the years to come.
Seeking for government jobs followed by better job opportunities and salaries are found to be the major reasons for teachers leaving their jobs in the college they are teaching in.
Labour turnover represents serious financial loss to the educational institutions too. When separation occurs, replacements have to be selected, recruited and trained to fill up such vacancies at various intervals.
The cost of teacher turnover is made up of some of the following components:
1. Loss of time while replacement is being found
2. Quality of teaching is affected
3. Students’ understanding capacity is affected
4. Cost of selection, recruitment and training of the replacement
5. Lower quality during the learning period of the replacement
6. Administrative and other incidental cost of removing the leaver and adding the replacement to the payroll
Some of the suggestions that can improve the situation are:
1. Government can grant fund for library development, office up gradation, amenities for sports and other co-curricular activities at least in their initial period of development.
2. University can help the constituent colleges getting financial aid from the UGC by examining their academic performances, as first priority.
3. Management of Private colleges can facilitate teachers to avail UGC sponsored programmes such as Refresher Courses, Orientation Programme, Summer Institutes, Seminars, Workshops, etc. which are short duration courses and futuristic that comes under the Faculty Improvement Programme (FIP), emphasized by the UGC.
4. Private colleges in Nagaland can be brought under the Deficit Aided Scheme on fulfillment of certain laid down criterias by concerned colleges as implemented in some states.
5. Framed out Service Rules for security and permanency of the employees.
6. Regular increments at various stages, EPF, gratuity, medical and other employment benefits to employees.
Private colleges in Nagaland constitute about 80% of the Total Colleges in the state. There are all together 57 Private Colleges (38 Secular and 19 Non-Secular) and 19 Government Secular Colleges (including technical education). Among the private Colleges some are proprietoral and others are either run by societies, churches, community or other such organizations. In enrolment strength too, the private colleges feed 80% of the total students’ admissions out of which private Colleges produce much better results than the Government run colleges do.
In spite of this fact, private colleges do not get adequate financial support. Salaries of private colleges teachers are governed by the private managements, which differs from college to college. Turnover of private teachers from one to the other are more common and frequent because of the different pay structure in the colleges. The government college teachers are paid 4-5 times higher for the same amount of workload. Unless this higher rate of turnover of private teachers are checked by taking appropriate measures and brought at par with the Government teachers, the quality of higher education in Nagaland would remain jeopardized for the years to come.
Makhan Chetia, Vice-Principal
Unity College, Dimapur
