TEACHER EMPOWERMENT AND ITS RELATIONSHIP TO JOB SATISFACTION: A CASE STUDY IN MAZANDARAN UNIVERSITY

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between teachers’ empowerment and job satisfaction. The surveys used in this study contain School Participant Empowerment Scale (SPES) measured teacher perceived empowerment, the Teacher Job Satisfaction Questionnaire (TJSQ) measured teacher job satisfaction, and the demographic survey included age, educational background and gender. SPES measured six different dimensions o f empowerment: Decision-making, professional growth, status, self-efficacy, autonomy, and impact, along with an overall total and TJSQ includes nine factors of satisfaction: Supervision, colleagues, working conditions, pay, and responsibility. The result indicated that significant correlations were found between total teacher empowerment and total teacher job satisfaction. However, there was no correlation between factor of security in job satisfaction scale and the three teacher empowerment scales of professional growth, status, and autonomy. There was also no correlation found between the teacher job satisfaction factor of recognition and the three teacher empowerment dimensions of decision-making, self-efficacy and impact. In the other hand, there are significant differences in the demographic variables of educational background and gender with regards to teacher empowerment and job satisfaction.