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Teachers’ Personal and Professional Demographic Characteristics as Predictors of Students’ Academic Performance in English

This study aimed at investigating the effects of teachers’ personal and professional demographic characteristics on students’ academic performance in English. To achieve this aim, the researcher used a sample of 37 English secondary teachers and 400 students in the District of Plaridel, Schools Division Office of Bulacan during the academic year 2018-2019. The researcher used the descriptive-correlational method of research, which used a researcher-made questionnaire as the primary data gathering technique. The results of the regression analysis show that the eight (8) variables of the personal demographic characteristics and the four (4) variables of the professional demographic characteristics affect students’ academic performance in English to a various extent as shown by the non-zero coefficients. Results of the analysis of variance of the regression of personal and professional demographic characteristics on students’ academic performance revealed an F-value of .955 with a p-value of .490 and an F-value of 1.197 with a p-value of .331. Since the associated probability of the F-value is higher than alpha (0.05), the null hypothesis has to be sustained. This means that all variables of the personal and professional demographic characteristics do not exert significant effects on students’ academic performance in English. Conclusions were drawn and recommendations were offered.


INTRODUCTION :
Studies link the personal and professional demographic characteristics of teachers to the students' academic excellence. A study found a significant relative contribution of the teacher's academic qualification, teachers' content knowledge, teacher's instructional quality, teachers' evaluation procedures, and teachers' job satisfaction to the academic performance of the participants [1]. Also, another study revealed that the attributes of a teacher affect their skills [2]. In particular, instructional practices of teachers affect students' academic performance [3]. Some argued that teachers with excellent skills in the four areas are effective in handling online English classes [4] [5]. The students' performance in online English increases when handled by proficient online English teachers. They say English to be an essential language for humankind. Research showed that the teacher education students have average levels of oral communication apprehensions in English in the different communication situations and that their academic performance has a mean described as very good [6]. An author also said that when the number of teachers' years of experience progresses, student academic achievement increases, and vice versa [7]. Proficiency in English has become a requirement in conquering the global business environment. Learning English as a foreign language helps students comprehend grammar well and increases their overall communication and problem-solving skills [8]. Recognizing its importance, many realize the need to develop a high level of English language proficiency. In 2017, an author purported that the role of teachers' English competence, in public-sector teaching, is central to how these educational changes play out in countries around the world [9]. We describe English language ability in many dimensions of teaching. They focus language training on general language fluency, which addresses teachers' particular professional needs. There is also a significant relationship between teacher's practice and student's growth in English subjects while controlling for teacher and school characteristics [10]. Another study showed that teachers' teaching qualification has a significant relative contribution to students' academic achievement in the English language [11]. An author also showed that there was a significant relationship between teachers' competence and teachers' attitudes to media utilization [5]. This means the higher the teacher's instructional competence, the higher is the students' achievement. A research paper revealed that there is a significant relationship between teacher capacity building and students' academic performance and a significant relationship between teachers' classroom management, teaching method, personality, and students' academic performance [12]. In relation, low-to-moderate evidence of relationship exists between the qualities and skills of an educator [13].Accordingly, school variables such as principals' and teachers' years of experience, collaborating with other schools in a "school family," and meetings between parents and teachers appear to have positive effects on students' academic achievement [14]. This means that teachers' teaching experience is one of the important factors in improving students' scores that could have significant effects on students' wellness and growth. Another author supported the said findings when he claimed that there is a correlation between teacher job satisfaction and years of experience and between teacher job satisfaction and the age of the educator [15]. Another paper also mentioned that transformational leadership styles of school heads affect a teacher's self-efficacy in varying degrees [16]. However, a research paper showed in his study regarding untrained, under-qualified, and become incompetent teachers which result in skipping to teach some difficult topics in the syllabus [17]. This could lead to bullying of teachers because of incompetence. According to an author, students have inappropriate behavior towards bullying especially to teachers [18] [19]. No significant relationship exists between teacher ratings related to language status, but race/ethnicity was a significant predictor of both academic and social ratings according to [20]. A manuscript also mentioned that the relationship between teacher factors and student achievement in English showed a weak negative correlation between student achievement and several teachers-related factors [21]. Also, another research stated that even though the quality of teachers was high in terms of their academic and professional qualifications, it did not reflect much in performing the students [22].With all these conflicting results in related studies, embarking teachers' demographic characteristics and students' academic performance, the researcher purports to evaluate the relationship between the teachers' demographic characteristics and their impact on students' English performance in a new educational environment.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM:
The major concern of the study was to evaluate the effects of teacher's demographic characteristics on the English academic performance of the high school students in the EDDIS II, District of Plaridel, SDO-Bulacan. Specifically, the researcher sought to answer the following questions: 1. How may the personal demographic characteristics of teachers in the District of Plaridel, SDO-Bulacan be described in terms of: 3. METHODOLOGY :

Design
The researcher used the descriptive-correlational method of research since this method is concerned with describing the independent and dependent variables. A correlational research design comprises collecting data to determine whether there is an existing relationship between two or more variables in the study. This study aims to know if the teachers' demographic characteristics affect students' performance in English or not.

Respondents
Using purposive sampling, the researcher selected at least 11 students per English teacher. Hence, this study consisted of 37 English teachers and 400 students from Schools Division Office of Bulacan, EDDIS II, District of Plaridel during the school year 2018-2019.

Instrument
The primary data gathering tools used in the study were a researcher-made questionnaire on determining teachers' personal and professional demographic characteristics and a documentary analysis in analyzing the data from the Classroom E-Record to determine the point average of the respondents' level of performance in English.
To gather the necessary information for this study, the researcher used a researcher-made questionnaire to describe the teachers' demographic characteristics. The Teachers' Demographic Questionnaire is divided into two parts, personal and professional demographic characteristics. For the personal demographic characteristics, 8 indicators seek to answer: age, gender, academic qualifications, length of service, civil status, academic rank, performance rating, and medium of instruction. For the professional demographic characteristics, 4 indicators are to be answered: seminars and training related to English subject, research presented, articles published, and books published. Meanwhile, Classroom E-Record was used to determine the point average of the respondents' level of performance in English.

Statistical Analysis
In this study, the researcher used the following statistical tools to analyze the gathered data. The study used frequency and percentage to describe and analyze the personal and professional characteristics of the respondents. The study also used the same statistical tools in the academic performance of students in the English subject. In determining the effects of personal and professional demographic characteristics of teachers to the academic performance of students, the study used the regression analysis.

Data Gathering
The mode of the gathering was a questionnaire and documentary analysis method. In gathering the data, the researcher followed the following procedures: 1. A letter was sent to the Schools Division Superintendent of SDO-Bulacan, to the District Supervisor of Plaridel, and to the school principals of the District of Plaridel to seek permission to conduct the study.
2. With the approval of the Schools Division Superintendent of SDO-Bulacan, the District Supervisor of Plaridel and the school principals, the researcher then distributed the questionnaires to the respondents personally. 3. The researcher collected the questionnaires from the respondents and checked whether all questions were answered.

RESULTS :
This study aimed to describe the personal and professional demographic characteristics of teachers and test their effects on the academic performance of students in English subject. The study assessed the personal demographic characteristics of teachers in terms of age, gender, academic qualifications, length of service, civil status, academic rank, performance rating, and medium of instruction.  Table 1 presented the personal demographic characteristics of teachers. As seen, more teachers belong to the age bracket 31-40 years old. Also, the majority of the teachers were within the young and middle-aged adults.
In terms of sex, most of the teachers are female, where they outnumbered the male counterpart. For the academic qualification, more teachers are Bachelor's graduates with Master's degree units. In terms of length of service, most of the teachers belonged to 1-10 years in service. For civil status, more teachers were married. In terms of academic rank, there were more teachers with an academic rank of Teacher 1. For the performance rating, most of the teachers had a very satisfactory performance rate. And for the medium of instruction used in teaching, more teachers used English as a medium of instruction. The level of professional demographic characteristics of teachers was described in terms of seminars and training attended, professional demographic characteristics of teachers in terms of research presented, professional demographic characteristics of teachers in terms of articles published, and professional demographic characteristics of teachers in terms of books published. Table 2 displayed the professional demographic characteristics of teachers. As seen, more teachers have seminars and training at the school level. In terms of research presentation, most of the teachers do not have one. Also, most of the teachers do not have article publications, neither does the book publication.  Table 3 presented the students' academic performance in the English subject. As observed, more students had a very satisfactory performance in the subject. It is interesting to note that none of the students got a grade lower than 74, which translates to "did not meet expectation". Results of the regression analysis in Table 15 showed that all eight (8) variables of personal demographic characteristics affect the students' academic performance in varying extent as shown by the B Coefficients 0.561 (age), 1.198 (gender), and 0.629 (academic qualifications), 0.761 (length of service), 0.293 (civil status), 0.009 (academic rank), 0.115 (performance rating), 1.236 (medium of instruction). This means that for every unit improvement in the personal demographic characteristics mentioned could generate a 0.56, 1.19, 0.62, 0.76, 0.29, 0.009, 0.11, and 1.23, increase in students' academic performance. A closer look at the Beta Coefficients, one could deduce that of the 8 personal demographic characteristics, it was the medium of instruction that exerts the greatest influence (Beta=1.23) on the academic performance. Results of analysis of variance revealed an F ratio equal to .955 with an associated probability equal to .490. Since the p-value is greater than the significance level set at 0.05, we cannot reject the null hypothesis. We may conclude that the personal demographic characteristics of the teachers did not produce significant combined effects on the academic performance of students. This means that for every unit improvement in the professional demographic characteristics mentioned could generate a 0.732, 1.528, 0.4, and 0. 668 increase in students' academic performance. A closer look at the Beta Coefficients, one could deduce that of the 4 professional demographic characteristics, it was the research presentation that exerts the greatest influence (Beta=1.528) on the academic performance. Results of analysis of variance revealed an F ratio equal to 1.197 with an associated probability equal to .331. Since the p-value is greater than the significance level set at 0.05, we cannot reject the null hypothesis. We may conclude that the professional demographic characteristics of the teachers did not produce significant combined effects on the academic performance of students.

DISCUSSION :
In pedagogical innovations in delivering quality instruction, teachers' demographic characteristics have been one of the most important considerations for developing an educational system. To better manage innovation processes, it is essential to better understand the human factors of innovation [23]. However, the performance review is one of the essential elements in the educational institution [24]. Having such will create motivation among teachers and perform better in their work. This means to say that a very humane consideration could lead one to successful innovations. Studies that agree to the current research include the researches [15] [21]. The researches mentioned that maturity comes with experience. In terms of gender, some researches provided substantial evidence of gender-related performance in personal attributes of teachers [25] [26] [27]. For the academic qualifications, a study affirmed the result of the current study [28]. They agreed in enriching and promoting professional standards and competency. For the length of service, a group of researchers agrees that length of service affects students' academic achievement [11] [14] [15]. For the performance rating, another research provided evidence of academic performance impact [29]. And for the medium of instruction, an author shared wonderful insight of having bilingual certification for better proficiency in teaching [30]. However, a study contradicted the former context [20]. For the professional demographic characteristics of teachers, we may see this in different ways. It may sometimes refer to teachers' qualifications, teachers' behavior, teachers' professionalism, teachers' way of giving and accepting criticisms to and from others. In a research study, it showed a summary of the personal demographic characteristics of their respondents in their study [31]. In a different study, a group examined the effect of teacher's qualifications on performing senior secondary school students [26]. They found that students taught by teachers with higher qualifications performed better. In seminars and training, a group provided an affirmative concept of attending seminars and in-service training for teachers to enhance their students' academic performance [32]. Another group of investigators stipulated the workload of academics like the teachers involves research and teaching [33]. However, the result of the study was different. Besides, the importance of conducting research and publishing is to convey their knowledge to students [34]. Researchers found a significant relative contribution of the independent variables to the academic performance of the participants [35] [1]. Another study revealed a significant relationship between demographic profile and professional development in their study [36]. Also, two different researchers argued that teachers with excellent skills in the four areas are effective in handling online English classes [4] [5]. Teacher education students have average levels of oral communication apprehensions in English in the different communication situations and that their academic performance has a mean described as very good [6]. When the number of teachers' years of experience progresses, student academic achievement increases, and vice versa [7]. Another study stipulated other predictors which take a good impact on students' performance in English [10]. Accordingly, there was a significant correlation between teacher practice and student growth while controlling for teacher and school characteristics. A research manuscript found that the provision of qualified teachers of the English language, using the right approach to the teaching of the English language can improve secondary school students' performance in the English language [37]. In this study, it was hypothesized that teachers' personal and professional demographic characteristics do not significantly affect students' academic performance in English. A group also reported that teacher-related factors were observed to have a varying extent of the effect on the academic performance of students [38]. On the other hand, it was surprising that the study of an author found no correlation between teacher and student achievement and only a slight statistically significant correlation between status and student achievement [39].

CONCLUSIONS :
Based on the findings of the study, the researcher concluded that the teachers' demographic characteristics were manifested as mature enough based on the data analysis. They are responsible enough to troubleshoot behavioral problems and strategizing classroom management. Also, the teachers' professional demographic characteristics were described at a low level in terms of paper presentations, articles, and book publications (except for attending seminars and training). In addition, the students' academic performance in English was revealed as "Very Satisfactory" -indicative of the teachers' capabilities to bring about desired outcomes of the student engagement and learning process. Lastly, the twelve (12) variables of personal and professional demographic characteristics such as; age, gender, academic qualification, length of service, civil status, academic rank, performance rating medium of instruction, seminars, and training, research presented, articles published and books published, affect students' academic performance in English but not to a significant extent.

RECOMMENDATIONS :
Based on the findings and conclusions of the study, the researcher offered the following recommendations: 1. The school policymakers may provide more incentives to encourage teachers to further pursue their education as this has potential benefits for the students. This can also be done by providing a more competitive salary package for teachers. Also, scholarships funded by the government may be a good strategy in improving teachers' demographic characteristics. 2. School administrators may have an initiative for administering Learning Actions Cell (LAC) sessions focused on paper presentations, and writing articles and books. This would keep teachers constantly seek in updating their knowledge and skills and to keep them abstract from current trends in English language teaching. 3. Students may sustain their "Very Satisfactory" rating in terms of their academic performance and look for steps in attaining an "Outstanding" rating, especially in English subject. 4. School principals are encouraged to carry out frequent teachers' assessment, conduct training needs assessment to identify the needs of teachers in terms of their profession. Teacher education programs may be given much attention especially in the area of lesson content, quality of students being admitted, and quality teachers being produced. 5. School administrators may give appropriate staff development for teachers such as seminars, training, and workshops that aim to develop professional growth for better student outcomes. Seminars, training, and workshops may be concentrated on innovative techniques on proper coaching and mentoring of teachers. 6. This research can serve as a springboard for prospective researchers in conducting studies that aim to seek knowledge and further testing of the theory to solve the gaps in the literature. Future researchers may look into other variables related to students' academic performance in English particularly teachers' instructional practices and teachers' pedagogical methods.