To fulfil the EDUP 3083 coursework, an interview was conducted with one of the teachers in

the school. On March 10, an interview was conducted at Sekolah Kebangsaan Sikamat in
Seremban. This interview was conducted during the internship period. The interview
questions are generated in order to gain information about teaching as a profession,
characteristics of a teacher as a professional and also discuss the current issues and
challenges faced by teachers. The respondent of the interview is the administrative and
curriculum senior assistant of the school. One of the criteria emphasised in choosing the
respondent is the career background and experience. The respondent had more than 25
years of experience in teaching and 5 years of experience as serving as the administrative
and curriculum senior assistant.

good
communication
skills
good
management
community-
and
building skills
organization
skills
Characteristics
of
professional
teachers
deep
knowledge and approachability
passion
ability to build
relationship
with students
and coworkers

Diagram 1: Characteristics of teachers as a professional

During this interview, the first question proposed to respondent is about the
understanding of him on the meaning and concept of teaching professionalism. From the
respondent’s perspective, teaching professionalism means the attitude and actions of a
teacher who is controlled by the code of ethics. The teaching profession is considered
professional because the profession as a teacher is considered professional because it
provides essential services that educate the nation, require intellectual ability in the
implementation of teaching and learning, requires specialized training in the field of teaching
and has its own code of ethics (Andy & Michael, 2018). The respondent also stated the
characteristics of a teacher as a professional are such as having good communication skills,
ability to take responsibility, good management and organisation skills, have deep
knowledge and passion on teaching and able to build good relationship with the pupils,
parents and co-workers. Respondent said that although having teaching experience for
about 30 years, respondent did not feel satisfied with the skills and experience that had been
obtained and continue upgrading herself with more knowledge in order to become a
professional teacher. This statement by the respondent is supported by Cropley and Dave
(2014) who stated that teaching is a lifelong learning process that to foster the continuous
development and improvement of the knowledge and skills needed for employment and
personal fulfilment.

The next question raised to the respondent is about the issues of ethical and legal
violations by the teachers in school. One of the most common ethical violations faced by the
respondent is the teachers’ poor time management skill. Based on the respondent, most of
the teachers did not respect the time allocated for each lesson as they enter and exit the
class late, kill the time by chit-chatting in the canteen without entering the class and not
teaching the lesson that need to be delivered during the lesson. Time management is
extremely important in teaching profession as the teachers need to finish the lesson module
by the time set by the Ministry and avoid loaded paperwork such as documentation of pupils’
data and preparation of the daily lesson plan due to procrastination by the teacher (Sahari
Nordin, 2018).

Next, the respondent is asked about the possible factors that cause the teachers’ to
violate the code of ethics and rules. Based on respondent, one of the main reasons is
teachers’ low interest in being in the profession. A teacher who choose the career not for
passion, but only by factors such as salary are seen to be less committed to doing the work
at the school. As stated by Robert and Natalie (2019), passion is the first factor that needs to
be considered in choosing the career for self-satisfaction and involvement. The respondents
also stated that other factors such as teachers’ negligence towards commitment and
overloaded work pressure also cause violation of ethics.
 Teachers'
performanc
e declined

School's Students'
reputation achievement
affected Effects of dropped
ethical
violation

Parents' lose Bad role

trust on the model for
teachers the pupils

Diagram 2: Effects of ethical violation in the school

The respondent is also asked about the effects of the rules violation in the school.
Some of the effects include teachers’ low performance, students’ achievement dropped,
teacher being bad role model to the pupils; parents’ lose trust on the teachers and schools’
reputation being affected. The respondent also stated that although time violation is not a
serious problem such as hitting the students violently, but it does have destructing effects
that could have long term effect. One of the effects is the students’ attitude formation where
they think it is absolutely normal to be ignorant towards their commitment. Thus, this is what
caused the pupils’ attitude problem such as not completing the homework given.

Steps taken by the respondent as the school’s assistant principal to handle this
violation are frequent monitoring, providing counselling sessions and also giving warning and
taking disciplinary actions towards the troubled teachers. According to the respondent,
frequent monitoring do works effectively in order to keep this violation at the bay.

In conclusion, teachers need to be professional by obeying the code of ethics as

teachers are given an important responsibility to educate the children and build the nation.
Teachers need to be continuously aspiring and motivating the students, not destructing
them.
References

Andy, H., & Michael, T.C. (2018). Collaborative Professionalism: When Teaching Together
Means Learning for All. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Sahari Nordin. (2018). Kod Etika Keguruan dan perkembangan profesional guru. Shah
Alam: Oxford Fajar.

Robert, J., & Nathalie, H. (2019). Passion for Work: Theory, Reseach, and Applications.
London: Oxford University Press.