Faculty Trust and Collective Teacher Efficacy as organizational attributes. Development and validation of instruments for its evaluation

Abstract

Introduction. Faculty trust, understood as an organizational attribute, facilitates efficient relationships between people and is the fundamental basis for social learning. Collective teacher efficacy is defined as the teacher´s belief about his or her ability to achieve success in the teaching task. This article revises the role of both concepts in school improvement and analyzes the factorial structure and internal consistency of two instruments adapted by the researchers to the Spanish-speaking area. Methodology. The instruments measured the personal perception of both constructs from teachers serving early childhood, primary, secondary, language and continuing education schools regarding their teaching practice. A total of 258 teachers (176 women, 82 men) from both public and private schools in Andalusia participated voluntarily. Exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis with structural equations of both instruments were performed to obtain evidence of construct validity and internal consistency. Results. The results showed that the fit of the model is satisfactory, as it is the value of the quadratic error of approximation (RMSEA). However, a set of items from both instruments were eliminated due to inadequate behavior in the resulting factorial matrix. In addition, both scales showed a different factorial structure than the respective original versions. Discussion. These results are satisfactory and consistent from the statistical point of view, and allow the measurement of the perception of “Trust” and “Collective Teacher Efficacy” of teachers from different educational fields. The Faculty Trust and Collective Teacher Efficacy scales, adapted to the Spanish speaking context, are effective tools to quantify teacher´s perception of both constructs. This adaptation makes it possible for studies related to Trust and Collective Teacher Efficacy to be extended to a broader cultural context.