FACTORS AFFECTING TEACHERS' FUNCTIONAL COMPETENCY LEVEL IN HIGH-PERFORMANCE SCHOOLS

Abstract

Teacher competency is a topic that highly emphasizes smooth teaching and learning process. The situation becomes complicated when teachers fail to translate their potential functional competency as expected. This study aimed to identify the factors that influenced teachers’ functional competency level in schools. The study's implementation was based on qualitative methods with an interview medium to obtain the required data. A total of six teachers were randomly selected from three high-performing schools in the state of Kedah. Based on the thematic analysis, four themes contributed to teachers' functional competency level, namely, teacher's attitude, skills, and knowledge born from self as the internal situations in developing self-competence while the school climate factor as the external factor that influenced teachers' functional competence level through the conditions of their work environment. This study contributes to increasing the level of teachers' functional competency level in realizing educational excellence across 21st-century learning. The high level of functional competency is very significant with teachers' work in planning lessons and meaningful teaching strategies. Simultaneously, teachers can also practice high-order thinking skills (HOTS) and build technical skills in achieving the set objectives.