Creative Commons

This study investigates how the various motivational factors affect teachers of secondary general and special education public schools in the Greek system taking into consideration the impact of the harsh economic situation. In addition, it seeks to recognize what non-financial incentives do these teachers propose (find important), since system has difficulty in providing them with financial ones. To these ends, not only motivation theories are broadly analyzed so as to identify motivation’s relationship to job efficiency, but also teachers’ motivators are determined. Moreover, various non-financial incentives are reported. With regard to the research itself, qualitative method has been used and more specifically, an interview guide has been designed based on semi-structured style. Furthermore, 8 teachers with various backgrounds have been interviewed (4 secondary teachers from general education and 4 from the special one). Results showed no important differences as far as the extent to which the motivational factors affect employees of both sectors, but revealed important disparities to the way they are affected by them. In addition, both teachers’ categories expressed the strong influence of economic crisis on their motivation level. Moreover, different non-financial incentives have been proposed by the teachers from the two education sectors. This study aims to contribute to the recognition of similarities and differences as far as the motivation level of secondary education teachers for general and special education sectors in the Greek public school so as to develop relevant techniques for the improvement of these teachers’ efficiency. Recommendations as well as limitations and future research are also discussed.