1 Introduction

1.1 The challenges of teacher recruitment and retention

Recruiting and retaining qualified teachers, especially in teacher shortage areas, are challenging tasks for education systems worldwide. Based on statistics published by the National Education Association [1], which is the largest teacher union in the USA, schools across the nation face a severe shortage of approximately 3 million teachers and educators in 2022. Due to the pandemic, a staggering 55% of teaching staff members are considering leaving the profession earlier than they had originally planned. The situation is much worse in rural districts. Taking the State of California as an example, the rate of emergency credentials issued for rural schools is 8.3%, while it is only 4.2% urban schools. This indicated that even if rural districts are able to fill pressing vacancies, many teachers thus hired may not be qualified [2]. Similarly, in Japan, the Ministry of Education presented a survey conducted in the 2021 academic year, indicating that 1897 (5.8%) schools of all levels were negatively impacted by teacher shortages. Additionally, the number of applicants for teaching careers declined from 12.8 to 2.6% between 2000 and 2020 [3]. In Australia, the government is committed to solving the perennial problem of staffing shortages; however, preservice teachers in urban areas are oversupplied, while there are many vacancies remaining in rural areas due to intractable barriers [4, 5]. Meanwhile, in China, due to the better salaries and working conditions in urban districts, the ratio of outgoing primary teachers in rural schools is rising annually and was two times higher than that of their city counterparts in 2014 [6]. In Russia, more than 24.8% of the teachers in remote villages have expressed their intent to leave their current position [7].

Many countries have difficulties recruiting prospecting teachers to teach in rural areas, and Taiwan is no exception. Many news headlines over the past few years have highlighted the problems posed by teacher shortages. Chien et al. [8] claim that the proportion of qualified teachers is much lower than that of nonqualified teachers in rural schools, with the former accounting for only 25% in one remote county. Moreover, the teacher turnover rate, estimated to be 7.3% and 2.6% in rural and urban schools, respectively, presents great challenges for rural areas in retaining sufficient qualified teachers [9]. Indeed, due to the dramatically declining birth rate in Taiwan, the government has implemented personnel management by minimizing the number of formal teacher exams annually [10]. This condition has led to the oversupply of preservice teachers and a high proportion of nonqualified teachers working at school [11]. Although the number of teachers in rural areas only accounted for one-eighth of the total, schools in rural areas still face even more severe challenges in recruiting teachers than their metropolitan counterparts.

It is argued that the quality of teachers is the most significant determinant of students' successful academic achievement [12, 13]. A shortage of teachers indicates that teachers might be overloaded with instructional and administrative work, unable to meet student needs, and sometimes required to teach subjects beyond their expertise. According to an OECD report, students in socioeconomically disadvantaged schools tend to have fewer teachers with advanced university qualifications than those in socioeconomically advantaged schools [14]. Due to the teacher shortage and high turnover rate, students in rural areas have a relatively lower level of academic achievement than those in urban districts in literacy and learning motivation [15, 16].

The other negative consequences of teacher shortages cannot be overemphasized. On the one hand, in lieu of the instruction of experienced teachers, novice teachers by themselves are not capable of developing a decent curriculum [17]. Further, students need to frequently adapt to different teachers, which might have a negative impact on their learning motivation and self-identification. Moreover, the high teacher turnover rate impedes schools’ efforts to maintain relationships with parents and the local community [18].

1.2 Factors related to teacher recruitment and retention in rural areas

Assessing the factors related to recruitment and retention is necessary because these factors indicate what attracts or hampers teachers from teaching in rural areas. Much attention has been given to monetary incentives. Generally, urban districts offer higher salaries and better fringe benefits than rural districts; thus, teachers are more likely to migrate to urban schools [13, 19, 20]. Additionally, teachers in rural districts often lack the opportunity to gain extra income, tutoring fees for example, which can also obstruct teachers’ willingness to teach in hard-to-staff schools [7]. It is argued that various kinds of financial support, including salary supplements and living allowances, are highly valued by teachers [21]. As such, monetary incentives may be a significant factor to consider when recruiting and retaining teachers in rural settings.

In the literature, working environments are also seen as significant determinants. It is argued that a reasonable workload and sufficient administrative support are important elements for an ideal workplace. In Taiwan, the relatively heavy workload of school administrations is a commonly occurring concern in rural schools. Compared with teachers in urban areas, who only need to worry about their in class teaching responsibilities, the majority of teachers in rural areas have to take on multiple tasks and deal with overwhelming administrative workloads as well, which might include applying for projects or holding school-wide activities [22, 23]. Furthermore, the lack of administrative support in schools may lead to teacher job dissatisfaction and even a high turnover rate [18, 19]. Teachers are more likely to select schools that have adequate administrative support regarding decision-making [24, 25].

Meager living conditions in rural areas may also lead to the low level of willingness among teachers to work in rural schools [25]. The inconveniences in shopping, accessing health care and commuting to urban areas hinders teachers from choosing to work at rural schools [26], especially younger teachers who desire more entertainment and shopping amenities [27]. Moreover, it is arguable that married teachers are more likely to leave rural schools since they need to live together with their family members who generally work in urban areas [28, 29].

Other related elements of teachers school selection are professional development opportunities and prevent parent background. The insufficiency or professional development opportunities in rural districts is another concern for teachers working in rural areas, including participating in seminars and pursuing further degrees [18, 30]. Regarding parent backgrounds, several studies have indicated that teachers prefer working in urban districts positioned in high socioeconomic communities, where the cooperation of parents and students may be much stronger and teachers can more easily implement their teaching plans [29, 31, 32].

1.3 Relevant solutions to the problem of teacher shortages

Policymakers have considered the solution of raising salaries for those teachers working in rural areas. In China, although the government implemented the policy of increasing teacher pay, high-quality teachers still remain in short supply [6]. Similar situations have also occurred in Australia, as an example, with rural schools providing free accommodation, remote allowances, and transportation subsidies, but there is still difficulty recruiting qualified teachers. The results noted above echo Shuls and Maranto’s 2014 research [33], which indicated that monetary incentives might not play the most important role in teachers' career choices. Concerning nonmonetary strategies, the government of South Korea has highlighted the advantages of working in rural schools, including smaller class size, less instructional time, additional credit toward future promotion to an administrative position, and the priority choice in selecting the next school [34]. In Singapore, in addition to offering competitive starting salaries, multiple incentives, including various career development opportunities and different department heads, have also been implemented as a means of attracting novice teachers [14, 35].

The Taiwanese government has adopted a policy to attract teachers to work in rural areas. Based on the Act for Education Development of Rural Schools [36] and the Act for Promotion to Administrative Position [37], solutions to teacher shortages fall into the category of monetary and nonmonetary approaches. The former offers a 5–10% salary increment for rural teachers and a bonus for long-term teaching. The latter includes giving added credits for transition to other schools and promotion to administrative positions. However, many in-service teachers still expressed their low willingness to work due to various disadvantages of working in rural areas.

Collectively, the lack of sufficient qualified teachers in schools is a severe and universal problem, especially in rural areas. Without stable teaching staff, students cannot receive thorough and coherent learning, which negatively impacts the fundamental right to education. As a result, in addition to implementing the currently limited solutions, more information concerning the perspectives of in-service teachers should be gathered for the development of effective and appropriate policies.

Thus, this research aims to investigate the influencing determinants that are considered when teachers make such decisions. Meanwhile, the advantages and disadvantages of rural and urban schools are also worth investigating. To explore the outlined issues, the present study addresses the following research questions:

  1. 1.

    What are the major factors in teachers’ school selection?

  2. 2.

    What are the advantages and disadvantages of working in rural and urban schools?

  3. 3.

    What are the differences in the perceptions of teachers from rural and urban areas?

2 Research method

2.1 Methodology and research structure

The analytic hierarchy process (AHP) was used to design the questionnaire and analyze the collected data. The AHP approach, developed by Professor Thomas L. Saaty in the 1970s, is a scaling method for dealing with multiple criteria in decision making. The objective of adopting the AHP method is to allocate resources and implement the most important activities based on the proportion and ranking of elements. Through the choice of the relative values of each of the elements being compared, a positive reciprocal matrix is developed, and the priorities of the elements in each level of hierarchy are calculated [38, 39].

Indeed, the AHP method is widely used in other research fields, including health technology assessment [40] and construction [41], because this well-structured statistical technique provides better perspectives on decision-making. Compared to other analysis methods, the AHP method can better reflect people's differences in feelings when they make comparisons instead of simply calculating the scores of each element [38], which caters to investigating the relative importance of each determinant teachers’ school selection.

Based on the literature review, the dominant elements that impact teacher career selections were gathered and organized into 12 determinants. Then, an AHP structure consisting of three hierarchies was developed for this research. In the first level, there are three dimensions of teachers’ decision-making regarding working location, namely, working environment, reward from work, and quality of life. Each dimension in the second level was then assigned to two factors, which were then further assigned to the other two determinants in level three. Twelve determinants were listed, as shown in Fig. 1, and the AHP questionnaire was developed based on this research structure.

Fig. 1
figure 1

AHP structure

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2.2 Materials

The self-developed questionnaire was reviewed by two scholars, two elementary school principals, and one in-service teacher. The questionnaire consisted of three sections. The first section elicited demographic information from the participants. The second section captured information for making pairwise comparisons between those determinants. Finally, section three focused on comparing the strengths and weaknesses of rural and urban schools based on the determinants. In each question, a scale of response options from 1 to 9 was used to reflect the intensity of importance. The larger the number chosen by participants was, the greater their preference for the relevant determinant.

2.3 Participants

The questionnaire for this research was sent to 500 in-service teachers, half of whom were in rural schools and half of whom were in urban schools. Initially, concerning the participating urban schools, 10 were chosen by the researcher's social connection. Then, the remaining schools were recommended by the initial subject schools. As for selecting rural schools, to ensure the inclusion of various types of rural areas, the participating schools in this research were selected and recommended based on the three classifications of rural schools enacted by the government, which consisted of normal rural, special rural and extremely rural schools. At first, 2 normal rural schools, 2 special rural schools, and one extremely rural school were selected. The estimated number was 10 normal rural and 10 special rural schools; however, due to a change in the classification of one school, the final composition included 9 normal rural and 11 special rural schools. As extremely rural schools were limited in number, only 5 schools were chosen and recommended. Ultimately, 50 schools were chosen, half rural schools and half urban schools. A contact person at each school administered the questionnaire. To ensure anonymity, participants returned the questionnaire in self-addressed envelopes that had been provided along with the questionnaire. Among 500 questionnaires, 427 valid questionnaires were received, with a response rate of 85.4%. Of these participants, 35% were male and 65% were female; 70% were formal teachers and 30% were temporary teachers.

3 Research results

3.1 The priority of determinants

The 12 crucial determinants related to teachers’ career choice were investigated using AHP. The resulting rankings are shown in Table 1, which not only indicate the large gap between determinants but also provides insight into teacher preference regarding school selection.

Table 1 Weight of the twelve determinants
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The determinant of decent family life was rated as the most valued determinant among the participants, having the highest weight of 0.169. That is, in-service teachers considered living with their family and enjoying personal time to be important. In contrast, the least attractive determinant with the lowest weight (0.023) is social recognition and status. This implied the weak connection between fostering a positive impression from people and decision-making regarding school selection.

Additionally, the results also revealed other valued determinants, which are presented in a descending order of preference as follows: professional autonomy (weight: 0.144), comfortable living conditions (weight: 0.136), and convenient transportation and commuting (weight: 0.132). Significantly, teachers tend to design and arrange the curriculum by themselves rather than complying with the rules of the school, and they hold their family and personal lives in high esteem.

To further aid interpretation, it is worth noting that the determinant of salaries and subsidies ranked fifth, with a weight of only 0.086. Obviously, the monetary solutions commonly adopted by the government, including salary raises or providing subsidies, do not cater to teacher preferences and considerations.

3.2 The strengths and weaknesses of rural and urban areas

In this subsection, the perceptions of rural and urban teachers are analyzed presented in Table 2. In terms of the strengths and weaknesses of schools from different districts, both the rural and urban teachers surveyed reach consensus and share similar perceptions. On the one hand, working at rural schools is better due to offering more determinants than their urban counterparts, accounting for seven out of the twelve determinants. Notably, a large gap between rural and urban schools was found regarding four of the determinants, which indicates that teachers in rural areas have a higher level of professional autonomy (rural teachers: 0.096 > 0.048; urban teachers: 0.112 > 0.049), receive better salaries and subsidies (rural teachers: 0.053 > 0.033; urban teachers: 0.072 > 0.035), feel less stress in their teaching affairs (rural teachers: 0.043 > 0.015; urban teachers: 0.044 > 0.016), and enjoy closer relationships with their local community (rural teachers: 0.042 > 0.0.2; urban teachers: 0.057 > 0.023).

Table 2 The strengths and weaknesses of rural and urban schools
Full size table

On the other hand, five out of the twelve determinants indicated advantages for urban schools. Moreover, there was a large gap between rural and urban schools in three of the determinants, indicating that teachers in urban schools have relatively comfortable living conditions (rural: 0.021 < 0.115; urban: 0.017 < 0.081), more convenient transportation (rural: 0.022 < 0.110; urban: 0.018 < 0.077), and a better family life (rural: 0.033 < 0.137; urban: 0.034 < 0.092). Although it seems that urban schools hold fewer strengths than their rural counterparts, their advantages were revealed by the sum of the weights after multiplying by the proportion (rural: 0.405 < 0.598; urban: 0.498 < 0.502). This method is derived from the impact of urban schools on the dominant determinants mentioned in the first section, including living conditions, transportation and commuting, and family life. In other words, this is the reason why the urban schools are better able to recruit and retain teachers, since the advantages held by rural schools do not match the crucial determinants emphasized by respondents through the questionnaire.

3.3 The differences between teachers from rural and urban areas

In addition to investigating the strengths and weaknesses of rural and urban schools, other important findings are presented below. For all of the strengths exhibited by rural schools, it is surprising to discover that teachers from rural schools have lower levels of agreement regarding determinants than those from urban schools. Taking several determinants as an example, for professional autonomy, the rural teachers’ perspective reflected by the weight was only 0.096, while that of urban teachers was 0.112. Moreover, for salaries and subsidies, teachers from rural areas are given a weight of 0.053, while their urban counterparts are given a higher weight of 0.072. Additionally, concerning the sense of accomplishment, urban teachers’ perspective on weight is 0.017 higher than that of rural teachers.

The relatively pessimistic viewpoints of the rural teachers are also reflected in the sum. The weight of the rural schools’ advantages is 0.402 for rural teachers and 0.498 for urban teachers, while the weight of the urban schools’ advantages is 0.598 for rural teachers and 0.502 for urban teachers. Apparently, teachers from rural schools reported having relatively unsatisfied working or living conditions, while teachers from urban schools held different perspectives. Thus, the results not only reflect the strengths and weaknesses of rural and urban schools but also provide insights into the different perceptions of the participants.

4 Discussion

4.1 The importance of data analysis in teacher shortage issues

The recruitment and retention of qualified teachers is a serious challenge worldwide, especially in rural areas. By exploring the weights of the determinants and comparing the perspectives of teachers through the AHP method, this research aims to provide practical suggestions for addressing teacher shortages. Concerning the use of statistical methods for collecting and analyzing data, using a Likert scale to calculate the degree or amount of participants’ agreement is the dominant and prevalent methods. In this research, however, the AHP method was adopted for making comparisons and ranking the weights among determinants. Thus, compared with the using a Likert scale, the AHP method can explicitly provide a quantitative dimension to the participants’ qualitative perspectives, which makes this research more representative than other types.

Indeed, research and data collection are critical methods of ensuring that governments and schools comprehensively understand the issues and strategies under discussion. This idea has been demonstrated by [42] and several enactments of states in the USA that emphasize the importance of conducting related research. Taking the state of Colorado as an example, legislation was enacted in Colorado to coordinate the collaboration between higher education institutions and schools investigating the problem of insufficient teachers and preparing plans to address it [43]. In the same year, a bill for conducting research on teacher recruitment and vacancies was also passed in Florida [44]. Obviously, realizing the needs and preferences involved in teacher school selection is the main priority in employing corresponding policies to fundamentally solve problems. However, there is a lack of thorough statistical research regarding the issue of teacher shortages, implying that the consideration of the needs and thoughts of teachers from both rural and urban areas might be neglected in Taiwan.

4.2 The determinants of monetary incentives are moderately valued

Compared with the related literature, the results of this study may be unexpected. Among the many studies that investigate teacher recruitment and retention issues, monetary incentives are one of the most crucial determinants [33, 45, 46]. In most developed countries, i.e., the USA, China, and England, rural teachers obtain lower salaries and subsidies than their urban counterparts, which is the dominant factor leading to teachers’ low willingness to stay in rural districts in those countries. This point is in contrast to the findings of this research, since the determinant represented by salaries and subsidies only accounted for 8.6% and ranked fifth. This discrepancy arises from the salary scale of teachers in Taiwan, where the teachers from all types of districts receive the same salary, and rural teachers can receive more subsidies than urban teachers. In addition, teachers in Taiwan are not allowed to take on part-time jobs after work, including tutoring or cram school.

As such, teachers might evaluate whether the relatively higher salary they receive exceeds the cost of enduring the undesirable living conditions in rural schools. Obviously, the effect of monetary incentives in Taiwan is limited since teachers face higher opportunity costs to accept jobs with higher salaries while simultaneously enduring poorer living conditions than they otherwise would. Consequently, in addition to offering better salaries and subsidies, other nonmonetary solutions should be offered as well.

4.3 The determinants of quality of life are most valued

Among the dominant determinants, quality of life is relatively critical. First, family life is a priority consideration, and this result is in line with several studies concerning issues of teacher recruitment. It is argued that teachers tend to apply for schools that are close to where they live [47]. For those transferring to urban schools, relocation to join a spouse or move closer to their family is necessary [29]. Furthermore, young teachers living in rural areas who later get married need to leave because remote communities lack job opportunities, which can be seen as a severe disadvantage when their spouse needs to seek employment [28]. Obviously, the location of the school deeply influences teachers’ decision making and therefore leads to rural schools facing recruitment and retention challenges for qualified teachers.

Second, living conditions and transportation are critical determinants as well. Studies have already indicated that teachers tend to work in urban schools due to relatively easy accessibility to health care, shopping malls, all kinds of services and public transportation [26, 27]. Rural teachers report that the transportation cost for activities and from the long distance from their relatives are quite annoying [48]. Moreover, some of the rural teachers have difficulties adapting themselves to the local lifestyle or feeling isolated from the community, which also resonates with [7], who pointed out that some rural teachers intend to leave for and go to urban schools due to the better living conditions and community.

4.4 The potential attractiveness and risks of rural schools

Based on above analysis, we can see that the rural area has better results regarding nearly half of the determinants. This implies a potential advantages that might be effective in recruiting qualified teachers. Indeed, there are still some long-term rural teachers who understand the advantages of working at the rural. Firstly, the dominant advantage highlighted by the participants is complete professional authority. Most rural schools consist of small-scale classes; thus, teachers can design lessons flexibly and to specifically cater to student needs. This condition is proven by [45], who indicated that it is easy for rural teachers to arrange community visits in conjunction with STEM courses.

Second, teachers expressed feeling less stressed about teaching affairs when facing a relatively small-size class. Actually, the need to grade less homework and deal with fewer teaching affairs than urban teachers is beneficial. Moreover, the advantages of closer relationships with the community and higher social status were also emphasized by the participants, which aligned with [28]’s research results concerning intimate relationships between teachers and parents or teachers and the community. In summary, rural schools hold the advantage regarding several of the determinants, which are neglected but crucial factors in addressing the issue of teacher shortages. As [5] indicated, the stereotypes or prejudices of poor working and living conditions could be overcome by taking practical strategies.

However, the disadvantages of rural schools, which correspond to the advantages held by urban schools, should also be noted. Based on the results, having a decent family life, comfortable living conditions and convenient transportation and commuting are the dominant advantages reflected by participants working in urban schools. These disadvantages of rural schools have been prevalently discussed in several studies, and they represent some of the main reasons why rural schools encounter challenges when recruiting and retaining teaching staff. Moreover, the issue of overwhelming workloads in rural schools was also indicated by the data, echoing the problems of limited personnel policies and overwhelming administrative workloads in rural areas [23].

4.5 The unawareness of the challenges and demands in rural areas

Concerning the recruitment and retention of teachers, it is important to explore the viewpoints of teachers from both urban and rural areas. Among the strengths of rural schools, the weight calculated for rural teachers is lower than that of their urban counterparts, which reflects their relatively pessimistic thoughts about their working and living conditions even when those determinants are assumed to be advantages. Moreover, this result also implies that urban teachers do not realize the exhausting and dissatisfying situation represented by working in rural areas.

From the overall operations and personnel staffing to classroom management and the selection of teaching modes, rural schools differ significantly from urban schools. Consequently, the aforementioned lack of awareness on the part of urban teachers concerning rural working conditions is cause for concern. First, this implies that urban teachers lack opportunities for coming to realize the working and living conditions in rural areas, and that neither type of teacher communicates or cooperates with the other type. Second, for teachers who intend to apply for transfer to rural schools, the psychological gap between positive imagination and the authentic situation results in a stronger willingness to subsequently leave rural schools. Indeed, it might not only be urban teachers, but also the public and the government that do not thoroughly realize the realities of rural areas, which can further result in disregarding the needs and demands of rural schools. Thus, the comprehension, communication and even cooperation from outside rural areas are significant.

5 Conclusions and recommendations

The conditions for teacher shortages vary from country to country, and it is the governments’ responsibility to balance demand and supply in the teacher labor market. Before corresponding policy enactment, research and data collection regarding teacher perspectives is crucial to implementing correct and effective strategies.

5.1 Mitigating the challenges associated with transportation, quality of life, and administrative constraints

The needs for accessible transportation and decent living conditions were highlighted by the participants in the questionnaire. Arranging more frequent shuttle buses from rural to urban districts and providing specific channels for purchasing daily products would help to mitigate the inconvenience for rural teachers in maintaining their fundamental life. However, the effects of improving transportation and living conditions are limited in rural areas because those who used to live in urban districts still tend to leave after the end of the term. Thus, it might be advantageous for schools to recruit teachers from the surrounding community or local districts, who might be more likely to feel comfortable in the rural setting and live in the district for a long period [49, 50]. Notably, to ensure diversity in teachers’ backgrounds, it is not recommended to use a majority of local teachers in a school. For augmenting attractiveness, offering 0.5 to 1 day off for commuting, taking vacation, or even having time to get acquainted with the community is another effective measure. If the conditions were more ideal, helping teachers connect with residents and the community and supporting place-based curricula can lessen their sense of maladjustment and, even ultimately, help them become rooted in the local scene [51].

In Taiwan, the overwhelming administrative workload of teachers in rural schools is another barrier to recruiting and retaining teachers. As a result, the central government should rearrange the administrative work allocated from the central government and expand the administrative staff to assist rural schools. Moreover, administrative support can be an effective method of enhancing teacher willingness to stay at rural schools. It is argued by [12] that since rural schools are smaller in scale, the leadership of the principal has a direct influence on teachers and creates a larger impact on the school as a whole. In other words, leadership can be more influential for rural school teachers because there are only a few administrative supervisors. Overall, by supporting adequate resources, creating a positive working atmosphere, and even providing mentor programs for novice teachers, in-service rural teachers might be able to increase their willingness to stay in rural schools.

5.2 Promoting awareness and communication in the context of rural education

Concerning the crisis of teacher shortages in rural areas, this research showed opposite results and indicated the several advantages of working at remote schools. It is important to break stereotypes and highlight the strengths of rural schools through marketing and experiencing. For marketing, it was stated in [5, 49] that rural schools that succeeded in teacher recruitment and retention prefer marketing their schools by highlighting the positive characteristics inherent to their schools or districts, including experiencing less stress due to the small class sizes, fewer administrative meetings, and closer connections with community. Generally, marketing by schools is a prevalent behavior. Rural schools, however, should commit to marketing themselves more vigorously than their urban counterparts since teachers often have negative stereotypes about schools in less populated areas and are unaware of the potential prospects. It is recommended that rural schools adopt various kinds of strategies simultaneously. For instance, using social media and participating in job fairs can simultaneously expose one to the masses and to targeted audiences. Regarding experience, [52] and [53] emphasized the importance of cultivating preservice teachers who are fully qualified and helping them experience the benefits and challenges of teaching in rural areas. Provided that the strengths of rural schools have been noted, working in rural schools might be more attractive to preservice teachers or in-service urban teachers who would prefer better working conditions.

The relatively pessimistic viewpoints of rural teachers are worth noting as well. The lack of comprehension and communication between rural schools and urban schools or even between schools and outsiders could lead to their needs and demands being neglected by the public. In more precise terms, the challenges faced by rural areas require recognition, validation, and assistance from the public. First, it is necessary to encourage communication between rural and urban schools. It is recommended by [21] that by providing the assistance of senior teachers from the main city to those who are close to retirement, such teachers might become willing to share their ample working experiences and thus help rural schools become more competitive. Second, schools are encouraged to cooperate with higher institutions in preparing preservice teachers. On the one hand, universities and colleges can thoroughly realize the conditions and demands of rural schools. On the other hand, volunteered preservice teacher candidates cultivated by teaching colleges are expected to be thoughtfully prepared and understand the challenges of teaching in rural schools in advance, which would enhance the possibility of their staying in a hard-to-staff area [53]. A similar concept is also adopted by [54], who shared the thoughts of cultivating prospective local teachers by supporting local college students in accepting teacher education training and preparing for their future careers.

5.3 The implication for countries facing teacher shortages in rural areas

In summary, the issue of teacher shortages in rural areas is not unique to Taiwan but rather prevalent in many countries. Through this research finding, countries that face similar challenges in recruiting rural teachers can receive practical suggestions or solutions to these problems. However, the rural education landscape may vary across countries, thus necessitating using AHP to identify priority the determinants perceived by teachers and to implement corresponding solutions to effectively address the problem of teacher recruitment in rural areas. Additionally, conducting a comparison via the AHP method between rural and urban teachers can effectively highlight and raise awareness of the differences and predicaments faced by each school type, which could prompt the government to enact inappropriate policies or provide resources or welfare that do not actually cater to teachers’ needs.

Future studies could determine if there are different unforeseen conditions for teacher shortages in every rural district across Taiwan. Consequently, future research should focus on investigating a certain area to thoroughly understand its strengths and weaknesses for solving the problems of teacher shortages. The authors are convinced that by solving the weaknesses and highlighting the strengths of rural districts, the recruitment and retention issues can be solved.