Abstract:

Quality education has been quite elusive as evidenced by the National Achievement Test results. Teachers are faced with challenges to deal and improve current situations. Employing action research skills into their practice will provide a framework for systematic inquiry and handle the issues directly concerning them (Donato,2003). Being an engaged University, MUST’s extension services seeks to provide technical assistance by sharing its expertise. A teacher-training program aiming to effect change is believed to be based on the community’s needs. Descriptive and survey design with Four Group Discussion (FGD) was conducted to 87 in-service teachers from 3 neighboring schools. They were asked to rate their competencies and their attitudes towards research. More than one-third has below basic competencies while the rest are not confident that they have beyond basic skills on management, communication and data analysis in research. It is great to note that these teachers find skills as important and majority revealed having good attitude towards research.

Keywords:

Extension Program, Teacher-training, research competency, research attitudes.