February 25, 2019 | UHCL Staff
Four College of Education professors at University of Houston-Clear Lake have collaboratively published a book intended to resonate with educators or others involved in teacher preparation programs. The book, entitled “Facing Challenges and Complexities in Retention of Novice Teachers,” by Professors Denise McDonald, Michele Kahn, Leslie Gauna and Kent Divoll, is a research book investigating new teachers’ challenges and concerns in the Houston area, and illustrating the main factors that impact their decisions to remain in the teaching profession or leave.
The book, edited by McDonald, represents research each professor conducted over one semester to three years. “It’s a comprehensive book with chapters that might be with one or multiple new teacher interviewees and runs the spectrum from elementary through high school and across all content areas,” said McDonald, who also wrote the introduction and served as the book’s editor.
She explained that each researching professor used the same overarching questions to frame the studies. “The main questions were focused on what type of mentoring occurred, how that mentoring was effective or not, what discrepancies existed between the teacher preparatory phase and the reality of teaching diverse learners, and to describe the greatest source of support in their position as a new teacher,” McDonald said.
Her own research spanned three years, she said, but each professor added additional questions as needed for their particular area of research. “Our combined goal was to determine the factors and experiences that cause new teachers to leave or to stay in the teaching profession,” she said.
Each professor contributed at least one chapter to the book. McDonald said her chapter, entitled, “I Feel Like Edith Piaf,” focused on a study on the experiences of a new teacher to whom McDonald gave the pseudonym Edith. “The teacher said she felt like (French ballad singer and actress who rose to fame in the 1940s) Edith Piaf. She shared stories of sorrow and hope, and her fears and criticism,” McDonald said. “Her stories were impactful and revealed her values and her identity as a teacher.”
She said she began her chapter with a summary of existing literature about teacher preparedness and teacher identity, and presented a literature review of the argument for doing the research. “I have a summary table of findings for her first, second and third years and discuss constructs that include her challenges and concerns, mentor support, relationships, identity claims, professional opportunities, the story of her emotional self and a summary,” she said. “Each year all those constructs are defined, with different findings. The best part were her stories. Edith had multiple challenges in the three years I researched her, but she did stay in the profession.”
Divoll and Gauna contributed a chapter entitled, “Career Changers’ Experiences as Neophyte English as a Second Language Middle School Teachers. Their study was based on a group of teachers who began their professional lives in other careers and became ESL teachers later.
“Our chapter tells the story of two career changers who became middle school ESL teachers,” Divoll said. “We explored the marginalization and identity crisis that ESL educators often face.”
The information is important, Gauna said, because it highlights how ESL teachers are marginalized by state and local policies and within the school environment by their peers and administrators. “Novice ESL teachers are rarely paired with someone who has experience teaching ESL. Our chapter provides recommendations for induction support for them,” she said. Gauna also co-authored a second chapter focusing on an outstanding Latina bilingual education teacher who felt she had no choice but to leave the profession.
The book explores many factors that could influence a teacher’s decision to leave the profession. Kahn’s chapter, called, “Walking with Fish, Swimming with Cats: Novice Teachers and Equity,” explores the circumstances of teachers who experienced marginalization or even bullying by other faculty or administrators and felt compelled to leave due to a lack of support and resources.
“One of the more surprising experiences I researched regarded the bullying of teachers by other teachers or administrators,” Kahn said. “One teacher was nearly fired for missing work because she was caring for a family member, and was publicly scolded for missing a meeting, even after informing the meeting participants that she couldn’t be there. Later, she discovered that this appeared to be some kind of hazing ritual for new teachers, which stopped after she signed a contract for the next year.”
Two other teachers had uninvolved or unprepared mentors, and another was left to develop all lesson plans and curriculum on her own, Kahn said. “That teacher was never even given the teacher’s edition of the textbook.”
McDonald said this research spurred the College of Education’s initiative to create programs to mentor new teachers as they transition into the classroom. “We hope other teacher educators will read this book and it will resonate nationally with others to examine challenges within teacher preparation programs,” she said. “We want to make sure we support new teachers so they will remain in the profession longer.”
For more information about UHCL’s College of Education programs, visit www.uhcl.edu/education/.
