Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Harley Walden
TEACHER FEELINGS
Abstract
For the past twenty years there has been little written about teachers
perceptions for how others view them as professionals (e.g., the way
that teachers are discussed and treated in their communities and
reflected in educational policy reform). Teachers are one of the primary
stakeholders in a childs education; however, recent legislation reduces
teachers roles in this process and the narrative regarding teachers is
that they are easily replaceable and low in skills that would identify
them as a profession. In sum, the ways that others view teachers is an
important component of the development for educational policy
reform. This has the potential to negatively impact the teaching
profession. The purpose of this study is to see what are teachers
perceptions for how other view them as professionals, and to
determine how these perceptions relate with recent educational policy
reform. The research participants are nine voluntary elementary school
teachers. The research methods of this study involved a five question
multiple choice and two short essay question survey that was given to
the research participant via email link. The results of this study
indicated that participants perceived they had little to no say in the
development of educational policy reform. Recommendations for future
research should include research regarding educators from other
counties in West Virginia and other states across America. This
knowledge could lead to chains of dialogues and discussions aimed at
developing educational policy that takes into consideration teachers
own perceptions of the profession and how others view them.
Keywords: teacher perceptions, control, education policy
reform
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they were between the ages of 25-34. One respondent (11%) reported
that they were between the ages of 35-44. Two respondents (22%)
reported that they were between the ages of 45-54. One respondent
(11%) reported that they were between the ages of 55-64.
Question 3
Question three also dealt with demographic information
regarding the respondents gender. Eight respondents (89%) reported
that they were female and one respondent reported that they were
male (11%).
Question 4
On question four, information regarding the respondents years
of experience as educators was recorded. Two respondents (22%)
reported that they acquired two-three years worth of teaching
experience. One respondent (11%) reported that they had four-five
years worth of teaching experience. Two respondents (22%) reported
that they acquired six-seven years worth of teaching experience. One
respondent (11%) reported that they had eight-nine years worth of
teaching experience. Three (33%) respondents reported that they had
ten-plus years worth of teaching experience as an educator.
Question 5
Question five used a Likert rating scale to determine
respondents agreement with twelve different statements concerning
the development of educational policy reform. The Likert rating scale
rating respondents agreement ranged from: strongly disagree,
disagree, neither agree nor disagree, agree, and strongly agree. The
twelve statements provided on question five included: I feel valued as
a teacher by my peers, I feel valued as a teacher by parents, I feel
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and four (50%) reported that they neither agreed nor disagreed with
this statement.
I feel valued as a teacher by national leaders. One
respondent (12%) reported that they agreed with this statement.
Four respondents (50%) reported that they disagreed with the
statement and three respondents (38%) reported that they neither
agreed nor disagreed with the statement.
I feel valued as a teacher by society as a whole. One
respondent (12%) reported that they agreed with this statement.
Four respondents (50%) reported that they disagreed with the
statement, whereas one respondent (12%) reported that they
strongly disagreed with the statement. Two respondents (25%)
reported that they neither agreed nor disagreed with the statement.
I have control over curriculum in my classroom. Two
respondents (25%) reported that they agreed with this statement
and two respondents (25%) reported that they disagreed with the
statement. Two respondents (25%) reported that they strongly
disagreed with the statement and two respondents (25%) reported
that they neither agreed nor disagreed with the statement.
My voice is heard in educational policy decision-making.
Three respondents (38%) reported that they disagreed with this
statement, whereas two respondents (25%) reported that they
strongly disagreed with the statement. Three respondents (38%)
reported that they neither agreed nor disagreed with the statement.
Educational policy decisions are controlled by teachers.
Only seven respondents answered this portion of the question. Four
respondents (57%) reported that they disagreed with the statement
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and curricular change that threaten to erode the role of the teacher in
their own classroom.
Recommendations
Some areas for future research should focus on incorporating
more participants, which was outside the scope of the present study.
In particular, research could explore educators from multiple schools,
grade levels, and content areas from other counties and states, in
order to gauge a broader spectrum of the kinds of perceptions that
teachers have about educational policy reform and their own
effectiveness. It would be interesting to gauge the same questions
across the gambit of educators from various regions around the
country and quantitatively provide statistics that can generalize about
educators and their attitudes toward educational policy reform on the
state and federal levels, as well as their perceptions about their
effectiveness as teachers. Educators from non-Appalachian classrooms
could yield particularly interesting statistics regarding educational
policy reform, in terms of analyzing different approaches to curricular
change and how teachers believe others view their value as
professionals. Some questions for future research include: What are
the generalizations that can be made be asking the same set of
questions in a different survey format to a larger sample size? How is
educational policy reform accounting for teachers perceptions of
agency and effectiveness? Are politicians and policymakers interacting
with experienced teachers in efforts to truly create educational policy
reform from the inside-out approach? How can politicians and
policymakers seek to incorporate teachers in a meaningful and direct
way from the beginning of the educational policy reform process?
Educators in the post-modern classroom perceive educational policy
reform in meaningful and different ways, as evidenced by this study,
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Appendix A
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Appendix B
Disagreed
14%
Strongly Disagreed
29%
57%