Global ETD Search

111	Out of the classroom closet: why only some gay and lesbian teachers are out Lecky, Duane Joseph 19 August 2009 (has links) Canada and British Columbia have legislation in place to protect gays and lesbians from discrimination based on their sexual orientation. A growing number of BC school districts have policy protecting gays and lesbians. However, some gay and lesbian teachers still hide their sexual orientation. Organizational theory recognizes that formal rules do not define the organization. In-depth interviews with 13 gay and lesbian teachers indicate that they would rather not maintain their classroom closets; but that they needed to know that they would be safe coming out. The methodology followed the tradition of narrative inquiry by collecting stories. Initial recruitment was through email, print, and word-of-mouth advertising. An on-line form was used to filter prospective participants to include urban, rural, Muslim, Catholic, closeted, and politically active participants. The great silence with respect to gays and lesbians in the workforce, paired with a history of negative messages needs to be offset by the frequent and ubiquitous dissemination of positive messages. gay lesbian homosexuality gay teacher coming out narrative narrative inquiry Canada British Columbia BC sexual orientation discrimination school policy Organizational theory In-depth interviews qualitative recruitment techniques on-line form anonymous participants anonymous interview queer gay rights
112	Relationships of power: exploring teachers' emotions as experienced in interactions with their peers. Martin, Judith Violet 24 August 2009 (has links) Emotions play a significant role in the lives of teachers, especially in their interactions with their workplace peers. This research uses a case study approach to explore this topic through the medium of an asynchronous on-line discussion group. Twelve public school teachers, eight women and four men, from BC, Canada, volunteered to participate anonymously in a 12 week on-line forum. The study was guided by three research questions: 1) How do teachers make sense of their emotional interactions with their peers? 2) How do these understandings change through discussion with a group of peers over 12 weeks? 3) What understandings of the emotional processes of school culture emerge when teachers discuss and reflect on these emotional aspects of their work in a collaborative setting? The participants responded to weekly focus questions and also initiated their own discussion topics. They were introduced to alternative perspectives of emotion, including the social constructionist, feminist, and discursive. They were asked to focus on everyday interactions with their peers and to suggest what the emotions they experienced and observed achieved within the group. They were also encouraged to pay attention to the feeling rules in their staff meetings and to notice which emotions they thought were deemed appropriate to be expressed and which were deemed inappropriate. Initially the participants used a number of strategies based on the individualized and psychological perspectives of emotions to make sense of their interactions. During the discussion group they were able to discuss their interactions in a safe non-judgemental setting and to reinterpret them in light of new information. Competition, patriarchy, and neo-liberal education policies were seen to influence the dynamics of the workplace. Two mechanisms which appeared to link the teachers’ individual, private experiences of emotions with the culture of the school were the use of the words “positive” and “negative” and the norms embedded in the feeling rules of each school. These mechanisms both constrained and allowed the expression of certain emotions, opinions, and points of view in the workplace, thereby highlighting the political role of emotions. Symbolically the forum represented a collective space within an individualized world. education emotion teacher interaction peers asynchronous on-line workplace collectivity culture school feeling rules norms competition patriarchy positive negative staff meetings social construction discursive feminist collaborative Canada BC process neo-liberal politics individualized collective emotional process experience public discussion group case study

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Out of the classroom closet: why only some gay and lesbian teachers are out

Relationships of power: exploring teachers' emotions as experienced in interactions with their peers.