In 2000, contributors to the formulation of the National Plan for Training Personnel to Serve Children with Blindness and Low Vision anticipated a severe shortage of direct service personnel as early as 2006 with an increasing negative impact on teacher numbers through the end of the decade. It is necessary to attract approximately 5,000 new teachers to the field to meet the needs of the ever-increasing population of students with visual impairments requiring specialized training.This study investigated the personality and background experiences of individuals who are attracted to work as educators with students with visual impairments. A sample of 132 teachers who had been trained at either the undergraduate or graduate level and were employed within their first five years as teachers with this specialization completed the Holland Self-Directed Search (Form CP) and a Participant Profile form to ascertain the personality types and experiences of those new to the field.The study considered three variables: (1) gender, (2) race/ethnicity, (3) teacher training level and their association with Holland personality type (RIASEC). All three variables were weak predictors of the personality type of teachers of the visually impaired as indicated by Goodman and Kruskal's tau. Results of the Holland Self-Directed Search was a stronger measure of the personality type associated with becoming a teacher of students with visual impairments. The data related to the sample revealed that 65.2% of those responding identified themselves as Social type.Teachers identified how they became aware of the field prior to making a decision to enter a teacher-training program, what their reasons were for making a decision to enter a training program to become a teacher of students with visual impairments, and which areas of their teaching experience differed from what they had expected prior to employment in the field. Limitations of the study, implications of the results for recruitment and retention of teachers of students with visual impairments, and recommendations for future research are provided.

ABSTRACT THE QUEST TO RETAIN TEACHERS: ONE URBAN-SUBURBAN SCHOOL SYSTEM’S STORY OF TEACHER MOVEMENT by Karen Smits Recent data on teacher attrition indicate that approximately 15 percent of teachers either leave the profession or move from one school to another each year. The attrition rate is highest for teachers new to the profession with 30-50 percent leaving within five years. High rates of attrition are a contributing cause of various educational problems including reduced student achievement, teacher shortages, declining teacher morale, and organizational discontinuity. The purpose of this study was to examine the reasons why teachers choose to leave the profession or move to another school from one year to the next. A qualitative case study was conducted to explore the reasons teachers from one urban-suburban school system voluntarily resigned at the end of one school year and what changes could have been made to keep them from leaving. The study answers three questions: Why do teachers leave? Why do some move to other schools while other teachers leave the profession? What could keep teachers from leaving? Data were collected using exit questionnaires, exit interviews, and semi-structured interviews of teachers leaving after the 2006-2007 school year. Data were analyzed using both deductive and inductive methods. Teachers who participated in this study made the decisions to move or leave for two primary reasons: administrative support and new opportunities. Administrative support took many forms and was described in a variety of ways including the following: administrative visibility, communication, use of time, support with student behavior, workload, implementation of new initiatives, and school climate. Teachers who left for new prospects were seeking different teaching opportunities or a better chance of moving into administration. The greatest difference between the teachers who moved and those who left the profession was hope. Teachers who moved to another school system believed the situation would be better elsewhere. Teachers who left the profession saw the struggles they endured as likely to occur in any teaching situation. Teachers indicated that they may have considered staying if they had received more administrative support, experienced better working conditions, had more supportive mentors, or had a teacher advocate who could have intervened on their behalf.

Professional development (PD) is used as the primary means for ensuring the continued learning of teachers. PD opportunities and support vary in type and quality. Little is known about the participation in and support of PD for high school science teachers. The establishment of supportive professional cultures provides a means to support teachers' PD in addition to providing meaningful interactions between teachers to improve practices related to teaching, learning, and assessment. Even less is known about patterns of relationships between professional culture with high school science teachers and students. PD and professional culture have been reported to increase teacher retention and student achievement. The studies presented in this dissertation use mixed methods approaches to explore data collected by the Policy Research Initiative in Science Education Research Group during the 2007-2008 academic year. The first study assessed PD of high school science teachers from two perspectives: (1) teachers' participation in PD, and (2) schools' practices to support teachers' participation. Teachers' participation was determined using self-reported survey data. Schools' PD support was operationalized using data collected from administrative interviews. Descriptive statistics revealed little relationship between teachers' participation in PD, schools' PD support, and teacher retention. Descriptive statistics of schools' PD support indicated associations with student achievement. The second study operationalized school science professional culture with a rubric developed for the study. Elements within the rubric addressed many components mentioned in the literature as indicative of positive professional culture. School science professional culture had little relationship with either teacher retention or student achievement. Strong associations were found among the elements associated with school science professional culture. These results provide support for the inclusion of these elements in future studies of school science professional culture. The final chapter provides a summary of both studies. Recommendations are made for improving policies in place to support PD and professional cultures experienced by high school science teachers. Specific attention should be directed at the development of cohesive PD programs that address both schools' and teachers' needs. Additionally, more opportunities for in-depth communication regarding school practices for teaching, learning, and assessment need to be provided.

This study investigated personalized adaptive learning, teacher education, and self-efficacy to determine if personalized adaptive teacher education can increase self-efficacy. It is suggested that teachers with higher self-efficacy tend to stay in the teaching profession longer. Chapters 2 and 3 are literature reviews on personalizing adaptive learning to determine what common components are used in personalized adaptive learning systems to get a clear understanding of what previous literature suggests building this study on it. Chapter 4 investigates the data collected from 385 teachers to understand better what teachers report on factors that increase their self-efficacy. As a result, it was found that teachers' self-efficacy increases with more training, support, and resources. In chapter 5, a framework was developed based on previous findings, with components of personalized adaptive learning to provide support/help at the right time for teachers to increase their self-efficacy. An empirical study was conducted to validate this framework, where the framework was used as a guide to personalize and adapt summer teacher preservice training and survey teachers on their self-efficacy before and after the training to see its impact on teachers' self-efficacy. However, since summer preservice training was virtual, the framework could not be implemented fully, as we were not able to observe teachers' behaviors and monitor their learning to provide them help and support, as needed and being in the post-COVID-19 year as educators dealing with about two-year learning loss systemwide, seems decreased teachers' self-efficacy. The findings of this study can guide preservice teacher education institutions and decision-makers of teacher education to assess inservice teachers' needs and self-efficacy to help and support them with a more personalized adaptive education to improve their self-efficacy.

This dissertation examined different facets of teacher turnover in Southern Arizona by using literature from education, educational psychology, and industrial and organizational psychology. The purpose of synthesizing across research domains was to obtain a more nuanced understanding of the phenomenon. Motivation for the study reflected the teacher shortages faced on a national (Sutcher, Darling-Hammond, & Carver-Thomas, 2016) and regional level (Educator Retention and Recruitment Task Force, 2015). In order to identify potential strategies for increasing teacher retention, the dissertation project pursued three studies on this topic. Study 1 utilized data from the Schools and Staffing Survey project. Participants were matched across the 2011-2012 Teacher Questionnaire and 2012-2013 Teacher Follow-Up Survey (TFS) in order to determine whether teachers' beliefs at Time 1 varied by their occupational status at Time 2 (i.e., stayer, leaver, or mover). The study also asked whether teachers' beliefs and attitudes predicted the odds of being a stayer, mover, or leaver at Time 2. Exploratory factor analyses, analyses of variance, and logistic regressions were utilized. Results indicated that there were no differences between teacher groups; and, none of the variables predicted TFS status. Study 2 specifically examined whether teachers differentiated between organizational (school) and occupational (profession) beliefs, particularly in regards to turnover intentions. The study also examined whether specific variables differentially predicted organizational and occupational turnover intentions. The purpose was to identify specific areas that increased both types of retention. Analyses relied on confirmatory factor analyses, analyses of variance, and structural equation modeling. Results indicated that teachers’ beliefs were empirically distinct and that each type of turnover consisted of unique predictors. Study 3 emphasized perceived school goal structure, or school-level goals for teachers, teacher learning, and performance. Mastery school goal structure generally reflected goals for teacher development whereas performance goal structure reflected testing and high performance goals. Both school goal structures were examined in relation to teachers’ occupational turnover intentions, emotion, and coping. Exploratory factor analyses, correlation analyses, and hierarchical linear regression analyses were used in the study. Results indicated that there were two performance school goal structures rather than one anticipated structure: one that emphasized testing and another that emphasized social comparison for teachers. Perceived mastery school goal structure related to lower intentions to leave the profession and more productive coping. Perceived performance-testing school goal structure generally related to more negative affect and ineffective coping; neither performance goal structure related to turnover intentions. Overall, the three studies inform the literature regarding teacher beliefs, motivation, and turnover intentions. The dissertation increases our understanding of teachers' school- and work-related beliefs, and it informs what we know about teachers' turnover intentions. Furthermore, the findings encourage future research on teachers' beliefs and actual turnover, particularly within the current educational context.

No description available.

abstract: In 1976 Florynce R. Kennedy, a United States lawyer, activist, speaker, and author famously stated that “anybody with the brains and energy to become a teacher ought to want to become something better.” With these stigmas surrounding the teaching profession, it becomes a wonder that anybody decides to become a teacher, or even more difficult, stay in the profession. The state of Arizona, specifically, has reached landmark attrition rates and dissatisfaction surrounding lack of education funding. The stories of those leaving have been well publicized over the last year, but what about those who choose to stay? This dissertation examines the counter narrative behind the teacher attrition crisis by focusing on the stories of the teachers in the secondary English Language Arts (ELA) classroom who have decided to remain in the profession. Through narrative inquiry, this study examines how teachers narrate their experiences as teachers and how those constructs may have contributed to their retention. This study collected data from four high school English teachers through two in-depth interviews, classroom observations, a self-made teacher journey concept map, and teaching artifacts in the form of a teaching experience “time capsule.” Through this data, the participants’ stories highlighting their journey to teaching, current careers, and insights on retention were re- storied then thematically coded and analyzed. Findings are in essence the stories themselves, but also reveal how these teachers narrate their career, societal impacts, quality of life, as well as what motivating factors inspire them to stay in the classroom and teach. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation English 2019

The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the perceptions of novice teachers in 1 school district regarding their professional experiences. Novice teacher was defined as someone with 5 years or fewer in the teaching profession. The study was of an emergent design using phenomenological qualitative methods that included face-to-face interviews, triangulation of information, and analyzation with specific adherence given to understanding the social phenomena of the lived experience from the participants’ perspectives. Specifically, the study addressed possible relationships between novice teachers’ experiences and perceptions of success and self-efficacy that contribute to their choice of continuing in the profession of teaching. Participants in this study ranged from 23-55 years of age, represented male and female gender, encompassed all levels of grade configuration within the school district (elementary, middle, high school), and covered experiences within each of the 5 years of defined novice work. Information was collected through individual one-on-one interviews covering preparatory programs, individual school sites, district induction programs, and the relationships developed within each spiraled experience. This study identified reasons for retention in the population of novice teachers and possible obstacles that might cause a novice teacher to leave the profession during or at the end of the 5 year apprenticeship. Information collected revealed that age, timing of entrance into a teaching career and preparatory programs had an effect on novice efficacy and job success. In addition data suggested that job support, job fulfillment, as well as future career choice were influenced by experiences a novice lived through within a school culture including type of administrative support, peer mentoring, collegial socialization, district expectations, and induction involvement.

In rural and remote schools in Western Canada, researchers have discovered that high teacher turnover affects school climate as well as student achievement. The purpose of this project study was to explore novice teachers' and administrators' perceptions about the influence of school-related and classroom activities on decisions to stay or leave permanent teaching positions at a large remote school in Precambrian Shield School Division. Boylan's theory of teacher retention was the conceptual framework for the study. The guiding research questions were focused on teachers' and administrators' perceptions of various aspects of school and classroom activities in remote schools that might influence decisions to stay or leave. A bounded case study design using purposeful sampling was adopted and 11 novice teachers in their first 2 years of teaching experience in a remote school and 1 administrator agreed to participate in the study. The sample included 4 elementary and 4 middle/high school teachers along with 3 teachers with diverse teaching assignments and 1 experienced administrator. Data collection included qualitative questionnaires, semi-structured interviews, and document reviews that were coded and analyzed for common themes. Key findings suggested that classroom climate, professional support structures, and student achievement were perceived to be of negative influence on retention decisions, especially inconsistent professional support structures. These findings were used to create a professional development plan to support and provide mentoring for novice teachers in remote schools. This support plan, particularly the mentoring framework, will likely reduce turnover at this school and will provide a model for helping other districts with similar high turnover in remote schools.

Teacher recruitment and retention is a problem of perpetual concern among education policymakers. High rates of teacher attrition, particularly within the first few years of a teacher’s service have been of particular concern. It is believed that persistent teacher shortages contribute both to underperformance of students generally, as well as to achievement gaps between students of different races and socioeconomic backgrounds. The importance of this issue has led to a great deal of research in the field, which has found that there are a large number of factors that influence the desirability of schools to teachers. What is still unclear from this research is how much these different factors matter relative to one another and to salary. This study aimed to address this gap in the literature by introducing a new survey methodology to the field that allows for quantification of the extent to which various working conditions factors matter to teachers. A survey was distributed to all secondary teachers in the state of Utah where respondents were asked to choose between hypothetical school choices that varied on salary and certain nonmonetary factors. Periodically, respondents were asked to answer open-ended questions explaining their responses. The results of this survey allow for an estimate for each individual of how much salary and each of the working conditions influenced the decisions that they made. These results were analyzed for trends with respect to teacher demographics and contextual factors and were compared to the responses teachers gave to the open-ended questions. This study resulted in a number of practical recommendations for school administrators, policymakers, and fellow researchers. For practitioners, there are results from this study that generate clear recommendations for using limited resources to make schools more desirable to teachers. The results of this study also provide estimates for how much additional salary is needed to entice teachers to work in schools that traditionally struggle to recruit and retain high quality teachers. For researchers, this study provides a model that can be replicated in additional contexts to answer these important practical questions. The study also opens up avenues of future research including new methodological questions worthy of further investigation. By introducing a new survey methodology to this well-developed field of research, this study aims to recommend a new tool for use by researchers in addressing the persistent challenge of teacher recruitment and retention.