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Moving On: A Phenomenological Study on the Experiences of Migrating Teachers in Disadvantaged School Districts

Teacher migration occurs frequently in public schools across the United States. As teachers transition and move to new schools, this can have implications for student achievement (Adnot, Dee, Katz, & Wyckoff, 2017; Ronfeldt, Loeb, & Wyckoff, 2013), school/family relationships (Simon & Johnson, 2015), and school administrators (Ingersoll, 2003b). The purpose of this phenomenological qualitative study is to better understand the experiences that led teachers to voluntarily migrate to different schools within their district. Data for this study was collected through semi-structured interviews and document analysis. Public district documents were evaluated to better understand specific policies and/or restrictions on migrating teachers. All data was compiled and categorized into four major themes: 1) school characteristics, 2) school-based relationships, 3) professional atmosphere, and 4) leader support. While this study shows that there was no essence to the phenomena of teacher migration, it does make light of the fact that extremely negative relationships with either teaching colleagues or the school principal were important considerations in teacher’s voluntary, intra-district migration decision.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:uno.edu/oai:scholarworks.uno.edu:td-3588
Date18 May 2018
CreatorsDufrene, Gini E
PublisherScholarWorks@UNO
Source SetsUniversity of New Orleans
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
SourceUniversity of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

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