Elisabeth Clemens Kimberly Austin University of Chicago
In the large literature on school reform, researchers draw on institutional theories of change to examine the role of teacher attitudes and beliefs within the change process. Much of this literature claims teachers perceive reforms as ineffective, equivalent to existing practices or instructional fads and, therefore, not worthy of adoption. Teachers can easily resist or evade these reforms, because of the separation between structures and practices in education, commonly known as de-coupling. Even among recent studies that question the de-coupling thesis, research continues to focus on cognition and norms rather than the process of incorporating new practices with existing ones. This study incorporates these elements of work by asking: How do school reform efforts interact with teachers' existing work practices? To address this question, the study examines instructional content, classroom management and patterns of interaction between teachers and students in schools implementing recently adopted "character education" reforms. It also gathers evidence of cognition and norms by investigating teacher interests, attitudes, beliefs and resources. To do this, the research combines participant-observation in classrooms and other school spaces in two U.S. urban elementary schools (both public, one charter) with staff interviews.
Broader Impact
The study's findings have theoretical and practical implications. First, this research will contribute to social scientific understandings of the role of work in processes of intentional policy change. In doing so, the project also contributes to the literature in the sociology of education by articulating classroom structures and practices, which many studies describe as the ?black box? of classroom instruction. Lastly, this research encourages policy evaluators and school-based practitioners to adopt a wider lens when implementing and evaluating school reforms. For instance, research in educational psychology already suggests a link between instruction and classroom managemen. This study directs educational reformers to consider similar links between instruction, classroom management and patterns of interaction among organizational actors when designing and evaluating school improvement efforts.
Studies of school change often cite teacher resistance as the source of failed reform. Recent studies have challenged this depiction with findings that highlight the role of leadership in mobilizing change resistant teachers. But, the foregone conclusion that teachers are change resistant has led researchers to overlook the process by which teachers discard (or accept) reforms. Using qualitative data, this study explores the change process at Allen Elementary School and Thompson Charter School, two urban elementary schools implementing programs that encourage positive student behavior. The analysis combines several perspectives that incorporate elements of Goffman’s frame analysis. Common among these traditions is the role of frames in motivating action. Following social movement literature, I find that diagnostic and prognostic frames, which I call problem frames, were critical to mobilizing teachers. These frames aligned the new programs with teachers’ existing personal frames to define a problem and present a solution. I identify another set of frames that I call coordinating frames. These frames were deeply practical plans that detailed and organized individual and collective action in order to enact the solution identified in the problem frame. These frames, which were embodied as rules, systems, and goals, had to fit within teachers’ existing practices. Rather than heighten the need for change, coordinating frames provided a sense of continuity. According to the literature, the alignment of organizational frames with the personal frames produces a resonance that deepens participation. But, "what sticks" is largely depicted as voluntary. My research, however, finds that frame resonance at these schools was actively cultivated. School leaders used the organizational learning system to create a common language, set of practices, and expectations of use. However, these actions were insufficient to sustaining the use of the programs as planned. I attribute this mismatch between plans and implementation to a secondary process that revolved around cues as defined in the sensemaking literature. These cues exist in the comparison between frames and the experienced moment. Experienced cues were noticed as events that confirmed or disconfirmed the problem and coordinating frames. Reflective cues were not only observed patterns in experienced cues but also observations on the relationship between the new practices and existing ones. These reflective cues entered into teachers’ discourse and along with the frames provided an outline for a collective narrative of use. This narrative provided a working theory of how to use these new programs that superseded the problem and coordinating frames. My discussion of experienced and reflective cues as well as the creation of the collective narrative provides a more substantive discussion of how actors notice some cues and overlook others, which is lacking in the sensemaking literature. This research also makes contributions to organizational studies and education research. With respect to the former, in open, natural organizations like schools, this research proposes a view of planned organizational change that is iterative. I have shown that organizational leaders use institutional and shared organizational beliefs and values to construct frames that mobilize and organize actors. I have also shown that as members implement programs, experienced and reflective cues challenge the appropriateness of leadership-provided frames. These cues contribute to the construction of a collective narrative. I theorize that successful planned change involves the use of the organizational learning system as a channel for other organizational members to discuss cues and adjust frames. These adjustments "bubble up" from experiences as opposed to strict comparisons with initial plans. These revisions inform the construction of new problem and coordinating frames. And, this iterative process repeats as actors not only develop consensus about the appropriate use of new practices but also eliminate persistent or emergent ambiguity and uncertainty. With respect to education research, this study argues that teachers are not blind resistors to reform but rather learners attempting to gather information about new practices. This research suggests that this learning process relates to both the content knowledge and behavior management aspects of teaching. Scholars have examined teacher knowledge has a barrier to change. Often this research focuses on teachers’ lack of knowledge to use new instructional approaches. But my research suggests that it is the abundance of information that overwhelms teachers and stymies action. Less is known about how the demands of managing a classroom affect school reform. This study, however, has shown that the need to maintain classroom order influences teachers’ use of new programs. Lastly, this work took a distinctive view of the technical core in schools as the collection of classrooms. Teachers did not produce individual narratives but a collective one based on their first-hand experiences, observations, and conversations with colleagues and leadership. This conflicts with the individualized view of teaching in education research and policy. My research suggests that the phenomenon of resistance reflects the organizational culture and not simply the individual preferences of teachers.
