Creating a Culture of Growth (Revisited)

Introduction

Teaching is an isolating profession. Teachers can go for hours while only interacting with students, closed off from the larger community. Administrators—and other teachers, for that matter—don’t have much time to visit classes as often as they like. Two employees in a school may only interact briefly in a mailroom or at a lunch table. Additionally because of common calendars, among other things, teachers rarely interact with teachers at other schools. Professional development often takes the form of visiting a conference or workshop for a day or two per year, often in the middle of a busy school year. These factors help to paint the picture of why teachers have little opportunity for interaction with other educators to discuss and reflect on their practice.

This review will look at recent work on how a school might increase the “informal” professional development within a school, defined as teachers discussing practice outside of the environment of a conference or workshop. First, an argument will be made that more frequent communication and collaboration improves student outcomes. A description of what this might look like structurally in a school setting will follow. Next, a case will be made for the role of strong and targeted leadership to promote and maintain a culture of professional growth. Finally, some recommendations will be made, including what leaders can do to promote such a culture. 

Creating a Culture of Growth

While it may seem obvious to educators, a large amount of evidence does link teacher effectiveness to student outcomes (e.g. Rocko, 2004). It follows naturally to then explore what factors in a school increases teacher effectiveness. To this end, Thoonen et al. (2011) collected survey data from over 500 teachers across 32 elementary schools in the Netherlands. They concluded that the strongest predictor of teaching effectiveness were the teachers trying new practices (along with reflection). Further, experimentation and reflection were directly linked to how often teachers interact with other teachers. Therefore, a school where teachers are interacting frequently can increase experimentation and reflection, leading to improved teacher effectiveness and student outcomes.

Working with other teachers doesn’t just increase teacher effectiveness, it can also increase a sense of community. Bryk et al. (1999) conducted surveys of 5,690 teachers in nearly 250 schools in Chicago to determine the factors that go into creating a communal school. Similar to the results above, they found that the most important factors contributing to an improved community were teachers communicating with each other in an environment conducive to innovation or experimentation with teaching practice. Smaller schools seemed more able to facilitate conversations, perhaps because of increased contact between leaders as well as other teachers. However, Bridwell-Mitchell and Cooc (2016) found that larger schools can have as much, if not more contact between teachers due to a larger “pool of resources.” Whether large or small, teachers need to perceive a trusting and supportive community in order to experiment. Fortunately, this perception can increase the overall well-being of a teacher (Thoonen et al., 2011).

The type of interactions between teachers needs to be both formal and informal. As an example, Cosner (2009) looked at 11 high schools that were considered strong at building organizational capacity. Collegial trust came up as one of the largest impacting factors on community in these schools. In particular, the administration worked on increasing three factors: 1) increase face-to-face time for all employees at meetings and during in-house professional development, 2) creating new face-to-face interaction events (both formal and informal), and 3) making it known that increasing trust was a priority for the community. 

Creating a community of growth will increase a school’s social capital, which is defined as the social “resources” available to members of a community. Social capital has been shown to have a direct impact on improving both the community at large and the academic outcomes of students (Vescio et al., 2008). Over time, social capital can be increased when teachers feel that they “fit” in the community, not just having long-tenured teachers (Bridwell-Mitchell and Cooc, 2016). Creating more unique or non-traditional interactions between teachers can go a long way to helping teachers feel they fit.

With so many benefits to creating a culture of growth within a community, it is interesting to note that teachers, by default, don’t take on leadership roles with a goal to create a community. In a study of over 300 teachers in the New York and New Jersey area, Nolan and Palazzolo (2011) investigated what new or inexperienced teachers considered as teacher or community leadership. Most teachers viewed leadership as a way toward advancement (e.g. serving on committees or helping clubs) or advocacy (e.g. helping at-risk students or creating opportunities for individual students), but not for student academic outcomes. Further, these novice teachers did not feel responsible to take on roles within the community, unless they were specifically interested in advancing to a higher administrative position.

In short, it is imperative that schools create communities where teachers feel that they fit in to a community. Increasing interactions between teachers can increase the amount of experimentation with practice and thus positively impact student achievement. 

What a Culture of Growth Looks Like

While a teacher feeling comfortable interacting with other teachers is representative of a strong community, this alone will not create a culture of growth. In general, there are three components that a school needs to scaffold create a culture of growth: “direct” components, such as rules for observing classes; “indirect” components, such as a school investing time to promote teacher

learning; and “subtle” components, such as a feeling of a trusting environment and overall job satisfaction (Haiyan et al., 2016, and references within). A community that has a culture of growth will lead to teachers being more likely to improve their practice in a safe environment for collaboration and experimentation, which will then increase teacher satisfaction, making them more likely to seek growth. A positive, self-reinforcing cycle will be in place.

An individual teacher’s interaction within a culture falls on a continuum of collaborative community. Little (1990) describes parts of the continuum as follows:

• Informal conversations between teachers. Interactions happen almost by accident. These conversations may build community between a few members, but not for the school as a whole. Because interactions are mostly sharing experiences rather than intentional conversations about improving practice, these do little to change a community.

• Intentionally seeking and offering help. Communities with these interactions where teachers are improving practice more, often it is exclusively new teachers (or experienced teachers moving to new roles) that seek help (Shulman and Colbert, 1987).

• A sharing community. Teachers will visit classrooms often, will discuss practice, and will try out new ideas. In this environment, “teachers are prepared to reveal a good deal of themselves in the public arena.” (Nias, 1989, p. 28).

• A fully-cohesive community. Communities are reliant on truly working together. Teachers are dependent on each other to complete the work of the school, from daily lessons to curriculum design. The community is reliant on collaboration for the school to function, isolated teachers cannot function within this structure.

For a school to create a culture of growth, a strong community is necessary. Increasing community is a combination of formal and informal, structured and unstructured interactions of the members within the community.

To move a school to a culture of growth, strong leadership is necessary. A large amount of evidence shows what a large impact a leader has on an school. For example, leaders can increase teaching effectiveness (e.g. Edmonds, 1979) as well as organizational growth (e.g. Hallinger and Heck, 2010). Further, leading by example can model expectations for teachers (Day et al., 2010). Leaders can form the culture by hiring teachers that ”fit” (Kochanek, 2005). Finally, leaders can create explicit structures and programs for collaboration, which builds trust (Tschannen-Moran, 2004).

Despite this power, the impact a leader has on student outcomes has been questioned, specifically in two conflicting meta-studies. On one side, the effect of leadership on student outcomes was found to be nearly zero (Witziers et al., 2003), while another suggested that leadership played a significant role (Marzano et al., 2005). To resolve the debate Robinson et al. (2008) looked at both studies, including their own meta-study to find that the type of leadership has an effect on student outcomes. Robinson et al. (2008) found that an instructional leader, one who focuses on pedagogical growth and learning, was more impactful than a transformational leader, who focuses on building strong purpose amongst staff. They note strong effects for leaders who were “promoting and participating in teacher learning and development” and moderate effects for those “concerned with goal setting and planning, coordinating, and evaluating teaching and the curriculum.” (Robinson et al., 2008, p. 635). Similar research has shown the effect of leaders can have on motivating teachers to research new practices (Day et al., 2010, and references within).

As shown earlier, teachers are motivated to improve practice when a culture of growth is present. Leaders can create such a culture by leading by example, setting formal and informal opportunities for teachers to connect, focusing professional development on exploring and reflecting on practice, and cultivating an overall sense of community to create a culture of growth. 

Recommendations 

What action steps can a school take in order to promote the culture of growth?

One popular movement is personal learning communities (PLC). Teachers form small groups with the intention to discuss practice. For example, groups might meet to help a teacher create an assignment, focus a lesson, or get advice on student behavior. PLCs can be wide-ranging, but these groups only positively impact student learning when the focus is on examining practice, rather than just focusing on solving internal issues (Vescio et al., 2008). Fortunately, effective and focused PLC groups can create a stronger community.

To improve professional development, both internally and externally, additional structures can be put in place to enhance what a teacher will take away from the experience. After some case studies of schools in Shanghai, Haiyan et al. (2016) suggest that all professional development should be extremely personalized. For example, having teachers prepare a classroom lesson before a professional development session and then refine after the session can personalize the impact for the teacher. Additionally, they recommend that schools create explicit time for teachers to observe others, be observed themselves, and reflect on these observations—and connecting experienced and new teachers is particularly impactful. They also suggest that teacher evaluations should explicitly expect that teachers are continual learners, and not just with teacher practice. Finally, a culture of a learning environment is extremely important. This includes encouraging and supporting teachers, celebrating student achievement and growth, modeling expected behaviors, and promoting collaboration and sharing. 

In short, schools should act with intentionality while creating new opportunities for teacher interaction. Leaders need to expect that teachers are committed to growing personally and professionally. Any new programs a school puts in place needs to be well thought out and be specific to learning about practice. Reflection and personalization can enhance traditional forms of professional development. 

Summary

It is clear that the culture of a school can impact student learning. If a school has a culture of growth amongst its teachers, the students will benefit. Creating a culture is not easy, nor is it easy to maintain. However, school leaders play a large role in creating a school’s community. Recommendations from above are clear: create more time for teachers, both formally and informally, to connect and start to build a culture of growth. In reality, it is not as easy as requiring more class visits. Teacher time is precious, and creating a new program of interaction cannot just be another thing to do during the year. A school must craft the right programs and structures as well as attempt maximize the effect of already existing programs through personalization. It is hard work, but because of the direct effect on student outcomes, it is necessary work. 

 

References

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