Resistance in the Core: A Mixed Methods Investigation of Secondary Teachers' Collegial Learning Networks in the Context of Reform

Abstract

This sequential explanatory mixed methods study analyzed teachers’ collegial learning networks in the context of a specific teacher learning reform, Professional Learning Communities (PLCs). Teachers from four high schools in one district participated in the quantitative data collection. Social network analysis modeled variables that affected the formation and dissolution of new collegial learning network ties, clustered teachers into network subgroups, and individualized interview protocols. Phenomenography via focused ethnography was employed during the qualitative phase of the study. Interview data from one unique subgroup (Kirby-H) facilitated exploration of these teachers’ collegial learning networks and reform experiences.

Membership in the same PLC content/grade-level group was significantly correlated with new collegial learning ties, but Kirby-H described the formal reform and its associated learning incidents in overwhelmingly negative terms, preferring or attaching a positive valence to informal collegial learning in almost two-thirds of the total learning incidents. The qualitative data suggest that teachers in Kirby-H did not believe that the PLC facilitated their professional learning. Therefore, the strong quantitative correlation between same PLC membership and new collegial learning ties suggest that collegial ties are composed of learning outside of formal structures (i.e. informal learning). Further, maladaptive beliefs of Kirby-H members may have complicated the success of the PLC reform. Findings suggest the following: 1) PLC content/grade-level groups were constructed on top of preexisting, informal learning networks and bounded by content area, and 2) teachers within key subgroups have the potential to complicate the success of teacher learning reforms and their informal learning must therefore be taken into account during the design phase of a professional learning reform.