Pre-K teachers’ professional identity development at community-based organizations during universal Pre-K expansion in New York City

Abstract

This study examines how policy directives and recommendations implemented during a massive universal Pre-Kindergarten expansion in New York City has impacted teachers’ professional identity. We adapted the critical ecologies of the early childhood profession by Dalli et al. (Early childhood grows up: Towards a critical ecology of the profession. In Early childhood grows up, Springer, Dordrecht, pp. 3–19, 2012) and utilized data from in-depth interviews with teachers at community-based organizations in Pre-K programs. Our thematic analysis of transcripts revealed three themes in relation to teachers’ professional identity: becoming a teacher who can play multiple roles to meet administration’s expectations is necessary; continuously modifying practice based on external support from the leadership and policymakers can be confusing; and having a brand new relationship with administrative bodies presents challenges. Data drawn from these themes reveal external factors that have influence over teachers’ professional identity. As there is heightened attention toward publicly funding early childhood in the U.S., and the need for a respected workforce, the implications of this work includes seeking out teachers’ voices to meet their localized needs to support healthy professional identity development while they adjust their practice in response to the policy change.

The Impact of a Dual Education System on the Professional Training of Future Preschool Teachers in Higher Education Institutions

“…At the same me, the improvement of the preschool educa on system signifi cantly depends on the system of training and employment of future teachers, the alloca on of suffi cient resources for the implementa on of individualized educa onal programmes (Hamre et al, 2017). It is emphasized that teachers should be given more opportuni es for professional development and more a en on should be paid to the forma on of professional iden ty (AKABA et al, 2022). The necessity of training young specialists under the guidance of a more experienced teacher is also substan ated (Khandaker, 2021).…”

What Makes Me, Me? Factors influencing pre-service teacher personal identity development during professional practice

“…Figure 3.1 provides an overview of Bronfenbrenner's six ecological systems (Bronfenbrenner, 1979;Crawford et al, 2020;DeCino, 2022). Recently, Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological theory has been used to study different aspects of education and identity development, including personalised learning (Taylor & Gebre, 2016), school culture and beginning teacher retention (Zavelevsky & Lishchinsky, 2020), obstacles faced by gifted minority students (Crawford et al, 2020), enablers and barriers to students' transition into teacher education (Amundsen, 2021), Professional identity development (ProID) of pre-service teacher (PST) school counsellors (DeCino et al, 2022) in-service teacher ProID (Akaba et al, 2022) and how the education curriculum promotes primary school PST personal identity development (PerID) (Lopes & Pereira, 2012). These studies adapted Bronfenbrenner's ecological model by using their own descriptions of ecological systems.…”

“…• Categories classified into Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems, guided by literature (Akaba et al, 2022;Amundsen et al, 2021;DeCino et al, 2022).…”

“…Ecomap data was organised and analysed, following the six steps of RTA. Categories (and consequently, themes) were classified into Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems, guided by literature (Akaba et al, 2022;Amundsen et al, 2021;DeCino et al, 2022).…”

“…. However, when reading about how Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory was utilised in other studies such as byAbdou et al (2022),Akaba et al (2022) andTennant et al (2018), I noted that researchers do not explicitly specify which phase they are using. My research looks at individual and contextual factors that influence PST PerID across one year, in the NZ Aotearoa cultural context.…”