What Roots a Forest Plows a Path: A Critical Spatial Analysis of Teacher-Led Networked Organizing

• In Event: Teacher-Led Networked Educational Organizing in the United States: Invited Session

Abstract

This theoretical paper examines the rise of teacher-led networked organizing since the mid 2010’s. Although isolation has long characterized the teaching profession (Lortie, 1975), educators today have more opportunities to connect with colleagues near and far. Sociologist Manuel Castells coined the term, “networked social movement” in 2015 to describe a new wave of social movements around the world in the 2000’s that were amplified and shaped by the use of connected technologies. These movements shared certain key characteristics: leadership was most often horizontal rather than vertical, social media was used to amplify ideas and spread information, physical spaces were occupied by groups to generate a collective identity and agency, and equitable democratic participation was both an organizing principle and central goal of the movements. We argue that teacher-led networked organizing is reflective of broader social movement trends in the digital era and that this organizing has the potential to provide teachers spaces in which they can pursue social justice-oriented educational change outside of the confines of institutional structures and directives.
Our paper begins with a historical framing of the rise of teacher-led networked social organizing, and we use the theoretical lens of social space (Lefebvre, 1991; Massey, 2006; Soja, 1996) to analyze the affordances made available to teachers as they participate in these movements. We focus particularly on the teacher-led movements represented in this symposium panel: EdCamp, EduColor, SSChat, and TeachSDGs. In doing so, we also provide a guiding framework for the symposium. Our analysis reveals how the “lived spaces” (Lefebvre, 1991) and educational “third spaces” (Gutiérrez, 2008; Zeichner, 2010) constructed and inhabited by these networks generate opportunities for teachers to work outside of the designed first and second spaces of schools that constrain the social scripts through which they engage with one another. In networked third spaces, teachers are afforded opportunities for reflection, collective resistance, and re-envisioning toward educational justice. They are encouraged to think beyond their particular school and district spaces and consider the larger systems that forces that impact public education in our country. However, teachers can also be challenged by the new kinds of interactions and negotiations that occur in teacher-led networked organizing.
The paper concludes with a discussion as to how teacher educators and schools of education can foster teacher leadership and professional development through learning from and supporting these teacher-led organizing activities. We ask and discuss question such as: How do these new forms of organizing and teachers who participate in them respond to the political and ethical considerations that can arise as a result of participation? As teachers lead networked organizing activities, how can they build the commitment and cohesion among participants that is necessary to sustain movements over the long term? How can more teachers participate in and contribute to these types of social movements? How are teacher education programs preparing the preservice teachers for this new and changing context of educational leadership and professional development?

Authors

• Kira J. Baker-Doyle, Arcadia University

• Jeffrey Paul Carpenter, Elon University

• Emery Marc Petchauer, Michigan State University