Adapting Teach For America to Taiwan: A Case Study of Social Entrepreneurship in a Rural Educational Setting

• In Event: Connecting Communities: Transformative Research Exploring Host and Indigenous Community Perspectives in Preservice Teacher Education Abroad

Abstract

This paper is to investigate how Teach for America’s teacher pipeline model, through the lens of social entrepreneurship framework, is implemented in rural Taiwan, and how the concepts of Teach For Taiwan can be effectively operated through adaptation and localization for the educational and social context in Taiwan. This is a qualitative ethnography research by using participant observation to collect 10 classroom observations and 49 semi-structured interviews, including Teach For Taiwan staff, teachers, and administrators, at a case study school in rural Taiwan. The findings suggested Teach For Taiwan helped facilitate short-term teacher pipeline and brought bring living water and enthusiasm to the local school and community, but the teachers with limited experience and long-term sustainability would be major concerns.

Author

• Mike Yuchuan Shen, National Chung Hsing University
  Presenting Author