"COVID Changed Everything": Exploring Teachers' Agency in the COVID-19 Pandemic

• In Event: Fairmont Roundtable Session Three
  In Roundtable Session: Investigating, Measuring, and Reconceptualizing Teacher Agency (Table 5)

Abstract

This study explores how the shift to online schooling during the pandemic presented teachers the opportunity to think critically about taken for granted aspects of schooling. We investigate three particular aspects of teacher agency: capability, intention, and enactment using a novel interview method we refer to as reflexive longitudinal lifeworld interviewing. Our findings illustrate how the removal of district interventions contributed to an environment that fostered teachers’ agentic capabilities as they reconceptualized their grading systems and negotiated their commitments to mathematical content. Our findings speak directly to established policies by furthering our understanding of how institutional conditions shape instructional practice.

Authors

• Lizi Metts, Vanderbilt University
  Presenting Author

• Katherine Schneeberger McGugan, Vanderbilt University
  Presenting Author