Finding Resilience During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Perspectives From School Leaders of Color

• In Event: Understanding and Supporting the Well-Being of Underrepresented Educators: Perspectives Across Identity Locations

Abstract

Objectives or purposes
In the fall of 2021, most California public schools returned to in person learning after months of remote learning. This brought about additional challenges for principals as they found themselves in the position of bearing additional duties such as navigating public health mandates and implementing pandemic related policies, exacerbating their levels of stress (Clifford and Coggshall, 2021). Pandemic conditions have contributed to alarming rates of turnover, with approximately 4 out of 10 principals planning to leave the profession in the next three years (NASSP, 2022). This is especially detrimental for leaders of color, as they are already underrepresented in educational leadership and have higher turnover rates than White principals (Levin & Bradley, 2019). To minimize the high turnover rates and work-related stressors experienced by our principals of color, it is critical to better understand and examine what resilience factors protect their wellbeing. It is also important to examine how the levels of stress have changed or remained the same across the distinct phases of the pandemic, as each phase has elicited specific demands on our principals of color.

Perspective(s) or theoretical framework
We will employ the ecological system theory (Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 2006) to examine how principals of colors’ wellbeing is influenced by the interaction of their surrounding systems. We will also employ a risk and resilience framework to understand how principals of color build resilience to overcome the stressors that are present in the COVID-19 context.

Methods and Data Analysis Procedure
Data were collected from a longitudinal study conducted in the Spring of 2021 and Fall of 2022. Participants were 62, K–12 school principals of color from California. The data is part of a larger mixed-methods data. The present data used were drawn from a Likert scale measure on stressors experienced by principals of color, which was collected during both waves. The open response data was collected during the second wave and asked about principals’ personal resilience strategies used during the pandemic.

Expected Results
To examine the changes in stressors from the first wave (during distance learning) to the second wave (return to in-person learning), we will analyze the stressor items using descriptive statistics. For the open-response data, we analyzed the data using a descriptive thematic analysis procedure comprising two stages. In the first stage, two doctoral student researchers created a codebook to describe various resilience factors. In the second stage, the two doctoral students separately coded all of the open-ended responses and met to resolve inconsistencies to develop inter-rater reliability (inter-rater reliability of 100%). For the present symposium, code labels will be grouped to generate sub-themes of resilience factors using thematic analysis.

Significance
The results from this study will highlight the complexity with which principals of color are navigating the risk and resilience factors that come with their work both in and outside the formal functions of their role. Findings from the study can inform research, policy, and practice to better support principals of colors’ resilience and help minimize their high turnover rates.

Author

• Meg Stomski, University of California - Berkeley
  Presenting Author