“Will They Have My Back?” Teacher Sensemaking and the Implementation of a Controversial Issues Policy

• In Event: Undermining Equity and Justice: Navigating a Hostile Sociopolitical Climate in PK–12 Schools

Abstract

Purpose:
Schools as spaces where students and teachers can engage in analysis, and debate around controversial issues is part of the lineage of the American public education system (Kraatz et al., 2022; McAvoy & Hess, 2013). Contemporary efforts to chill speech in schools, censor curriculum (Meehan & Friedman, 2023), protests over protections for LGBTQ+ students, as well as national political movements focused on suppressing diversity programs and policies in K-12 schools (Stout & LaMarr Lemee, 2021) has led some to label this as the era of the “Ed Scare” (Friedman, 2022). Encouraged by state and national school board associations and with support from policy consultants, school boards have begun to create policies intended to address content, speech, and symbols used in classrooms that might be considered controversial (Journell, 2022; Kaplan & Owings, 2021). However, little is known about the way such policies are understood by teachers and what impact such policies, particularly those implemented in the midst of this “Ed Scare” have on teachers' approaches to curriculum and classroom discourses around equity and social justice.

Framework:
Drawing on research (Diem et al., 2015; Sutherland, 2022) that describes how political contexts impact school board policymaking, as well as teacher sensemaking around the enactment of school board policy (Coburn, 2005), this study examines how policies are understood by school board members as well as the teachers who are asked to implement them. Analysis is grounded in scholarship (Darragh & Petrie, 2019) that describes the way political contexts impact teacher choices, particularly their choices to take up content and classroom discourses grounded in pedagogies of justice, equity, and inclusion.

Methods & Data Analysis:
This paper presents the results of a participatory case study (Hudon et al., 2021) examining the implementation of one such “controversial issues” policy at a middle school in the Midwest. Using a focus group approach, participant teachers described district policy on controversial issues in the classroom and what impact this policy has on their professional choices. Following the deidentification of the transcripts, a member of the local school board who helped author the policy participated in three rounds of open coding of the data.

Results & Significance:
Findings indicate a divide between school boards intentions for such controversial issue policies and what teachers believe about these policies. Teachers describe a “chilling effect,” on their classroom choices around content understood to be connected to critical race theory, as well as literature and material related to LGBTQ+ themes. Teachers also described feeling pressure from school administrators to slow equity and social justice efforts. The participatory nature of this case study provides unique and powerful insights into the divide that exists between the school board members who design policy and the teachers and administrative staff tasked with enacting such policies. This case study highlights the importance of teacher-administrator trust and provides reason to question the way school hierarchies often hobble effective implementation and improvement of school board policy during times of local political tension around equity and social justice.

Author

• Janel Anderson, Gonzaga University