Teacher Inquiry: Educators Path to Policymaking and Advocacy for Bilingual Learners

• In Event: Translanguaging as Embodied Language Policy in Critical Inquiries about Linguistic Justice Across Generations and Contexts

Abstract

Objectives
This study explores teachers’ professional growth and policymaking as they designed and carried out classroom-based inquiry projects in their master's degree program. As a capstone experience, teachers conduct an inquiry project to answer a research question emerging from their teaching practice or context with bi/multilingual students. Our goal was to explore potential links between their uptake of the tools of inquiry or praxis (Freire, 2000) and: (1) greater agency and a more confident voice, (2) a translanguaging stance and a plurilingual orientation, (3) skills and strategies as advocates for their students. We asked, in what ways (if any) do K-12 teachers of bi/multilingual students engage as language policymakers (Menken & García, 2017) as they develop and carry out classroom or school-based inquiry projects?

Perspectives
Engaging teacher inquiry as professional development has a long history (Barnes & Shudak, 2022; Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2009); yet few studies focus on teachers of bilingual students or language education (see Wong, et al., 2025 for an exception). A substantial body of research also establishes that teachers in their classrooms and schools operate as language policymakers (de Jong, 2011; Henderson & Palmer, 2017; Menken & Garcia, 2017); yet much of it documents teachers’ de facto implicit engagement with policymaking in language education programs (Shin & Rubio, 2023). This project investigates what happens when we explicitly invite teachers to use critical inquiry (Freire, 2000) to support their teaching practice and advocacy for bilingual students (Dubetz, 2014) - when we encourage teachers to envision themselves as researchers and policymakers.

Methods
Analysis follows a qualitative-dominant mixed-methods approach (Johnson & Onwuegbuzie, 2004). We first conducted a holistic, thematic qualitative analysis (Creswell & Poth, 2018) of the teachers’ words and work, focused on their engagement with tools of inquiry as language policymakers and advocates for their bilingual students. Based on the qualitative codebook, we quantify the teachers’ expression of the extent and type of growth they experienced with scaled construct scores. Given the small sample, we will explore demographic data to identify potential trends within and across groups and teaching settings to inspire future research.
Data
We gathered 10 teachers’ in-class spoken and written reflections, focus group interviews, their inquiry projects (written reports and presentations), other work products, and a demographic survey.

Results
As teachers build their praxis toolkits, their voices develop ideological and professional clarity (Alfaro & Bartolomé, 2017); they engage more intentionally and strategically in advocacy (Palmer, 2018; Dubetz, 2014), and they develop their translanguaging stance. Their implicit language policymaking in their classroom expands into advocacy and explicit engagement with policy/practice change.

Significance
While the literature already reflects teachers acting as language policymakers through their decision-making in their classrooms, our findings illustrate the inquiry’s potential to build intentionality into a teacher’s professional advocacy for their bilingual students. Supporting teachers to develop advocacy skills, empowered professional voices, and skills to ask and answer their own questions is crucial as political forces increasingly target their immigrant and bilingual students, scrutinize their curricular choices, and undermine their schools’ funding sources.

Authors

• Teresa Bruno Warkentin, University of Colorado - Boulder

• Deborah K. Palmer, University of Colorado - Boulder