Private practice teachers: towards a deeper understanding of the privatization of instructional services in different educational settings

• In Event: Teachers in Comparative Settings

Proposal

Introduction and Rationale:

In recent years, there has been an increase in private sector involvement in providing educational goods and services to public education (Verger et al., 2016). One area of increasing private sector involvement, which so far has received relatively little scholarly attention, is private sector provision of instructional services. The privatization of instructional services can take several forms (Author A, 2022; Author B, 2002). One option is that a private practice teacher registers as a self-employed worker and independently contracts with a school system to perform specific instructional responsibilities. Another entails the involvement of private staffing agencies which source private practice teachers to schools.

While private sector involvement in education is nothing new, private practice teaching entails the privatization of a core technology of schooling, which could have far-going implications for the very nature and fabric of schools as social organizations (Author B, 2002). Research shows that schools often choose to hire private practice teachers to fill temporary gaps or to take on a more structural teaching job that requires specific knowledge (Cörvers & Van Thor, 2010; De Wit et al., 2014). The expertise that private practice teachers bring in could have a positive impact on the possibilities of schools to effect change and improve education, especially if this expertise was not yet available at the school. Staffing agencies may also attract more personnel into teaching, especially as reports show shifting workplace priorities in favor of flexibility and improved work-life balance (Hess, 2021; Kelly, 2021). Nonetheless, studies also show that private practice teachers are sometimes perceived as less involved in the school (De Wit et al., 2014), and less motivated to embed themselves knowing they will soon leave again. It has also been reported that relationships between private practice teachers and permanently employed teachers can be tense, with potential far-reaching implications for students ‘caught in the middle’ (Cornwall, 2004, p.18). The increase in the number of private practice teachers is especially relevant today as school systems around the world face teaching shortages alongside declining enrollment in traditional teacher preparation programs (Garcia & Weiss, 2019; King & James, 2022; Van Overschelde & Wiggins, 2020).

Purpose and Research Questions:

By addressing private practice teaching in an international comparative context, this paper contributes to a deeper understanding of the scope, nature, and implications of private practice teaching in different systems (the Netherlands and the US) and will allow us to identify gaps as well as reflect on and address common methodological challenges in researching private practice teaching. Working in an international comparative context is crucial due to the emerging nature of the topic and limited scholarship in a single country context. The ways in which private practice teaching emerges is rooted in the social, political, organizational, and economic contexts of local and national school systems.

The objectives of this paper are twofold. The first part of the paper will examine the national context and trends to clarify the definitions, approaches, and contexts of private practice teaching in the Netherlands and the US. It will examine the national trends in labor markets, teacher hiring, and the status of the teaching profession. The second part of the paper addresses the following questions: (a) What are the exact responsibilities, working conditions (e.g. wages, employee rights) and opportunities for professional development of private practice teachers?; (b) What motivates teachers to work as private practice teachers?; (c) How do teachers experience working as private practice teachers and what does it mean for their organizational involvement, job satisfaction and career trajectory of time?; and (d) How do private practice teachers view and construct their professional role and identity vis-à-vis the larger school bureaucracy and understand and enact teacher professionalism?

Theoretically, the study is informed by scholarship in the area of sociology of the professions (Freidson, 2001; Evetts, 2013). The analysis relies on in-depth interviews with private practice teachers (n=30) in the Netherlands along with analyses of the US national data from the 2018 Teaching and Learning International Survey (OECD.org), data from national staffing agencies in the US working in the education sector, and Washington State education employment data. In the US, data will describe the extent to which teachers are employed through different contract types, what characterizes these teachers, and what are their job satisfaction and perception of school culture, and how these differ from teachers under regular contracts.

Our findings highlight that teachers have different motivations to enter private practice teaching, which often relate to a desire for flexibility in terms of when and where to work, what tasks to fulfil and/or how to do so. This desire can be influenced both by personal characteristics (e.g. illness, family responsibilities) as well as system characteristics (e.g. high workload and/or lack of autonomy under regular contracts). While some private practice teachers specialize and fulfil particular tasks (often not engaging with administrative or school-organizational tasks), others perform the same tasks as regular teachers. Even so, the majority of private practice teachers report a lower workload and higher job satisfaction compared to their previous employment under regular contracts. While they feel particularly committed to contributing to the learning and development of their students, many feel less responsible for school organizational goals.

Contributions:

The study expands knowledge about the emerging approach of private practice teaching in two contexts. The results unpack the ways in which private practice teaching is related to important teacher outcomes such as job satisfaction and school culture perceptions. The paper begins to describe teacher motivations for taking up private practice teaching, as well as of how they view and perform their roles and responsibilities. The study contributes to the literature by raising questions about this new form of teacher staffing and the important role of professionalization in understanding this new phenomenon.

Authors

• Marjolein Camphuijsen, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

• Ellen Goldring, Peabody College (Vanderbilt University)

• Angela Cox, Peabody College Vanderbilt University