On Their Own? New Teachers’ Integration into Their Schools’ Work-related Social Networks

• In Event: 3-022 - Seeking Advice in Schools: Understanding Social Network Ties among Educators

Integrative Statement

When an individual joins a new organization, an important early task is to establish relationships with colleagues, as these relationships enable newcomers to access the advice, information, and other resources that are crucial to successful adjustment to the new workplace (Brass, 1995; Brass, Galakiewicz, Greve, & Tsai, 2004; Korte, 2009; Korte & Lin, 2013; Morrison, 2002). Collegial interactions are important for new teachers’ successful socialization into their schools (Kardos, Johnson, Peske, Kauffman, & Liu, 2001; Kardos & Johnson, 2007; Pogodzinski, Youngs, & Frank, 2013), and, over time, for improvements in their ability to improve student outcomes (Kraft & Papay, 2014). Despite efforts to increase supports for new teachers, however, many schools and school systems provide little support for newcomers to develop collegial relationships (Johnson & Birkeland, 2003; Kardos et al., 2001; Kardos & Johnson, 2007; Little, 1990; Lortie, 1975). One obstacle to improving these supports is the lack of research on new teachers’ collegial interactions, the variation in these interactions across schools and school subjects, and the changes in these interactions over time.

Drawing on four years of social network data from all 14 elementary schools in one suburban school district, this study fills this gap in the literature by examining the degree to which new teachers seek, provide, and broker advice about teaching and learning over their first years in new schools. The analyses compare the network centrality of new and incumbent teachers over time, and use hierarchical latent space network models (HLSMs; Sweet, Thomas, & Junker, 2013) to examine whether being new to a school predicts either seeking or being sought out for advice, controlling for a variety of other factors known to predict such ties. Analyses also explore how new teachers’ integration into their schools’ networks differ across schools and school subjects.

Results suggest that new teachers in their first year in a new school—regardless of whether or not they arrive with prior experience in another school— do not differ from incumbent teachers in the amount of advice they seek about their work. These findings are illustrated in Table 1, which show sender effects from HLSM models that control for a range of sender, receiver, dyad, and network characteristics. These results show no clear patterns of significant differences in advice seeking between either novice or experienced newcomers and incumbents.

Results also suggest that the degree to which newcomers seek advice changes little—and by some measures even declines—over teachers’ first years in a new school. These findings are illustrated by Figure 1, which shows advice seeking (out degree) for novice and experienced newcomers across their first four years in a new school. The figure illustrates slight declines (for novice newcomers) and little change (for experienced newcomers) in advice seeking across this period. These findings have implications for policy and practice related to the support of new teachers as they enter school organizations.

Author

• Matthew Shirrell, The George Washington University
  Presenting Author