Collective Pedagogical Teacher Culture and Teacher Satisfaction

• In Event: Creating and Sustaining Positive School Communities

Abstract

In the current educational climate, teachers are under a tremendous amount of public pressure. High stakes testing associated with No Child Left Behind—the twenty-first century’s initial educational reform initiative—has undermined schools’ organizational cultures by altering working conditions for teachers. Yet teacher job satisfaction is critical to schools’ successful functioning. Using a representative sample of kindergarten teachers who responded to the first wave of the Early Childhood Longitudinal (ECLS-K) Survey in 1998-1999, we investigate the association between two aspects of organizational culture--professional learning community and teacher collaboration-- and teacher job satisfaction. We find a significant association between both professional community and teacher collaboration and job satisfaction, with an interactive influence of professional community and teacher collaboration.

Authors

• Elizabeth Stearns, University of North Carolina - Charlotte

• Neena Banerjee, University of North Carolina - Charlotte

• Stephanie Moller, University of North Carolina - Charlotte

• Roslyn Arlin Mickelson, University of North Carolina - Charlotte