This paper is based on a keynote address to the 2012 Scottish Educational Research Association Annual Conference. It explores the relationship between research and teaching, particularly in the context of teacher education in Scotland but also in terms of wider implications. The paper begins with a discussion of how key terms such as education,…

Content-area university faculty can play a critical role in the trajectories of K-12 teachers into leadership. The purpose of this study is to examine the practices and values of one university faculty member with a long record of work with K-12 teachers, with an aim to offer some guiding considerations as to the potential role of university…

Recruitment of qualified and motivated faculty for physician assistant education programs is difficult. While the causes of the difficulty may be many, the primary one is the physician assistants (PAs) must choose between clinical and academic practice in order to pursue a career in academe. Little if any research has been conducted in this area.…

Alarmingly high rates of teacher attrition exist in contexts designed for students with considerable needs, such as in alternative education programs serving marginalized youth. Research has linked teachers' levels of motivation and well-being to their effectiveness and retention. Consequently, we explore what distinguishes teachers who thrive in…

Public education in Chile has been steadily losing students as a result of the implementation, for the last 35 years, of a market model. In this paper we exemplify how a structural problem (public schools' declining enrollment) created by neoliberal educational policies is transformed into an individual problem to be managed by the public school…

Based on positive psychology, self-determination theory and a perspective on teacher quality, this study proposes and examines a strength-based approach to teacher professional development. A mixed method pre-test/post-test design was adopted to study perceived outcomes of the approach for 93 teachers of six primary schools in the Netherlands and…

This paper aims to understand the relationship between context and agency in the context of a South Korean high school teacher's English classroom pedagogy. This was explored through two semi-structured interviews with the teacher, which was transcribed and analyzed using the principles of grounded theory in order to obtain a bottom-up,…

The skill of reading is regarded as the cornerstone of literacy learning in the foundation phase. Although it is the most complex skill to master, it forms part of literacy teaching. Most learners begin schooling without having any kind of exposure to reading. This lack of exposure introduces a number of challenges, which are consequently…

In this quantitative study, a survey was developed and administered to middle and high school teachers to examine what factors motivated them to implement problem-based learning (PBL). Using Expectancy-Value Theory by Eccles et al. (1983) and Self-Determination Theory by Ryan and Deci (2000b) as the theoretical framework, this instrument measured…

This brief summarizes the results from a study of the recruitment, employment, and retention of minority k-12 teachers. The study examines the extent and sources of the minority teacher shortage--the low proportion of minority teachers in comparison to the increasing numbers of minority students in the school system. Using the National Center for…

The original vision of a charter school called for heavy doses of professional teacher contribution throughout all aspects of curriculum and administration. Unfortunately, that is not how charter schools have evolved. Until now. The Minnesota Guild of Public Charter Schools is the first union-sponsored entity created for the sole purpose of…

Professionalization is an important but overlooked dimension in education politics, particularly the politics of accountability. To isolate the importance of professionalization, this article compares accountability movements in K-12 education with similar movements in higher education. I draw on three pairs of reports that have sought to impose…

The Child-Centred Approach (CCA) is increasingly promoted within India and internationally as a response to the challenge of delivering quality education. From identifying and examining Indian indigenous and global concepts of CCA within traditional and contemporary child-centred pedagogic discourse, this paper reveals the complexities of…

In 2010, Principal Kirk introduced Small Group Meeting (SGM) at Hillcrest Elementary. SGMs are multiage student groupings who meet with school faculty once a month to work on community building, service-learning projects, and advising. Many teachers liked the SGMs, some felt they needed more time to prepare, and others felt it was a waste of time.…

Organisation issues rarely feature in the English language education literature, since language education is seemingly mostly concerned with the individual learner or teacher. As such, the impact that school climate might have on Iranian English language teachers remains an uncharted territory. This mixed-method study explores the relationship…