1 Teacher Voice Jonathan Gyurko Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy under the Executive Committee of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2012 2 © 2012 Jonathan Gyurko All rights reserved ABSTRACT Teacher Voice Jonathan Gyurko In many of today’s education debates, “teacher voice” is invoked as a remedy to, or the cause of, the problems facing public schools. Advocates argue that teachers don’t have a sufficient voice in setting educational policy and decision-making while critics maintain that teachers have too strong an influence. This study aims to bring some clarity to the contested and often ill-defined notion of “teacher voice.” I begin with an original analytical framework to establish a working definition of teacher voice and a means by which to study teachers’ educational, employment, and policy voice, as expressed individually and collectively, to their colleagues, supervisors, and policymakers. I then use this framework in Part I of my paper which is a historical review of the development and expression of teacher voice over five major periods in the history of public education in the United States, dating from the colonial era through today. Based on this historical interpretation and recent empirical research, I estimate the impact of teacher voice on two outcomes of interest: student achievement and teacher working conditions. In Part II of the paper, I conduct an original quantitative study of teacher voice, designed along the lines of my analytical framework, with particular attention to the relationship between teacher voice and teacher turnover, or “exit.” As presented in Parts I and II and summarized in my Conclusion, teacher voice requires an enabling context. For much of the history of public education in the United States, a number of social and political factors presented conditions that inhibited teacher voice. As the state acquired more responsibility for the delivery of schooling, the required institutional context took shape allowing for the emergence of teacher voice in its various forms. Collective bargaining laws established formal procedures for the expression of teacher collective voice, originally on matters of employment but quickly spreading to issues of education and policy. Over the past thirty years, just as teacher voice gained strength at the negotiating table and in the corridors of power, the evolving institutional context has privileged choice, or “exit,” over voice; a concurrent centralization of authority has made decision making less susceptible to voice efforts. At present, and despite mechanisms that promote teacher voice such as unionization and collective bargaining, teachers feel as if they do not have much of a voice in educational, employment, or policy decisions. Context matters, though, for when teachers are satisfied with their place of work, when represented by an effective union, and when the issues they raise are implemented or addressed, voice levels are at their highest. My findings also indicate that the right working conditions are associated with higher levels of teacher voice even among those educators who are inclined to leave their school. This finding suggests, and additional research is required to confirm, that promoting teacher voice can reduce unwanted turnover in schools. I conclude with thoughts on the future prospects of teacher voice. New technologies, social media, and other forms of connectivity are providing teachers with new opportunities to voice ideas amongst themselves and with supervisors and policymakers. Although it is too early to tell, there is reason to believe that these new voice pathways will serve as an effective medium for teachers to influence decisions and policies and expand the enabling context for teacher, and public, voice in education. Contents: Introduction: The Trouble with “Teacher Voice” 1 Part One: A Brief History of Teacher Voice 15 1. The Colonial and Early National Period 22 2. The Common School Era 36 3. The Bureaucratization of Schools in the Progressive Era 55 4. The Era of Civil and Teacher Rights 100 5. The Era of Choice and Exit 163 6. Perspectives on the Effects of Teacher Voice 199 Part Two: Teacher Voice Today 216 Conclusion: Teacher Voice Tomorrow 313 Appendices 330 Endnotes 341 References 363 i To Donna, William, and Robert, with love and gratitude. ii 1 Introduction: The Trouble with “Teacher Voice” A respected survey finds that seventy percent of teachers feel as if their voices are not adequately heard in current education debates. The figure is nearly identical to when the question was first posed, twenty-five years ago.1 New non-profit organizations are founded across the country to help teachers rebuild their profession; a key aim is to ensure that teachers’ voice is heard.2 In New York City, charter school teachers contact the local union and want to join. Among their reasons for doing so, they want to have a larger voice in their school. In Illinois, Florida, and elsewhere, other teachers do the same and for similar reasons.3 In Wisconsin, Tennessee and other states, laws are passed to restrict teachers’ collective bargaining rights. Legislators argue that the limits are necessary to protect taxpayers; teachers protest that the changes remove their voice from educational decisions.4 In New Haven, district and union leaders collaboratively negotiate a new contract that is lauded by editorial boards and held up as a national model, in part because it gives teachers a voice in a number of school decisions.5 2 A well-received volume of essays by some of the nation’s leading education scholars explores ways to improve teacher quality. Although the essays cover a broad range of strategies, including better training, human resource management, and performance- based pay, the articles make no mention of a role for teacher voice.6 In Washington DC, thousands of teachers and parents rally to restore the voice of educators, parents, and communities in the making of education policy, which they feel has gone astray.7 • • • In efforts to improve public education, the notion of “teacher voice” is regularly invoked. Depending on how it is expressed and whom you ask, teachers have either too much voice or too little of it. Teacher voice lies at the heart of some of the most animated debates in public education. Expanding or contracting it is implicit in many strategies for school reform. It is at once a question of individual as well as collective action and shaped in a context of policies, institutions, and social norms. When “teacher voice” is invoked, it does not typically refer to the ordinary speech of teachers in classrooms and as part of their everyday interaction with students, parents and colleagues, although this is no doubt a form of teacher voice. More often than not, “teacher voice” refers to a particular kind of speech, when teachers express their ideas to 3 more broadly to influence practices, policies, and the political processes that decide many educational questions. Yet in current education debates, such distinctions are rarely made. As a result, “teacher voice” represents different things to different people and lacks a clarity of meaning that might otherwise be useful in thinking about the role of teachers in school improvement efforts. This is a study of teacher voice. By examining the concept through the lenses of theory, history, and current practice, I aim to bring some focus to an otherwise fuzzy and contested notion. Despite all of the hoopla, my research suggests that teachers feel that they don’t have much of a voice in their work, despite their tremendous responsibilities. Whether students and schools would benefit from teachers having a greater say likely depends on the content and the character of such voice, the dialogue it prompts with colleagues, supervisors, and policymakers, and the actions that result from the expression of their ideas. I am inclined to believe that practitioners should have a say in their practice. On its face, this might appear to be an uncontroversial, even self-evident claim. By way of analogy, we expect as much from doctors and object when their practice is inappropriately constrained by insurance companies, government policies, and other intrusions on their expertise. Given the technical nature of education and the unique skills and knowledge possessed by educators, their views on the organization and delivery of schooling carry particular weight. But teachers do not have an exclusive claim of ownership to the work of education. Citizens, public officials, education specialists, parents, and, as they grow 4 older, students all have a legitimate interest in the content and the conduct of the public schools. They too have voices that deserve to be heard. But the voice of parents and policymakers does not usually provoke anywhere near the controversy that occurs when teachers express themselves. For that reason, teacher voice deserves special consideration. “If a Tree Falls in the Woods…” A Definition and Analytical Framework What is “teacher voice,” anyway? Unhelpfully, the notion is often discussed in such broad terms that it becomes a catch-all for a diverse range of expression. This oversimplification leaves the concept without much specific meaning and often dependent on the context of the speaker who invokes it. For these reasons, it is helpful to begin with a definition and analytical framework. I offer that “teacher voice” is the expression by teachers of knowledge or opinions pertaining to their work, shared in school or other public settings, in the discussion of contested issues that have a broad impact on the process and outcomes of education. It is not ordinary speech. It is not the private conversations that a teacher may have with a student or parent or statements made in the workplace unrelated to one’s job. It is public speech on matters of public concern.