We explored how new Teachers of Color grappled with equity and excellence as they were constructing science teacher identities while learning to teach in a teacher education program committed to equity, justice, and excellence, and eventually teaching in urban schools where inequities and injustices persist. The theoretical framing, compiled from various bodies of literature, weaved together what we consider as essential parts of teacher identity construction and provided a lens with which to examine how conceptions of equity and excellence that the study participants were constructing meshed with their multiple identities, considerations on legitimate knowledge production, and dialectical relationships with which they grappled. Using transcendental phenomenology, we learned from and with three Black and Latinx teachers and their narratives. The teachers intertwined similarly and differently their evolving conceptions of equity and excellence into their evolving science teacher identities as they engaged in forms of contentious local practice and reflected on their experiences as science Teachers of Color teaching predominately Students of Color. Their multiple identities were meshed with histories of larger institutions—science, schooling, and society—and together these were shaping their conceptions of equity and excellence. The intermingling of equity and excellence, which was guiding the curricular and instructional decisions they were making in their classrooms, was also linked to what they considered as legitimate knowledge production in science classes and what counted as knowledge that their students needed to know at different times. The various dilemmas defined by opposing poles with which they were grappling also functioned as scales on which their coordinated equity‐excellence unit of meaning was forming. Based on the study, we offer insights into practices that science teacher educators may consider as they prepare new teachers, and work with practicing teachers, to embrace and coordinate equity and excellence in their ever‐developing science teacher identities.
Teacher attrition rates are high in urban schools, particularly for new science teachers. Little research has addressed how science teachers can be prepared to effectively bridge the divide between preparation and urban teaching. We utilized the theoretical frameworks of social justice, identity, and structure‐agency to investigate this transition. Specifically, we examined the Urban Science Teacher Preparation (USTP) program as a critical case of “well‐prepared” urban science teachers. Study participants included one cohort of four teachers. Data, primarily from individual interviews, a focus group, and written reflections, were collected from participants during pre‐service preparation and their first year of teaching. The USTP program nurtured the development of a professional identity aligned with teaching science for social justice, with a unique emphasis on identifying structural injustices in schools. Findings indicate all four teachers used their identities to negotiate school policies and procedures that restricted student opportunities to learn science through three processes: deconstructing the context, positioning themselves within and against the context, and enacting their identities. These findings suggest the importance of USTP programs to provide teacher candidates with political clarity for teaching for social justice and sustained induction support to resist school socialization pressures.
more » « less- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10371874
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Journal of Research in Science Teaching
- Volume:
- 57
- Issue:
- 1
- ISSN:
- 0022-4308
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- p. 3-32
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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