Home Growing Teacher Quality: District Partnerships with Urban Teacher Residencies

Open Access
- Author:
- Boggess, Laurence Bradley
- Graduate Program:
- Educational Theory and Policy
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- June 25, 2008
- Committee Members:
- Dana Lynn Mitra, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
David Alexander Gamson, Committee Member
Emily Boyd, Committee Member
Jacqueline Edmondson, Committee Member - Keywords:
- urban education
district reform
teacher quality - Abstract:
- This study examined how two urban school districts, Chicago and Boston, trained their own teachers through partnerships with urban teacher residencies—alternative teacher preparation and certification programs based on year-long, in-class apprenticeships with mentor teachers. This “home grown teacher” reform was implemented in response to high rates of new teacher turnover. District and residency leaders attributed this problem to the inadequate preparation new teachers received in traditional college and university teacher education programs. The study asked three questions: How do the districts in Chicago and Boston partner with urban teacher residencies? What do the reformers mean by “teacher quality”? and Why do the district-residency partnerships in Chicago and Boston construct dispositions of teacher quality differently? Proceeding from a conceptual framework that embedded the urban district in a mayorally-controlled urban regime, activated through civic capacity and motivated by resource dependence, the study used a two-site, holistic case study method (Yin, 2003). Qualitative data included interviews with 28 participants, district and residency documents, media reports, and researcher field notes and memos. Data analysis techniques were drawn from case study and grounded theory traditions and were assisted by NVivo7, a qualitative research software program. One set of findings described how the districts partnered with the residencies and identified contractual bridging and proxy control in Chicago and collaborative bridging and civic control in Boston. Another set of findings described how and why the district-residency partnerships constructed varying meanings of teacher quality. The study contributed findings to the research literature on district reform, urban regime analysis, and organizational theory.