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This research examined the relationship between job resources (social support, job autonomy, and colleague feedback) and innovative work behaviors of university teachers based on social exchange theory. The mediating role of psychological empowerment (meaning, competence, self-determination, impact) was also examined in the relationship between job resources and innovative work behaviors. Based on the established measurement scales, the questionnaire was used to collect data through quota sampling and purposive sampling methods. Empirical investigation was conducted with confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling analysis. The results reveal that job resources were significantly and positively correlated with innovative work behaviors, and psychological empowerment mediated the relationship between job resources and innovative work behaviors.

Parallel with the growth of research on the role of religious ideologies in teachers' professional lives, the present study drew on an ecological perspective and explored how religious ideology (i.e., Islamic principles) intersected with Iranian English language teachers' agency and identity. The study was methodologically situated within a narrative inquiry methodology, and data were collected from narrative frames and semi-structured interviews. Data analyses revealed that Islamic principles intersected with teachers' agency and identity in three major ways: Islamic principles as a humiliating cult, agency-demolishing nature of ideology, and resisting Islamic ideologies. The study shows that, on the one hand, ideology can serve as a source of humiliation and harm to teachers' agencies and identities. On the other hand, teachers also influence ideology by not only showing resistance, but practicing certain instructional initiatives that raise students' awareness of the destructive nature of Islamic principles. The study concludes with implications for teachers on how to communalize their agentic initiatives so that they can construct their identities in more constructive ways.

The article analyzes professional collaboration in a lesson study involving university mathematics professors, with the objective of contributing to professional development. The research was guided by the question, What principles promoted professional collaboration among university mathematics professors participating in a lesson study? The research focused on a lesson study involving university professors of mathematics and mathematics education over twelve weekly meetings of two hours each. The empirical material included the researchers' field notes and the transcripts of the recordings of the lesson study sessions. A qualitative analysis, based on content analysis, revealed that collaboration involved: "professional sharing" and "decision-making." The research shows that by fostering collaboration the lesson study mobilized different principles of teaching professionalism, such as knowledge that is basic to teaching, values and ways of conducting university teaching, a social and moral commitment to teaching, and teaching autonomy, contributing to the professional development of higher education professors.

Although many issues about the use of transcripts for studying classroom interactions have been addressed in other studies, little attention has been given to the use of transcripts to study student teachers' classroom interactions. To achieve a deeper understanding of student teachers' perspectives and permit the formulation of a more appropriate framework, it is crucial to hear from student teachers and investigate their experiences about the use of transcripts. Therefore, in the study reported on here we used 7 focus-group interviews of approximately 6 Saudi EFL (English as a foreign language) student teachers in each group to investigate their perceptions on the use of transcripts for studying their classroom interactions. The data were thematically analysed. Three themes that represented the participants' experiences of using transcripts to study their classroom interactions emerged: using the transcript analysis, learning from the transcript analysis, and committing to using the transcript analysis. The findings reveal that most participants felt they had autonomy in using transcripts to study their classroom interactions, but experienced some challenges. Most students were determined to change their classroom interaction based on their analyses of classroom interactions but only a few demonstrated the determination to continue using the transcript analysis approach.

Teacher professional development (PD) has been shown to have numerous benefits, such as greater self-efficacy, higher motivation, and enhanced wellbeing (e.g., Kimura, 2014; Polin, 2023; Wang & Chen, 2022), and teaching additional languages is certainly no exception. However, the extent to which teachers are willing and able to engage in PD throughout their careers depends on many factors, some of which are related to the context in which they work, while others are reflective of their individual attributes such as attitudes, motivations, and personality. This paper focuses on the latter by reporting the findings of a study that examined language teacher professional curiosity (LTPC). The data were collected through semi-structured interviews from 6 Austrian and 6 Polish language teachers at different stages of their careers. Qualitative analysis allowed valuable insights into the nature of LTPC, curiosity-driven behaviors as well as factors influencing these behaviors. It also provided the basis for a tentative cyclic process model of LTPC in which interest and curiosity interact to produce a focus of curiosity, which is impacted by motivation, agency, autonomy, and social context, generating a drive for teacher behaviors in respect to their PD.

Creating an environment where teachers feel trusted and responsible is not just a suggestion but a necessity. In this essay, I underline the indispensable role of school leaders in balancing autonomy and accountability and acknowledge the fact that empowered teachers are the cornerstone of engaging and successful learning environments. I discuss the crucial role of teacher agency in fostering effective education and strongly advocate for the primacy of trust building, collaboration, tailored professional development, and teacher leadership within schools and districts. It is expected that restoring teacher agency will yield positive student outcomes like clear goal setting and expectations, supportive feedback and evaluation, and ongoing professional learning. Leadership initiatives that prioritize trust, collaboration, teacher autonomy, and tailored professional development contribute significantly to the restoration of teacher agency. This essay underscores the significance of restoring teacher agency in the interest of building resilient and adaptive schools to meet diverse student needs in the ever-changing educational environment. A commitment to valuing educator expertise, dedication, and leadership is a crucial step in shaping the future landscape of education.

The purposes of this study were (1) to examine the components and indicators for promoting the professional development abilities of psychology teachers in rural primary schools within Guangxi Province; (2) to investigate the current state, the desirable state, and the necessity for promoting professional development abilities among psychology teachers in rural primary schools within Guangxi Province; and (3) to explore guidelines for the development of professional development abilities among psychology teachers in rural primary schools within Guangxi Province. The study utilized a multi-stage sampling method to select a sample group of 169 participants. The study was divided into 3 steps: Step 1 involved a study of the components and indicators, evaluated by 9 qualified individuals. Step 2 entailed an examination of the current and desirable state, and Step 3 focused on studying guidelines for developing the technological leadership qualities of teachers, with data provided by 8 participants. The research instruments used for data collection included questionnaires, semi-structured interviews, and assessments. The statistical methods used for data analysis include mean, standard deviation, and the analysis of necessary requirements (PNI[subscript modified]). The research findings exhibited that 1. the components and indicators of the technological leadership qualities of teachers in educational management comprised 4 components with 40 indicators, namely: (1) Professional knowledge with 4 indicators, (2) Professional ability with 4 indicators, (3) Professional affection with 4 indicators, and (4) Professional autonomy with 2 indicators. These are highly appropriate, accurate, and feasible overall and individually, to the highest extent. 2. The necessary requirements for the professional development of psychology teachers indicated the necessity for development in every component, considering the development needs as follows: (1) Professional knowledge, (2) Professional ability, (3) Professional affection, and (4) Professional autonomy, respectively. 3. Guidelines for the ability development of psychology teachers in rural primary schools in Guangxi Province revealed a total of 14 development guidelines. Overall, the assessment of these guidelines for the ability development of psychology teachers in rural primary schools indicated a high level of suitability and feasibility, with the highest level of feasibility.

Despite extensive efforts to improve the quality of English language teaching, Saudi students in the local primary schools have a poor level of proficiency in English. Hence, this study aims to examine the barriers to effective English teaching from the perspectives of teachers in the primary schools in Burydah primary schools in Saudi Arabia. 50 teachers in primary schools in Saudi Arabia were recruited through convenience sampling. The study recruited teachers from Buryadah, a city in Saudi Arabia. Self-reported questionnaires with close- and open-ended questions were used to collect rich data. Several teacher-related, student-related, classroom-related, and school-related challenges were reported. Teachers believed that the key barriers to effective English teaching in descending order were the limited ability to use technology, limited technical support to use technology, irrelevant curriculum, lack of training in immersive learning, lack of student motivation, cultural differences among students, overcrowded curriculum, malfunctioning air conditioners, limited engagement at the class, impaired communication skills, limited use of interactive teaching methods, limited teacher training, dull curriculum or unengaging content, limited students' ability to use technology, large class size, and limited flexibility in adapting the curriculum to the interests and needs of students. There is a need for cooperation among teachers, school headmasters, students, policymakers, and parents to address these barriers.

This article aims to explore the impacts of power dynamics arising from the use of the WhatsApp instant messaging application on the work routines of civil servants within a public educational institution. Utilizing the Foucauldian genealogy of power as a theoretical framework, we endeavor to conduct a critical historical analysis of the mechanics behind socially constituted power relations. Employing a qualitative case study approach, we juxtapose the analytics of power (drawing categories from the Foucauldian genealogy) with the investigative model of technological paradoxes, focusing on 'Control vs. Chaos' and 'Autonomy vs. Addiction', against data collected from interviews to uncover the power effects within this virtual space. Key findings include the observation that managers leverage a 'system of differentiations' to categorize and control subordinates through WhatsApp in a sophisticated and efficient manner. Moreover, the supposed enhancement of productivity through hyperconnectivity leads to compulsive smartphone use among employees, a phenomenon we interpret, following Foucault, as an institutionalized process of worker subjugation. Nonetheless, practices of resistance emerge, contesting these subjugation processes that affect the subject-workers. The institutional 'battle' for increased autonomy and healthier work routines emerges as one of the most potent forms of resistance against the overreach of power effects associated with WhatsApp use in the examined work contexts.

The transformative impact of advancements in educational technology, particularly those powered by artificial intelligence (AI), on the landscape of education and the teaching profession has been substantial. This study explores the repercussions of AI-powered technologies on teachers' autonomous behavior, digital burnout, and professional development. The study involved a cohort of 320 high school teachers in China segregated into control and experimental groups. The experimental group received instructions on AI-integrated applications and how they might be used in education. However, the teachers assigned to the control group did not receive information on the use of AI educational applications. Three distinct questionnaires probing autonomous behaviors, digital burnout, and online professional development were administered, and the ensuing data were analyzed using independent sample t-tests. The findings elucidate a discernible positive impact of AI-integrated technology intervention on teachers' professional development and autonomous behaviors. The incorporation of AI-enhanced tools facilitated an augmentation in teachers' professional growth and bolstered their independent and self-directed instructional practices. Notably, using AI-integrated technology significantly reduced teachers' susceptibility to digital burnout, signifying a potential alleviation of stressors associated with technology- mediated teaching. This research provides valuable insights into the multifaceted effects of AI-powered technologies on educators, shedding light on enhancing professional competencies and mitigating digital burnout. The implications extend beyond the confines of this study, resonating with the broader discourse on leveraging technology to augment the teaching profession and optimize the learning environment.

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between school structure, distributed leadership and accountability of school administrators. Relational survey design was adopted in the study. 444 elementary school teachers working in Aziziye, Palandöken and Yakutiye in Erzurum participated in the study. In sample selection, stratified sampling method was used. In data collection, the Enabling School Structure Scale, the Distributed Leadership Scale and the Accountability Behavior Scale for School Administrators were used. The data were analyzed using SPSS 23.0 for preliminary statistical analyses, LISREL 8.80 for Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), and the PROCESS macro for SPSS v3.3 for mediation analyses. In data analysis, Pearson Product-Moment Correlation Analysis, Bootstrap Analysis, and SEM were used. Furthermore, a mediation analysis was conducted to investigate whether distributed leadership played a mediating role in the relationship between school structure and accountability. The results revealed that coercive bureaucracy had a negative effect on accountability and distributed leadership while enabling bureaucracy had a positive effect on accountability and distributed leadership. Furthermore, the analysis revealed a positive effect of distributed leadership on accountability. This study revealed the mediating role of distributed leadership in the effect of coercive and enabling bureaucracy on accountability. In other words, it was found that the coercive and enabling bureaucracy had direct and indirect effects on accountability. Finally, a number of recommendations were made to educators, policy makers and researchers based on these findings.

Education seems to have both an increase in standardization and teacher burnout. The loss of control could leave teachers feeling unimportant in their own classroom. This article explains how one teacher used reflection to find and create autonomy, reigniting her passion for her job. Through celebration, reflection, and authentic connection, teachers can reclaim their joy and stay invested in teaching. Authentic teaching keeps teachers in the field and students motivated.

Lecturers who are actively engaged in shaping their teaching and teaching practices demonstrate agency. Teacher agency has increasingly been described as a key factor in educational development at universities. Lecturers are expected to innovatively develop courses and continuously improve their teaching practices to respond to, for example, student needs and labor market demands. In this multimethod study, we examined the process of developing and validating scenarios for measuring teacher agency in universities. We conducted four studies to create 23 scenarios that capture the complex nature of teacher agency. First, we interviewed university lecturers to identify bumpy moments in their teaching practice, and so found scenarios based on real-life experiences. Then, we employed two expert panels, to evaluate and refine the scenarios, which enhanced their validity. Finally, we used a pilot study to standardize the data collection procedures. Our multimethod study has established reliability by triangulating methods and researchers, involving multiple stakeholders, and providing detailed descriptions of the research process. This project holds implications for research and practice. The scenarios can be used in professional academic development programs for the collection of research data and to promote self-reflection, peer consultation activities, and professional growth and agency among university lecturers.

"Kurikulum Merdeka" is a learning experience framework that offers flexibility and focuses on essential content, character development, and students' competencies. Teachers had the discretion to develop their modules to choose, design, and organize the learning contents for students, based on their needs. By using that module, there is more flexibility and independence either for teachers and students, while enhancing the relevance, interactivity, and effectiveness of learning. This research aims to develop problem-based teaching modules on biology based on "Kurikulum Merdeka" as a reference in the learning process. This research and development, referring to Borg and Gall's model, consists of (1) research and information collection, (2) planning, (3) developing a preliminary form of the product, (4) preliminary field testing, and (5) main product revision. The participants in this development research are teachers as learning experts and students of a senior high school in one of the districts of East Lombok as a subject in limited trials. Data collection used closed questionnaires to determine the feasibility and ideality of the instrument. Data analysis using quantitative descriptive analysis involves analyzing the results of instrument feasibility and ideality from experts and students. The results show that the developed module was included in the very feasible and ideal learning resources. The readability test of the worksheet after limited trials was included in the good category for the biodiversity content, and quite good for the virus and ecosystem content. Therefore, the problem-based teaching module on biology content in phase E of grade XI of senior high school is considered feasible.

Decades of federal and state education legislation enacted to increase student academic achievement and enhance school quality have pronounced impacts on teachers and their instructional practice. That impact is captured in the term intensification. Intensification is multifaceted and manifests as additional tasks accomplished simultaneously, with no monetary consideration, constricting the curriculum, losing voice about curriculum, restricting teachers' classroom autonomy, and de-professionalization. This research had the three-fold purpose of determining (a) teachers' perspectives about Florida's educational standards relative to curricular autonomy, instructional autonomy, and professional expertise, (b) the extent to which teachers' experiences meet the criteria of intensification of curricular autonomy, instructional autonomy, and professional expertise, and (c) the degree to which teachers experience pressure from increased accountability to years teaching English Language Arts, Mathematics, Reading, Science, Social Studies, and Technology. Four research questions were framed to guide the inquiry, and data were collected from 356 high school teachers. Data were analyzed using Pearson's chi-square (?2) test of independence and multinomial logistic regression. Results revealed that teachers' instructional experiences meet the criteria of intensification to instructional autonomy, curricular autonomy, and professional expertise.

This qualitative study explores how foreign non-native English speaking teachers (FNNESTs) perceive themselves as English educators and how they exert agency to be better perceived as professionals. Given the close relationship between teacher identity and its implications for educational outcomes, this study is based on Norton's (2008) perspective on identity, which posits identity as dynamic, contradictory, and constantly changing across time and place. The data collection process included four semistructured interviews with two FNNESTs and four interactions on social networking sites. According to the results, the identities of FNNESTs were shaped through their initial language learning experiences, exposure to critically oriented scholarship in graduate school, their future anticipations, and mostly through their agency in the immediate professional context in which they currently teach. That is, four unique identities and one common identity were identified among the participants. In summary, FFNESTs do not perceive themselves as lacking but rather value their diverse language skills and past experiences as language learners.

This case study focused on middle school and high school teachers in an independent school to explore their perceptions of how overparenting influenced them in the classroom. A qualitative case study was conducted within an independent school in the southeast United States. Eleven middle school and high school teachers, which represented 52% of the full-time faculty at the school, participated in an online questionnaire and follow-up interviews regarding their experiences with overparenting. Findings revealed three themes: (a) teachers overwhelmingly associated parent--teacher interactions with conflict and confrontation, (b) teachers perceived overparenting influences teacher autonomy by forcing teachers to set boundaries, and (c) teachers experienced increased workloads. This study provides insight into how overparenting influences teachers, which may help teachers, administrators, and future educators prepare for this type of parent--teacher interaction.

Netnography, a qualitative research approach, entails observing, analysing, and interpreting online data. This netnography explores how teacher agency, emotion regulation, and professional identity were enacted by a novice Chinese language teacher in response to emergency remote teaching (ERT) in Australia amid the global pandemic. Ecologically sound, netnography creates uncoerced spaces to allow participants to have their voices heard, thus enabling researchers to discover nuanced patterns linked to the social-emotional state and wellbeing of the community members, regarding fears, tensions, and resilience triggered by ERT. Multiple data sources were triangulated from the teacher's reflective journal, digital teaching artifacts, debriefing sessions, interviews, and online questionnaire responses. Thematic analysis reveals teacher identity was re-envisioned through crisis teaching pedagogy and the regulation of negative emotions to facilitate agency, which reciprocally bolstered teacher identity. The findings also indicate teacher identity development is challenged and shaped by negotiating a new role in remote teaching, thus impacting pre-ERT identity. Hence, the emotion regulation trajectory of ERT can stimulate and encourage technology enhanced professional learning as teacher agency and resilience reinforce a new identity reimagined as a capable online teacher. By situating novice teacher agency, emotion regulation, and emerging identity in crisis teaching, this netnographic research conceptualises how ERT presents not only challenges for novice teachers' identity development and emotion but also the sustainability and empowerment of online teaching and professional growth of impacted teachers of Asian languages.

This essay argues that principals' capacity to advance equity might have been constrained by pre-COVID conditions. Drawing on the emerging literature on school leadership during the pandemic, the current article discusses how principals' capacity to advance equity was expanded as a result of the window of opportunities created by the COVID-19 pandemic. Given the increased frequency at which schools experience crises, understanding these opportunities may allow stakeholders to better support principals' efforts to enact equity-oriented leadership practices. Implications for leadership preparation, school funding, accountability policies, and future research are discussed.

In the spring of 2020, schools across the United States closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, forcing a sudden change from the traditional way education was provided. When schools resumed, many teachers found themselves teaching and scaffolding learning in a new situation, online. However, there is limited information on how teachers implement scaffolding--both in-person as well as online. As such scaffolding depends on teachers' perceptions, this suggests the need for a measure of teachers' perceptions of scaffolding across these modalities. This paper reports the design and development of a survey created to measure teacher perceptions of their agency/control related to and self-efficacy for implementing various forms of scaffolding and the forms of scaffolding they use. K-12 teachers who taught before and during the pandemic (N=105) completed the survey in spring/summer 2021. Using exploratory factor analysis, we found that the survey measured these constructs, and that constructs loaded separately by modality (online versus face-to-face). This suggests the survey could be used in shorter forms to provide information about teacher perceptions of scaffolding specific to their modality, in turn providing more information about the kinds of professional development they might benefit from.

Cross-border migration is increasing in a globalized world. On the physical borderlands, migration across and between borders occurs on a habitual basis. This qualitative study employs semi-structured interviews to explore how three "transfronterizo" teachers along the U.S.-Mexico borderlands draw on their backgrounds and lived experiences as they go about in their English teaching practices. Findings suggest that the diverse lived experiences of the three teachers allow them to develop a particular knowledge, consciousness, and agency in creating a third space, or a "mundo zurdo," in which they advocate for their "transfronterizo" students.

This paper explores the school culture and sense of community of a Midwestern middle school after seven years of personalized learning reform. This mixed method study identified a strong school culture based on the School Culture Triage Survey. Focus group interviews supported the survey findings and attributed the successful implementation and expansion of the personalized learning program to affiliative collegiality, autonomy/innovation, being student-centered, and intentional. These findings can be powerful for any school in instituting personalized or customized learning models.

Facilitating students' learning in a massive open online context is challenging for instructors in online teaching. The instructors should enact their professional (epistemic) feedback-giving skills to understand when, how, and why to address learning problems. In this study, we address this issue in terms of agency and suggest strategies that teachers can use to address these problems constructively. This study examines how instructors' professional agency comes into play in selecting how to intervene to assist students in solving problems in course discussion forums (Facebook group and Canvas discussion forums), which we refer to as an epistemic intervention strategy (EIS). By analyzing discussion forums' dialogical posts using thematic analysis and epistemic network analysis, we found that instructors adopted five different EISs to address students' learning. The EISs emerged during the processes of facilitating students' learning and were influenced by the complexity of students' questions and positioning in learning in the discussion forums. The findings of this study can inform practitioners that facilitating learning in online discussion forums may demand that instructors go beyond their feedback-giving skills to enact professional agency.

This article examines the power dynamics underpinning performance management at a selected South African university. It specifically employs Michel Foucault's (1977) ideas on Governmentality to interpret the envisioning of performance management in this context at the level of Policy. The study employed a qualitative research methodology to address the questions at hand. Data were generated from one primary source: a discourse analysis of the Performance Management Policy (2013) at a selected university in South Africa. Using Michel Foucault's (1991) theories on governmentality, a discourse analysis of Performance Management Policy documents was conducted with the goal of critically interrogating the kinds of new academic subjectivities being created in South African higher education. The findings show that the Policy on Performance Management at the university in question works towards creating academic subjects which conform with the university's expectations and are consistently self- regulated. Findings also show that management of academics is constantly controlled and regulated by a powerful matrix of governance, comprising the university and the wider global community. This paper recommends that performance management discourses should take into stronger cognizance the matter of academic freedom and autonomy. We further recommend that Policy developers and management teams at universities be conscious of the complex forces of power that shape academic identities so that their policies move away from oppressive discourses. We argue that there is much we can learn from governmentality theory if we hope to build more just and equitable societies going forward.

Prior research has identified five in-school factors that impact teacher retention: positive school culture, supportive administration, strong professional development, mentoring programs, and classroom autonomy. While much of the national attention is focused on state or district-level policies to address the teacher retention crisis, this study focuses on how school leaders can improve teacher retention by addressing the five factors. Semi-structured interviews with school leaders were used to provide examples of how principles can improve school culture and increase teacher retention.

The purpose of this study was to explore how novice online K-12 teachers in Arizona described the influence of organizational, interpersonal, and intrapersonal leader support on their psychological needs. To address the study purpose the author used qualitative descriptive design; using questionnaires and semi-structured interviews, the study sample included 39 novice K-12 online teachers in Arizona. The author used Support for Teachers' Psychological Needs (STPN) as the theoretical framework. Using Reflexive Thematic Analysis (RTA), nine themes emerged from the data that provide insight into specific leader supports in the K-12 online setting. Many organizational, interpersonal, and intrapersonal supports mimic brick-and-mortar findings. However, new supports were uncovered such as, teacher-to-student organizational supports and online communication best-practices. Recommendations included three practical ways that K-12 online leaders can increase competence, autonomy, and relatedness among their staff. This research adds to the existing body of work surrounding supports for teachers' psychological needs by expanding its focus to the online K-12 setting. Additionally, this research was unique for its focus on novice teachers as defined by having less than 4 years of experience in the K-12 online setting.

The burnout and attrition of teachers is a critical issue both in the United States and internationally. However, there is insufficient empirical research addressing these concerns among world language teachers. This paper reports the results of surveying high school world language teachers across all regions of the United States (N= 313) to investigate the relationship between three constructs: burnout, intent to quit, and teacher empowerment. The results of descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis suggest that teacher empowerment significantly impacts levels of burnout and intent to quit. More specifically, higher levels of professional growth, self-efficacy, and autonomy may predict lower levels of burnout and intent to quit in high school world language teachers. The findings of this study suggest that interventions that focus on increasing teacher empowerment may be effective in reducing burnout and intent to quit in high school world language teachers. Potential interventions focusing on these factors are discussed.

Some state legislatures have introduced a rash of bills designed to control how K-12 teachers discuss so-called 'divisive issues,' such as racism, sexism, and privilege. This legislation has prompted substantial news coverage on the impact of these laws. Sidelined in this discourse are the perspectives of teachers. This mixed methods study seeks to understand the impact this legislation may have on teachers. We identified three themes salient to how teachers as 'gatekeepers' (Thornton, 1991) anticipate these legislative efforts influencing their practice: curricular autonomy, context, and institutional guidance. The paper concludes with the significance of these findings, including potential policy implications at the national, state, and local levels.

The digitalisation and datafication of education has raised profound questions about the changing role of teachers' educational expertise and agency, as automated processes, data-driven analytics and accountability regimes produce new forms of knowledge and governance. Increasingly, research is paying greater attention to the significant role of digital intermediaries, 'in-between' edtech or State authorities and the classroom itself, in educational transformations. School data infrastructures, understood as comprising diverse sociomaterial elements including teachers, data, software, standards and pedagogical practices, is one such intermediary through which teacher expertise and agency is reconfigured. In this paper, I focus on teachers' involvement in processes of data infrastructuring in which people, platforms, systems and tools come together to create, enable and maintain data flows. Drawing on a sociomaterial ethnography of a secondary school in England, I analyse the work of a school data office in the behind-the-scenes work of data infrastructuring. The findings detail the significant labour and expertise involved in data infrastructuring, the dynamic, expanding and bespoke nature of the school data infrastructures that emerged, and processes of decontextualising and recontextualising numbers. The paper argues that the work of data infrastructuring undertaken by and through the school data office was an intermediary process which worked to both de-professionalise and re-professionalise teachers in new ways. In the process, this created new kinds of educational data experts and expertise, who gained significant influence and power within and beyond the school, both challenging and reinforcing existing organisational and governing power flows.

Purpose: Rural home care nurses require access to continuing nursing education to address the increasing complexity of client care needs. There is currently limited literature on continuing nursing education for rural home care nurses. The purpose of this study was to explore the continuing nursing education experiences of rural home care nurses. Sample: Purposive and snowball sampling were used to recruit registered nurses who worked in publicly funded rural home care in one western Canadian province, in communities with a population of less than 10,000 people. Twenty rural home care nurses participated in semi-structured telephone interviews. Methods: This study used interpretive description as its method of inquiry and analysis. Data was collected between December 2020 and May 2021 and the analysis was supported using NVivo 12 software. Findings: Key findings from this study contribute to the description of western Canadian rural home care nursing roles and the degree of autonomy required to provide expert care in the home environment. Rural home care nurses' experiences with continuing education are impacted by external factors including (1) Chameleonic Practice (One-Person Show, Professional Intersection, Becoming their Person), (2) Foundational Instability (Roadblocks to Learning, Stretched Thin, Rural Repatriation) and (3) Learning Leadership (Filling the Learning Bucket, Finding a Way, Learning Reciprocity). Conclusions: The findings of this study suggest that the continuing nursing education experiences of rural home care nurses is dependent on many factors. Significant policy changes and updated standards of practice are required to support safe client care through the delivery of evidence-informed continuing nursing education.

Despite the divisions within Northern Ireland's education system along religious and academic lines, it has managed to maintain relative stability, or at least a functional inertia, over the past four decades. The full potential, however, of this system and in particular, the Northern Ireland Curriculum (NIC), has yet to be realised. This paper presents a comprehensive exploration of the intricate interplay between the NIC and Initial Teacher Education (ITE), bringing to the fore the footprint of Lawrence Stenhouse. It critically examines the salient features of the NIC, particularly its alignment with Stenhouse's pedagogical tenets, and its subsequent ramifications on ITE, for both its content and pedagogical strategies. The ambitions are, however, not without their challenges. The overarching shadow of an exam-centric system stymies the NIC's full realisation, presenting a dichotomy between curriculum goals and pragmatic educational realities. The absence of a coherent Teacher Professional Learning framework also inhibited curriculum development. The Learning Leaders strategy, although yet to be implemented due to the collapse of the Northern Ireland Assembly and consequently lack of financial support, has the potential to pick up the baton of reform and help teachers and school leaders move closer to implementing the NIC in the way it was intended. The paper concludes by identifying the probable, possible, plausible and preferred ways forward for NI's education system.

Academic freedom constitutes an integral part of traditional university values that ensure the proper functioning of universities in pursuing truth and inculcating civic values. In a globalized world where Higher Education (HE) policy is the result of the interaction of local, national, and international levels, the positions of international organizations on questions of academic freedoms deem significant. Within global discourses on HE, literature contrasts the World Bank's human capitalist to UNESCO's humanistic approach. Through Foucauldian Discourse Analysis of both organizations' documents, the paper presented a genealogical analysis of academic freedom that challenged the existence of static, opposite, and binary positions. Transformations, ruptures, juxtapositions as well as gaps, limits, and exclusions were detected within and across International Organizations' discourses. Juxtaposition of economic and humanistic rationales as well as academic freedom protection and neoliberal policy interventions have muted discursive conflicts and inherent contradictions. The failure of UNESCO to address contemporary threats to academic freedom emerged from the appearance of neoliberal transnational governmentality as an inevitable social regularity that delimits what can be said and cannot be said about academic freedom. Through coercive funding schemes and technologies of differentiation, surveillance, and monitoring, the WB created the space for such transnational governmentality, and placed faculty members under its gaze resulting in undermining academic freedoms and de-professionalization of academics.

This research explored teachers' readiness for teaching in times of uncertainty and in global crisis situations through the perspective of teacher agency. Understanding the mechanisms by which teachers exercise their transformative agency was the main research aim. Teacher agency is conceptualized as a phenomenon that emerges ecologically from the interactions of individuals' capacities with the contexts and conditions in which they act. Thus, teachers are key figures upon which the possibility for transformation rests. The current research yielded three major mechanisms: (1) personal beliefs, emotions, values and attributes; (2) technical infrastructure, digital skills and teaching resources; (3) organizational infrastructure. This study highlights the importance of understanding the significance of teachers' transformative agency in times of crisis, as it applies to crisis situations in which means of transcending contradictory and conflicting impasses to transformative growth are sought.

Professional development, typically initiated by administrators to improve student achievement outcomes, is often irrelevant to the needs of early career music teachers. As music teacher educators, we were concerned about issues of importance to early career music teachers as they entered the music teaching profession. We explored conversation as a conduit of reflection and professional learning by convening a conversation group of five early career music teachers who gathered over six, one-hour-long meetings. Guiding their discussions were topics they identified in questionnaires administered before and during the study. Data included audio-visual recordings of the meetings, questionnaires, and researcher memos. Four themes emerged from our analysis of their conversations: (a) educating administrators and mentors, (b) knowing their place, (c) overcoming a lack of resources, and (d) giving students lifelong musical skills. We interpreted these findings through the lens of Snow's principles of symbolic interactionism. The conversation group facilitated the music teachers' move from the initial shock of sedimented school culture to a position of agency. The freedom of conversation around chosen topics of professional and personal importance provided the early career music teachers with choice, self-direction, collective support, and agency--key components of professional learning.

This framework synthesis investigates how notions related to expanding professionalism have manifested in recently published literature on popular music voice teaching. The reviewed literature was selected from a systematic mapping review conducted previously by the first two authors. The scope for the publication years was 2014 to 2020, and the included literature incorporated 64 titles of peer-reviewed articles, academic book and handbook chapters, and doctoral dissertations. The initial framework considered scholarship on expanding professionalism, and the directive themes for coding included forms of expertise and knowledge building, social and societal responsibility, and agency related to change. The data were examined from individual, societal, and institutional perspectives. The findings showed that notions related to expanding professionalism are used as means of legitimizing the academically emerging field. However, the professional development work results mostly from the agency of individual practitioners. Thus, support from higher music education institutes and professional organizations is needed to enable the professional sustainability of such practices and further the societal relevance of these institutional actors. This study contributes to the recent scholarship on expanding professionalism in music and music education. The emergent framework resulting from this synthesis can inform further empirical studies.

Despite limited opportunities for tenured academic positions, the number of PhD graduates in Social Sciences has steadily risen in countries with developed research systems. The current literature predominantly portrays PhD graduates as victims, either of the higher education system or of their own optimism in pursuing an academic career. This paper takes an alternative stance by spotlighting the agency exhibited by PhD graduates in Social Sciences as they deftly navigate their career pathways amid the constrained academic job market. Specifically, we adopt an ecological perspective of agency to explore how PhD graduates in Social Sciences exercise their agency in navigating their career from the beginning of their PhD candidature until up to 5 years after graduation. We employ a narrative approach to delve into the employment journeys of twenty-three PhD graduates. Within this cohort, we select to report four participants from four Australian universities, each possessing distinct career trajectories. Our analysis highlights agency as the link between various personal and institutional factors that shape our participants' career trajectories. Based on this finding, we offer recommendations for practice and policy changes that appreciate PhD graduates' agency.

The articulation of school autonomy into practice nationally, regionally and locally is highly situated in terms of what it enables or impedes with regard to the professional autonomy of principals and teachers. Principal autonomy does not necessarily mean greater teacher professional autonomy. In this paper, we draw on a three-year qualitative study investigating the social justice implications of school autonomy reform in Australia. We present interview data from a case study of a large secondary college to present two conflicting stories of autonomy. Supported by a managerial restructure reflecting distributed leadership, we juxtapose the positive account of autonomy expressed by the leadership team with the negative one expressed by teachers. We explore the justice implications of this disjuncture and argue the importance of critically examining the complex ways in which the intentions and enactments of distributed leadership can be differently articulated and understood within the context of school autonomy reform.

School improvement depends, fundamentally, upon collective agency--a group capability to work productively together and solve problems. Unfortunately, many schools operate in contexts of adversity that can pose considerable challenges with developing collective agency. Schools serving high-poverty communities of color often face chronic resource shortages, difficulties to reach their students, and negative reputations. Research has shown how such experiences of adversity can invite destructive tendencies that interfere with collective agency--including defensiveness, learned helplessness, and fragmenting conflict. However, prevailing approaches to researching school improvement have obscured insight into how collective agency may develop in adverse contexts. To study this, this paper draws on over 70 hours of participant observation and more than 50 reflective conversations conducted over 1 year with a Californian middle school facing adversity. Drawing on literature about group development and work teams, the article traces interaction patterns in three work groups, including one I led. The study finds clear efforts to develop collective agency at times, but it is a fragile emergence. Across all groups, collective agency becomes enabled when initiative to address a problem combines with manageable tasks, simple solutions, and group affirmation. However, these processes do not enable groups to fully address the complex problems they face, leaving groups vulnerable to recurrent experiences of inefficacy and overwhelm that quash collective agency. The findings offer a new understanding of school improvement amid adversity as a struggle to improve at "the next level of work," calling for reforms designed to sustain a foundation of collective agency.

Class teachers have a meaningful role in the life of primary school students as they are responsible for the majority of their students' instruction. Previous research has shown that teachers who make efforts to learn and develop in their work also promote their students' learning and well-being. This learning orientation is referred to in this study as teachers' professional agency. The well-being of students has been shown to be challenged in many ways already in primary school. However, we need more research on how primary school students experience well-being in classrooms in relation to their studies and whether their class teacher's professional agency relates to their well-being. We examined students' study well-being from two perspectives: study engagement and study burnout. Multilevel structural equation modelling was applied in the analysis to explore perceived study well-being in the classroom (student and class level) and its relation to class teachers' sense of professional agency. The results indicate that a high level of study burnout at the class level decreases students' study well-being over time and also challenges class teachers' sense of professional agency.

Academic freedom is under threat across the globe and a wave of substantial academic freedom declines affects not only autocracies but also (liberal) democracies. However, although the development of academic freedom has generated scholarly attention, this article presents the first systematic conceptualization and measurement of academic freedom growth and decline episodes. In particular, this article systematically analyzes the development of academic freedom across the globe and shows that global development follows waves of growth and decline. The first growth wave started in the mid-1940s and was succeeded by a second growth wave that started around 1977 and lasted for more than 30 years resulting in the greatest improvement in academic freedom that has been recorded since 1900. However, since 2013, we see an ongoing decline wave in academic freedom. Overall, this article highlights how academic freedom developed over time and across the globe in waves of growth and decline.

Technology education internationally has for some time struggled to achieve continuity between what is depicted in policy and curricular documents and the reality of day-to-day practices. With its focus often articulated through the nature of activity students are to engage with, technology teachers are recognised as having significant autonomy in the design and implementation of their practices. From this, it is important to understand teachers' beliefs about technology education, as their conceptions of the subject will inform practice. As such, this study sought to investigate teachers' conceptions of the purpose of teaching technology through reflection on their enacted practices. A constructivist grounded theory methodology was employed for the design of the study and analysis of data. According to our analysis, despite similarities between the nature of student activity that teachers designed and implemented, teachers represented the purpose of the subject in different ways. Three different conceptions of the purpose of teaching technology were identified; obtaining knowledge and skills for application, ability to act in a technological way, and ability to think in a technological way. Central to the three conceptions were contentions in the representations of what constituted subject matter knowledge in the subject, and the role that different application cases played in teaching technology. Without consideration and explicit articulation of the purposes for teaching technology, this lack of clarity and differences in rationale for teaching technology are likely to continue.

This paper aimed to elucidate teachers' perceptions of using autonomy support in Singapore's classrooms. Science and mathematics teachers (N = 10) were gathered for semi-structured interviews after a 10-week autonomy support intervention. Interview transcripts were analyzed using thematic analysis with emerging themes pre-conceived from the literature. The qualitative data provides meaningful insights into the teachers' understanding of what autonomy support entails, to which relevant examples of what teachers said and did to be autonomy-supportive were illuminated. The findings present an in-depth description of teachers' experiences of autonomy support, suggesting the interconnected nature of the autonomy-supportive features. Teachers should practice the features of autonomy support in a meaningful and simultaneous manner to support the students effectively. Despite the limitations, the concrete examples of autonomy-supportive practices delineated in this paper can be used as a springboard for teacher education programs and autonomy-support training workshops.

Students' intrinsic motivation to read, which is relevant to all forms of learning, tends to decline throughout secondary school. Based on self-determination theory (SDT), this study examines whether this downward trend is slowed when students perceive greater autonomy support in the classroom. We used large-scale panel data from the NEPS comprising N = 8193 students in Germany who reported their intrinsic motivation to read and their perceived autonomy support from German teachers at annual intervals from fifth to eighth grade. Scalar longitudinal measurement invariance was found for intrinsic reading motivation (IRM) and teacher autonomy support (TAS). A dual change score model showed a decline in IRM and a negative, non-significant decrease in TAS over time. Confirming our hypothesis, the decline in IRM was slowed by earlier levels of TAS. We discuss methods to counteract the decline in intrinsic reading motivation.

This study explores how teachers construct and enact agency in professional learning from an activity theory perspective. Through a qualitative case study of three language teachers' experiences within a professional development (PD) program focusing on China's Standards of English Language Ability (CSE), this research identifies agency construction as a triadic connection-building process among teachers (subjects), the CSE learning target (tool) and teachers' professional development goals (objects). The findings suggest that PD programs can be designed to assist teachers in building these connections by understanding their broader professional needs, guiding them to identify specific learning objectives relevant to their professional practices and supporting their application of the CSE to achieve these objectives. This study contributes to the literature on teacher professional learning by offering a nuanced understanding of teacher agency construction and proposing an agency-oriented approach to PD program design and implementation in facilitating teachers' engagement with new tools like the CSE to support sustainable professional growth.

This study explored the development of teacher leadership in collaborative online spaces, also called virtual communities of practice (vCoP). Employing a phenomenological research design with semi-structured interviews as the primary data collection method, participants were drawn from a single vCoP. The findings underscored the pivotal role of vCoPs in nurturing teacher leadership skills, facilitated by the dynamic interplay of teacher agency and distributed leadership. Teacher agency empowers educators to proactively take control of their learning journey within vCoPs, enabling them to explore areas of personal interest and expertise, including knowledge sharing and project initiation. Simultaneously, distributed leadership empowers teachers to assume leadership roles within the vCoP, irrespective of their formal positions or seniority, involving activities such as guiding discussions and organizing professional development. This harmonious collaboration between teacher agency and distributed leadership fosters a collaborative and inclusive environment within vCoPs, where teacher leadership thrive.