“Foreclosing” a teaching career? An exploration of the career decisions of undergraduate pre-service teachers’ through the lens of Identity Status Theory

Abstract

This paper explores the career decisions of a cohort of 42 undergraduate, pre-service teachers in Ireland through the lens of Marcia's (1980) Identity Status Theory. The study employed semi-structured interviews to examine the cohort's level of commitment to and exploration of a teaching career as part of their career decision making. Discourse analysis of their interviews evidenced that most had a high commitment to teaching but low exploration of other careers before committing to teaching, suggesting a “foreclosed identity status”. Possible explanations for this high degree of identity foreclosure are suggested and implications for initial teacher education are highlighted.