Abstract
Professional standards increasingly call for early childhood educators to hold a bachelor’s degree as one measure of educator quality. This has prompted many educators to return to college, creating both a need and an opportunity to better understand the factors that support educators to complete their degree and apply what they learn to their teaching practice. This qualitative study examined the higher education experiences of early educators enrolled in a public urban university early childhood teacher education program. Using a theoretical lens grounded in relational theory, this study explored how relationships in the university and the workplace influenced educators’ progress toward degree completion and their application of learning into practice. Data included in-depth individual interviews with educators and their workplace supervisors. This study shows how positive relationships with university faculty, staff, peers, and workplace colleagues and supervisors can support educators as they work toward earning their bachelor’s degree. The results revealed four characteristics of these relationships that influenced educators, as well as key barriers and challenges. In particular, the findings show how several negative relational dynamics may act as a barrier to educators’ efforts to apply new learning in the workplace. The paper concludes with implications for research and practice, and calls for increased attention to the relational contexts in which educators pursue their degree and make improvements in their teaching practices.
Highlights
Improved professional development for the early care and education (ECE) workforce is a high priority for local, state, and national efforts to enhance ECE quality
4-year higher education institutions have not played a major role in teacher education for those working in the birth-to-five sector
Using a theoretical framework grounded in the relational theory literature, this article explores a developing hypothesis that positive relationships may support early educators to complete their college degree and apply new learning to the early childhood classroom
Summary
Improved professional development for the early care and education (ECE) workforce is a high priority for local, state, and national efforts to enhance ECE quality. Professional standards increasingly call for ECE teachers to hold a bachelor’s degree as one measure of educator quality (Hyson, Horm, & Winton, 2012; Institute of Medicine & National Research Council, 2015). This mandate, for example in Head Start, has prompted many early educators to return to school (Huss-Keeler, Peters, & Moss, 2013; Whitebook et al, 2009b). Using a theoretical framework grounded in the relational theory literature, this article explores a developing hypothesis that positive relationships (between and among early educators, higher education personnel, and ECE program directors) may support early educators to complete their college degree and apply new learning to the early childhood classroom. I sought to understand the ways in which relationships might play a role and focused my inquiry on the following research questions: Research Question 1: How do early educators’ relationships at the university and in the workplace influence their higher education experience? Research Question 2: How are early educators applying what they learn in school in their early childhood workplace? What supports or hinders this application of new knowledge to practice? Research Question 3: How do early childhood program administrators view their role in supporting their employees to complete a bachelor’s degree program and improve teaching practices?
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