Research in Progress

1. Exploring How to Empower Teacher
Voice
Kristina Slusser-Hornback
University of Cincinnati

2. Problem Statement ● Voices of teachers and administrators are
inadequately represented in education policy.
● Teachers and administrators hold the
knowledge, skills and experience needed to
determine necessary changes in public
education.
● Need to better understand what teachers and
administrators within local public schools have
to say about current issues in education.
● Need to listen to teachers and administrators
about how to best address these issues.

3. Purpose Statement ● Provide a space in which teachers and
administrators within local public schools can
have their voices heard.
● Allow for educators to be given the chance to,
collectively, share their expert opinions
regarding education.
● Explore best practices for giving space to
teacher voice within education policy-- how do
educators see their voices being silenced? What
ideas do educators have about getting their
voices heard in education policy decisions?

4. Review of the
Literature
● Defining teacher voice:
○ Ability to purposefully express values, ideas, and
expertise on issues involving education, educator
employment, and education policy (McDonald,
1988; Gyurko, 2012).
● Current initiatives to enhance teacher voice
work to allow educators to take a proactive role
rather than a reactive role (Weatherly & Lipsky,
1977)
● Currently, teachers are reactive in their role of
implementing education policy.
○ Not involved from the beginning of creating
education policies; only involved in the
implementation (Carroll, 2013; Greene, 2013;
Wawro, 2015; Weatherly & Lipsky, 1977).

5. Review of the
Literature Cont’d
● Teacher voice plays a large role in teacher
satisfaction and motivation (Center for
Education Policy, 2016).
● Top 3 stressors reported by educators: testing,
outside-of-classroom demands, and lack of
teacher voice in major decisions (CEP, 2016).
● 76% of teachers report feelings as if they have
no voice at the local (district-level); 94% report
having no voice at the State and Federal level
(CEP, 2016).

6. Review of the
Literature:
Attempts to Engage
Teacher Voice
● 1994-- Fellowship Act Public Law 103-182,
Improving America’s School Act
○ US Dept of Energy established the Albert Einstein
Distinguished Educator Fellowship (AEF)
○ 10-20 meticulously selected STEM educators
○ 11-month leave of absence from classroom
○ Advise policy-making efforts at the Federal level
● 2013-- Kentucky Department of Education
(KDOE) designed the Teacher Advisory Council
(TAC)
○ 40 KY educators
○ Serve on council for 3 years
○ Attend 3-4 meetings/year with Commissioner
○ Provide feedback on drafts of current or up-and-
coming policies

7. Review of the
Literature: Issues
with Past and
Current Attempts
● Consultative; only become involved after
policies have been drafted and/or decided upon
(Lefstein & Perath, 2014)
● Silencing voices by selectively choosing
educators that participate (Greene, 2013)
● Educators left to interpret and implement rather
than design and create policies (Greene, 2013;
Weatherly & Lipsky, 1977)

8. Review of the
Literature: Gaps
● Limited research that explores how to best
include teacher voice in policy-making.
● VIVA Program (Wawro, 2015)
○ Program in Iowa that allows teachers time and
space to express views on educational policy
○ Works to create a culture of mutual respect
between educators and policymakers (Skaalvik &
Skaalvik, 2011)
○ Web-based platform and small group meetings
○ Focus groups to deliver a summary of the larger
group’s voice and their recommendations for
education policymakers
○ Online discussions convenient and beneficial
(Wawro, 2015)
○ Proactive rather than reactive (Wawro, 2015)
○ Educators demonstrated increased confidence
and empowerment within their profession
(Wawro, 2015)
● This is just one example.

9. Research Questions ● Address the gap in the literature about how to
empower teacher voice within policy-making.
● How do teachers wish to be involved in policy
decisions?
● How can we involve a larger representative
group of educators at the policy table?
● How do we empower educators to share their
expertise without layering onto their workload?
● How can we best empower teacher voice?

10. Methodology ● Qualitative research methods.
● Based on designs of social contructivism and
community-based participatory research
(CBPR) (Creswell, 2013).
● CBPR emphasizes action; works to use the
relationship between participants and the
research to guide how the research develops
and is completed (Wallerstein & Duran, 2006).
● Agenda for reform at the end of the research
(Creswell, 2013).

11. Participants
● Purposive and convenience sampling.
○ Participants chosen because of their expertise as
educators within local public schools
○ Individual educators then chose whether or not
to participate based on availability and interest
● Focus Groups
○ Based on educators’ locations
○ Representative of the 16 public school districts in
NKY
○ Meet once every 6 weeks
● Semi-structured Interviews
○ All participants will be given the opportunity to
partake in an interview
○ Purpose is to expand upon and dig deeper into
topics discussed during focus groups
● Reflective journaling by researcher and
participants
○ In between group meetings
○ Reflect on group meetings and space to
document other thoughts regarding teacher voice
in policy-making

12. Data Analysis ● Inductive approach (Gibbs, 2007).
● Focus groups and interviews audio-recorded
and transcribed
● Audio transcriptions and journals coded using
grounded theory method (Gibbs, 2007).
○ Open coding, axial coding, selective coding
● Constant comparison amongst focus groups,
interviews, and journaling codes (Gibbs, 2007).

13. Limitations ● Educator availability and participation
○ Will not have 100% participation at all times
● Length of study
○ 1 school year is a rather limited timeframe,
especially considering there will likely be
scheduling conflicts
● Not all educators will participate in the
individual interview
● If they did, that is a substantial amount of data
to analyze in time for the next phase of the
research
● Generalizability
○ This research will be specific to NKY and the
local public schools and educators; results may
not reflect similarly in other populations

14. Current Status of
Research Project
● Participants identified.
○ 48 educators from 12 of the 16 districts
■ 19 elementary teachers
■ 14 middle school teachers
■ 15 high school teachers
● Focus groups organized and first meetings
scheduled.
○ Meetings between Nov. 1st and Nov. 8th
● Reaching out again to invite more participants
to attend the first focus group meetings.

15. Next Steps of
Research Project
● Facilitate focus group meetings
○ Nov. 1st - Nov. 8th
● Decide initial discussion topic(s) of focus
groups
○ Develop guiding questions and activities
● Decide, with focus groups, best practice for
journaling activities
○ Online, private; online, discussion board format
○ Hard copy, personal
○ Other options?

16. Proposed Topics for
Focus Group
Discussions
● Personal experiences with current/past
attempts to have voice in policy decisions.
● Personal beliefs and values regarding education
policy and the educator’s role in deciding policy.
● Obstacles that hinder teacher voice in local
policy.
● Utopian ideas of how education policy is
decided.
● Realistic ways in which teacher voice
could/should be empowered at the local/State
level.

17. Feedback ● How might I improve my
recruitment/participation?
● What problems/concerns jump out to you about
this research design?
● What other limitations may exist for this
research?
● Do you have any ideas on journaling activities to
help prompt participants’ writing?
● When conducting focus groups and interviews,
what might be a pertinent question to ask
educators to help explore how best to empower
teacher voice?

18. References
Creswell, J. W. (2014). Research design: qualitative,
quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. 4th ed. Thousand
Oaks, California: SAGE Publications.
Gibbs, G. (2007). Analyzing Qualitative Data. Los Angeles: SAGE
Publications.
Greene, K. (2013). Notes from the blogging field: Teacher voice
and the policy-practice gap in education(Unpublished doctoral
dissertation).
Gutmann, A. (2012). The Spirit of Compromise: Why Governing
Demands It and Campaigning Undermines It with Dennis
Thompson, Princeton University Press, Princeton, N.J., 2012
Gyurko, J. S. (2012). Teacher Voice (Doctoral dissertation,
Columbia University)
Lefstein, A., & Perath, H. (2014). Empowering teacher voices in
an education policy discussion: Paradoxes of representation.
Teaching and Teacher Education,38, 33-43.
doi:10.1016/j.tate.2013.11.001

19. References Cont’d
McDonald, J. (1988). The emergence of the teacher’s voice: the
implications for the new reform. The Teachers College Record,
89(4), 471e486.
Stein, S. J. (2004). The culture of education policy. New York:
Teachers College Press.
Wallerstein, N. B., & Duran, B. (2006). Using Community-Based
Participatory Research to Address Health Disparities. Health
Promotion Practice, 7(3), 312-323.
doi:10.1177/1524839906289376
Weatherly, R., & Lipsky, M. (1977). Street-level bureaucrats and
institutional innovation: Implementing special education reform.
Harvard Educational Review, 47, 171-197.