Teacher professional development across the career cycle: Participation, preferences, and organizational supports

The purpose of the present study was to investigate differences in teacher professional development needs, interests, and satisfaction across the career cycle, using Huberman's (1988) model of career development as a framework. The study also investigated to what extent the school organizational context supports or hinders the professional development process for teachers at different phases of the career cycle. Research questions guiding the study included: Do teachers in the career entry phase participate more in traditional forms of professional development than teachers at later phases of the career cycle? Do teachers in the career entry phase participate less in innovative forms of professional development than teachers at later phases in the career cycle? Do teachers prefer different types of professional development at different phases of the career cycle? Are the professional development needs of teachers at all phases of the teacher career cycle being met? Do teachers at different phases in the career cycle desire different types of support from their schools to meet their development needs?; Participants in the study included teachers at all phases of the career cycle that were involved in a large-scale educational reform project in the Los Angeles area. A combination of qualitative and quantitative data was analyzed. This included a survey of 3242 teachers as well as semi-structured interviews with a smaller subset of teachers.; Findings from the study indicated both some qualitative and quantitative difference in teacher professional development experiences across the career cycle. Not surprisingly, beginning teachers tended to participate in more professional development than teachers later in the career cycle. However, teachers differed across the career cycle in the types of professional development they preferred to participate in. For teachers at later career phases, these preferences were at odds with the types of activities that they actually participated in. Teacher perceptions of the role of the school organizational context also varied across the career cycle. Implications of these findings for both practitioners and researchers are discussed.