School Culture As An Organization

The study of teachers' professional development has mushroomed in the past two decades. People realize the significance of teachers' professional development gradually. And teachers' professional competence is considered as the key in the quality-oriented education in China. As we know that teachers firstly exist as human beings, who are social and cultural beings simultaneously. It is the culture that makes people speak and behave in a certain way. This dissertation aims at understanding the negative school culture's influence on teachers' professional development in ABC Teachers' College, which is located in Yunnan Province in China. Exactly speaking, this study attempts to answer the following questions. (1) What is the teachers' institutional life like under the school culture in ABC Teachers' College? (2) Why is the teachers' institutional life like that in ABC Teachers' College? (3) How does the negative school culture influence teachers' professional development through the teachers' institutional life?This study is conducted in ABC Teachers' College through narrative inquiry (story telling research). The stories mainly come from the interviews with teachers and the regulations of ABC Teachers' College. One piece of story comes from the recording of the meeting of English Department in ABC Teachers' College.This study is mainly based on the following theoretical frameworks. (1) The theory of teachers' professional development, which is embodied in the characteristics of the teachers' development, mainly emphasizes the perspectives of the constructivism, collaborative learning, sociocultural learning and social learning. (2) The theory of organizational culture and school culture's influence. (3) The assumption of "story is an organization." This study is trying to understand how the negative school culture influences teachers' professional development in ABC Teachers' College.Through the narrative inquiry, we find, in ABC Teachers' College, teachers' institutional life under the negative school culture have the following features: the job...