Working Together More than Alone: Students' Evolving Perceptions of Self and Community within a Four-Year Educational Administration Doctoral Cohort

At first blush it would seem that educators are highly social beings. They choose to enter a field that academically and socially squires students into the adult world, capable of making informed decisions and participating in an active democracy. Ironically whether by design or default, many building administrators and central office leaders are isolated from one another. They practice their profession in small pockets--offices and freestanding central administrative centers (Bjork & Kowalski, 2005; Drago-Severson & Pinto, 2006; Heider, 2005; Lamkin, 2006; O'Hair, Williams, Wilson, & Applegate, 2009). To ameliorate disconnection's negative effect, in 2005 the Educational Administration Department (EAD) at Central University, identified and recruited 14 school administrators who sought improved connections with colleagues and advanced degrees. The university was located near a large city but far enough in its own right to be a vibrant, artistic metropolis of about 150,000 residents. Pathways, a special unit embedded within the EAD, then gathered the students into a mixed local/distance doctoral cohort; infused the curriculum with learning community literature; encouraged technology use as a vehicle for ongoing personal and professional connections; and hoped the cohort would become a professional learning community (PLC; DuFour & Eaker, 2005; Fullan, 2001; Huffman & Hipp, 2003; Lambert, 2003; Leithwood 2005; Morrissey, 2000). My co-author taught four of the research courses and I was one of the distance participants. As time went on we observed and discussed many of the changes that students underwent. In the third year we began a phenomenological inquiry into their lived experiences. Specifically we asked, "how did students' self-perceptions evolve within a cohort context, and how did these changes advance or retard (PLC) growth? " Although we conducted phenomenological interviews we soon found that excavating the participants' changing views of themselves over an extended period of time and subsequent place in the group required a symbolic interactionist analysis and dramaturgical presentation of findings. Theoretical Lenses Slices of PLC, transactional distance and social presence theory provide our investigative lenses and suggest the need for more research on local/distance degree cohorts. Because our work delves into the students' personal ruminations within a community setting we paid particular attention to affective aspects of individual metamorphoses (A. Etzioni & Etzioni, 1999; Schussler, 2003). DuFour (2004) explains that in any educational setting occasional or intermittent casual alliances are not enough to generate a culture wherein people share a "particular set of attitudes" (Baldwin, Faulkner, Hecht, & Lindsley, 2005, p. 166). Rather, cultural ties come about when people interact "with each other and stay together long enough to form a set of habits and conventions, . [and] come to depend upon each other for the accomplishment of certain ends" (Kim, 2000; Wilson & Ryder 1996, p. 6). Trust is the "super glue" that holds a professional collaborative body together (Riley & Stoll, 2004, p. 38). In our case it required professors who nudge students into becoming part of the group, share ideas, voice concern for others, expose vulnerabilities, display loyalty, respect diverse viewpoints, and communicate dialogically (Jude-York, Davis, & Wise, 2000; Kim, 2000; Riley & Stoll, 2004). Pathways intended for the virtual underpinnings of our cohort to facilitate trust building within and across the divide. Although not all of us participated from a distance everyone had to use technology to work together. Of course laptops were essential, enabling us to email and create PowerPoints. Lecture notes appeared for all to see on a smartboard and another screen displayed every distance student in her or his own window. For group work web cameras with Marratech and Skype software were standard equipment. …