Dueling Epistemologies? Implementing a Critical Model of Faculty Development in Teacher Education.

Teacher beliefs are mediated and lived in the dialectic of teacher education and teacher practice. We reframe this dialectic of teacher preparation as faculty preparation, as many faculty are not prepared for the rigors of teaching, and most are not trained in the ethics of their profession. We propose a critical model of faculty development that primes teacher educators to cultivate authentic teacher beliefs and professional integrity. The model embraces five components that: 1) situate faculty development in professional and ethical standards; 2) align faculty diversity competencies with the institutional mission; 3) embrace guiding principles for undergraduate education; 4) contextualize faculty development; and 5) challenge through reflective discourse. Teachers’ beliefs are constructed in the context of sociocultural experiences, defined by Flores (2001) as personal, theoretical, and pedagogical. The idiosyncratic knowledge acquired by teachers in their daily work also influences their beliefs (Brousseau, Book, & Byers, 1988; Clandinin & Connelly, 1996; Connelly & Clandinin, 1990; McDiarmid, 1990; Tamir, 1991) that ultimately impact instructional decisions and approaches (Flores, 2001). This essential connection among beliefs and behavior is further explored by Reybold (2002) who argues that epistemic assumptions drive reasoning and generate “behaviours and actions that correlate to ways of knowing” (p. 547). This “pragmatic epistemology” (p. 539), which originates in cultural models of truth and value, composes everyday reasoning and decision-making (D’Andrade, 1987). While classroom teacher experiences both in and out of the classroom are known to influence the development of professional beliefs and subsequent classroom behaviors, there is considerably less known about faculty epistemologies and their influence on the construction and development of teachers’ beliefs. Samuelowicz and Bain (1992) explored faculty beliefs in relation to notions about ‘good’ teaching and learning, teacher’s role, course design, and student outcomes. They found that teaching conceptions were context-dependent. Likewise, Kember and Gow (1994) noted a significant correlation between mode of instruction and approaches to learning. College students tended to use surface, extrinsically motivated approaches for studying when the typical mode of instruction within the department reflected a knowledge transmission orientation. Conversely, departments with a learning facilitation orientation encouraged college students to use deep, intrinsically motivated approaches for studying. Certainly, these studies with faculty members reinforce the importance of exploring the connection between belief systems, instructional practices, and impact on their college students. Educational experiences structure a cognitive apprenticeship in which learners develop an emerging professional identity that persists into professional practice (Lave & Wenger, 1991). For teacher candidates, this socialization process 2 L. Earle Reybold, Belinda Bustos Flores & Mari Riojas-Cortez The Professional Educator is situated initially in the higher education experience. This early socialization orients the teacher candidate to the profession in terms of skills, attitudes, and standards of ethical conduct (Brim, 1966; Bruss & Kopala, 1993; Weidman, Twale, & Stein, 2001). It stands to reason that faculty beliefs about practice shape this apprenticeship experience of teacher candidates through curriculum, pedagogy, and evaluation choices. However, teacher socialization is not restricted to the higher education setting; it is situated also in the lived experience of a local classroom setting. This article examines the dual zones of mediation (Kegan, 1979) where beliefs about teacher education are constructed and lived: teacher education and teacher practice. These beliefs are often contradictory, with one promoting a distant but necessary pedagogy and the other disconnecting practice from theory. We argue this dialectic between university socialization and classroom experience creates an ethical tension of practice that diminishes teaching effectiveness. We reframe this conflict of beliefs associated with teacher preparation in terms of faculty preparation, noting that faculty—particularly early career and adjunct faculty—are often grossly unprepared for the rigors of teaching and mentoring, and few are trained in the ethics of their profession (Reybold, 2003; Sheeks, 2005). In fact, “for too many individuals, developing the capacity for teaching and learning about fundamental professional concepts and principles remain accidental occurrences” (Gaff, Pruitt-Logan, & Weibl, 2000, p. x). Professional ethics are defined by Corey, Corey, and Callanan (1998) as standards for moral conduct in that profession. How, then, can teacher educators facilitate critical thinking and ethical reasoning in their student protégés? Building on this literature and our own experiences as faculty in education, we offer a critical model of faculty development that primes teacher educators to cultivate authentic teacher beliefs and professional integrity. Moreover, one can argue that knowledge of diversity and best practices is an ethical issue that needs to be addressed in all teacher preparation programs. Epistemology as Action in Teacher Education: A Disconnect? Most research on teacher beliefs is situated in the extensive works of Baxter Magolda (1992), Perry (1981), Schommer (1990), and Schommer-Aikins (2004) that characterize beliefs as epistemological perspectives. Epistemological beliefs are defined as the “individual’s views on what knowledge is, how it can be gained, its degree of certainty, and the limits and criteria for determining knowledge” (Brownlee, Purdie, & Boulton-Lewis, 2001, p. 247). Generally, dimensions of epistemology include the nature of truth, justification of authority, and reasoning processes, with ethicality being tacitly embedded in one’s belief system. One of the roles of teacher education is to socialize teacher candidates into the profession. In essence, teachers’ “ethical values are implicated in their relationship with their students, . their approaches to subject matter, and reflected in their own and their students’ stance toward the nature of knowledge” (Lyons, 1990, p. 167). However, throughout this socialization process commencing in the teacher education program and continuing as a member of the profession, teacher candidates themselves are faced with ethical dilemmas such as the implementation of best practices and the inclusion of diversity. Thus, faculty members must provide insight and guidance for understanding these conflicts and how they can be resolved. Faculty members also face a dilemma since often they lack knowledge in the area of diversity and implementation of best practices. Therefore, they need to engage in professional development that will help them understand how such ethical dilemmas arise from epistemological disconnects. Epistemological Disconnects Considerable research points to a widely recognized disconnect between theory and practice in teacher education (Brouwer & Korthagen, 2005; Kennedy, 1997; Richardson, 1990; Rodríguez, 1993), resulting in an ethical conflict for teacher candidates. What they experience in an actual classroom does not match what they have learned at the academy (Flores & Riojas-Cortez, 2005). For example, teacher candidates often have a romanticized view of what a classroom should be; this view prevents them from understanding the realities that teachers and students face everyday in the K-12 classroom. Additionally, teacher candidates may have been placed in a classroom where the cooperating teacher’s philosophy or practices differ from those espoused in the teacher preparation program. When this occurs, teacher candidates tend to become disappointed and even discouraged about pursuing the profession. They also covertly express Dueling Epistemologies? 3 Online Volume 1, No. 2 their disappointment by disregarding best practices and “practice” what their cooperating teacher instructs them to do, especially when the school’s accountability is determined by state-mandated tests. This disconnect between theory and practice is likely to occur even if a classroom teacher feels confident about teaching ability, but students do not fair well academically. This conflict stems from the teacher’s efficacy beliefs or perception about self in relation to student learning and outcome. While we have noted that teacher candidates engaged in a constructivist-oriented teacher preparation program are reflective about their beliefs about student learning and have a stronger sense of their teaching efficacy (Huey-Ling et al., 1999), we cogently argue that without purposeful intent this is not likely to occur. Likewise, conflict between teachers’ efficacy beliefs and student outcome is further exacerbated when teachers are not prepared to work with the diverse school population (Brindley & Laframboise, 2002; Neuharth-Pritchett, Reiff, & Pearson, 2000). While there is much research that demonstrates minority students having minority teachers fair better academically (Meier, Wrinkle, & Polinards, 1999; Zirkel, 2002), often there are assumptions that only minority teachers can be effective in diverse classroom settings. Flores and Clark (2004) challenge the assumption by suggesting that even when there is a cultural match, same ethnic group teachers do not necessarily believe that they can teach all children regardless of external factors. Flores, Desjean-Perrotta, and Steinmetz (2004) noted that bilingual education teachers, as compared to generalist teachers, were more likely to have positive efficacious beliefs towards ethnic minority populations because both their course work and field experiences provided opportunities to engage in the acquisition of the necessary knowledge and skills. Moreover, other studies have also