Why Now? Factors Associated with Choosing Teaching as a Second Career and Their Implications for Teacher Education Programs

"One night this feeling came over me. It was as clear as day," explained Ken, (1) a retired sergeant in the U. S. military, recalling an epiphany he experienced while fighting in the Afghan Mountains on December 6, 2006. "Inspiration basically said, 'When you go back [home] you're done. This is your last mission. You are going to be a teacher in the inner city. '" Although Ken had never considered teaching before, he had adopted a mentoring role for younger troops in the field. Six days after the epiphany, he returned home and began investigating a career change into teaching. Ken found a website for a school district's alternative route to teacher certification and discovered an information session scheduled for the next evening. "If it [the session] had been put off until the summer time, I would have been like, 'I can't do this . I can't wait that long. '" Ken attended the information session and soon embarked on a path toward becoming a second-career teacher. Despite his nearly seamless transition from the battlefield to the classroom, a closer look at Ken's story reveals several factors that influenced his decision to become a teacher. With a projected shortage of 2.2 million new public school teachers needed for the 2008-2009 school year (Hussar, 2000), policymakers, school district personnel, and teacher educators need to understand such factors and their implications for recruiting career changers. Several researchers note that graduates from university-based teacher education programs often choose not to teach in high-demand fields or in urban or rural school districts (Darling-Hammond & Cobb, 1996; Darling-Hammond & Sykes, 2003; Ng, 2003; Zumwalt & Craig, 2005). As a result, a report by the College Board (2006) urged educators to "welcome talented midcareer professionals" into the classroom. Indeed, recent scholarship has reported an increase in the number of second-career teachers, especially in urban settings and in high-needs content areas such as math and science (Johnson, Berg, & Donaldson, 2005; Johnson & Kardos, 2008; Zumwalt & Craig, 2005). However, studies of these teachers have failed to focus on the factors related to transitioning into teaching as a second career (Guarino, Santibanez, & Daley, 2006). Instead, the literature on career switchers highlights characteristics and skills of second-career teachers, such as time management, work habits, problem-solving (Chambers, 2002; Mayotte, 2003), maturity, self-confidence, and assertiveness (Dickar, 2005; Haipt, 1987-88; Manos & Kasambira, 1998; Resta, Huling, & Rainwater, 2001; Rodriguez & Sjostrom, 1998). The purpose of this article is to present findings from a qualitative study on the factors associated with transitioning into teaching as a second career and to discuss their implications for recruiting mid-career teachers. We employ the tenets of transition theory, developed by Nancy Schlossberg and colleagues (Leibowitz & Schlossberg, 1982; Schlossberg, 1981; Schlossberg, Waters, & Goodman, 1995), as our theoretical framework for investigating career changes into teaching. According to transition theory, a transition refers to "any event, or non-event, that results in changed relationships, routines, assumptions, and roles" (Schlossberg, et al, 1995, p. 27). Four interrelated systems affect a person's movement during a transitional phase: the situation or the context of the change, the level of individual support, the strategies she or he employs, and the personal characteristics and motivations a person brings to the change (Schlossberg et al, 1995). Because transitions, especially critical career changes, mark a "period of vulnerability" for individuals (Leibowitz & Schlossberg, 1982, p. 13), knowledge of factors which impede or facilitate transitioning into teaching as a second career may inform both recruitment and retention of second-career teachers. Making the Transition into Teaching: Asking "Why Now? …