ERIC Number: EJ1349939
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2022-Oct
Pages: 18
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0894-8453
EISSN: EISSN-1556-0856
Assistant Teachers, Workplace Satisfaction, and the Creation of a Culturally Competent Workforce Pipeline in Head Start
Jacoby, Jennifer Wallace; Corwin-Renner, Allegra
Journal of Career Development, v49 n5 p971-988 Oct 2022
Early care and education programs like Head Start provide a critical foundation for later achievement for children from vulnerable communities. Notably, recruiting and retaining bilingual teachers is an ongoing struggle for many Head Start agencies. Assistant teachers are more likely to be bilingual than their lead teacher counterparts (Jacoby, in press) and are important contributors to a workforce pipeline that diversifies staff. We conducted this qualitative study with 35 assistant teachers to understand how workplace attributes influence satisfaction and job retention in Head Start. Workplace attributes such as wages and support for professional education and those with symbolic value, such as the robustness of the program, both played an important role. We also found that the "instrumental-symbolic framework" demonstrated utility for understanding how workplace attributes might be leveraged to recruit and retain linguistically and culturally competent teaching staff.
Descriptors: Teacher Aides, Federal Programs, Low Income Students, Social Services, Preschool Education, Teacher Recruitment, Bilingual Teachers, Work Environment, Job Satisfaction, Labor Turnover, Teacher Attitudes, Teacher Salaries, Faculty Development, Professional Education, Cultural Awareness
SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: https://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2993
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Early Childhood Education; Preschool Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Laws, Policies, & Programs: Head Start
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A