Collaboration Inside Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako: What Teachers Say

Abstract

The purpose of this thesis is to examine how teachers collaborate as they transition to or work within Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako. This, New Zealand, Ministry of Education initiative requires teachers working in ECE, primary and secondary schools to collaborate on shared achievement challenges for the purpose of raising student achievement. This research explored questions concerning how teachers collaborated and shared data, how teachers understood Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako and what they perceived enabled or inhibited collaboration as schools transitioned to or worked within Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako. These were important questions to explore because Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako represent a large structural change in New Zealand education. This research was a small qualitative interpretive interview study. Teachers were interviewed from four Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako including principals, deputy principals and teachers with and without formal Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako roles. They came from the ECE, primary/intermediate and secondary school sectors. Interviews were analysed using thematic analysis and three themes; relationships, professionalism, and agency and capital were identified. Bourdieuian concepts were used as a theoretical lens. Findings were that teachers perceived relationships with their colleagues as important and viewed professionalism as critical to enable them to collaborate and share data with teachers in schools outside of their own. Due to the rapid shift to Communities of Learning/kahui Ako teachers did not have sufficient understanding of the initiative and therefore viewed Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako as an uncertain field. Their sense of agency was disrupted and their capital under threat as they navigated the change to Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako. The prioritisation of building relationships, viewing teachers as professionals, and responsively considering, individual teacher agency and cultural capital, may contribute to ensuring collaboration occurs successfully within Communities of Learning/Kahui Ako. But right now, sectors are still divided and data shared, between schools, at transition points appears to hold little value across sectors. The question of how useful cross-sector collaboration is when teachers still feel a need for more time focused on teaching in their own classroom, and collaborating within their own school is raised.