Two education professors developed New Teacher Groups to offer a safe place where beginning teachers can voice their concerns, share their joys and frustrations, and help one another deal with problems. Interviews with participants revealed that nearly two-thirds attended for personal and professional support they could get nowhere else. (MLH)

Counselors in rural areas face unique challenges in striving to practice ethically and meet the needs of clients and communities. These challenges lead rural counselors to examine and question their daily practice and lives in an attempt to balance ethical codes with the realities of rural life. Describes these challenges and suggestions to…

The focus in the author's role as Director of the New Zealand Principal and Leadership Centre (NZPLC) has been strongly influenced by her involvement with principals and has resulted in her dedication to a developmental approach that meets interpersonal, personal and professional needs of principals. It has been imperative that the focus of such…

Studying one's profession, especially when done in community with others, where the learning is richer and deeper, has not been the norm in the education community. Educators typically have been physically isolated from each other because of the structure of school facilities and the schedules that dominate the school day. This physical isolation…

A qualitative case study design was used to investigate the extent that special education program serves the student or serves the organization. If special education serves the student, then a researcher should be able to identify resulting agency and emancipation among the students. However, if special education is serving the organization, then…

This article compares the practices of teacher educators with those of academics working as educators on pre-service courses for nurses and social workers. It includes a framework for analyzing professional education work, which conceptualizes the educators as "second order practitioners." The findings of the study show that similar…

Like teachers, principals need support for building collegial networks and reducing professional isolation. Study groups provide an opportunity for principals to meet during the school year to study a topic of mutual interest. The experience can increase participants' confidence, teach new skills, strengthen their understanding of current…

Counselors sometimes struggle with professional challenges, a situation that can be more difficult with a lack of support among colleagues. Finding an alternative community of support can make a crucial difference for well being. Recommendations are drawn from kinship networks of the Maoris of New Zealand to demonstrate how they can serve as a…

Analyzes literacy education's discourse conventions on diversity. Calls for advancing a critical democracy within the context of higher education which would disentangle the rhetoric on diversity from a colonizing agenda. (NH)

One of the ironies of teaching is that it is one of the most social occupations, but it is also one of the most isolating professions. Most schools are organized in an eggcrate manner, making professional collaborations difficult. In what other business would a professional not have easy access to a telephone? What other professional lives are…

Describes the context, format, and goals of the Professional Carers' Group, a professional network designed to support a centralized treatment project for young people who have sexually abused others. Ways that group-based work with potentially isolated local professionals may help a treatment program maintain a systemic perspective is discussed.…

Examined the experiences of elementary school computer coordinators. Considers the microprocesses of interaction among computer coordinators and classroom teachers, and how these patterns are related to the integration of computers in elementary schools. Found that computer specialists are limited in their endeavors because of various structural…

Interviews with 44 teachers of the deaf and hard of hearing in resource room programs concerning their physical, social, and administrative isolation revealed five types of teaching experiences varying in the types of isolation experienced and teacher reactions to this isolation. (DB)

Describes a classroom-based teacher education program that helps men and women move from other occupations through a period of "risky imbalance" to meaningful new role of rural school teacher. A survivor of the 1960s, the Upper Valley Teacher Training Program is a state-approved, nonprofit, independent program using services of academics…

The purpose of the study was to examine the experiences of international graduates to find out how they perceived their new learning environment in Singapore, and to explore the strategies they employed to adjust to, manage and construct meaning out of their learning situation. A qualitative, critical incidents methodology was used in the…