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A life history: Career stages during a thirty-four year teaching career
Abstract
This study presents a life history of Mrs. Rose Beideck, business teacher and department chair, who taught at Lincoln Southeast High School, Lincoln, NE, for thirty-four years from 1961-1995. Very few, if any, qualitative life histories have been written of a career teacher. Most of the stories of career teachers are either brief interviews of successful teachers, or lengthy studies of teacher burn-out. In addition, this study explores the research on the career stages of teachers. Many career stage models base their findings on the age of the teacher or the years of teaching experience. Fessler and Christensen's (1992) Teacher Career Cycle Model presents a series of stages but adds into the model the influence of personal and organizational factors that can affect a teacher during her career. This is not a linear model but one experienced in a dynamic manner reflecting responses to the personal and organizational factors. The purpose for conducting this study is to explore the career stages a teacher of thirty-four years in the same environment experienced using a life history design. What career stages did Mrs. Rose Beideck experience during her thirty-four year tenure at Lincoln Southeast High School? This study was conducted through a series of approximately twenty interviews with Mrs. Rose Beideck, former students, and former colleagues. If career stages are to be explored and understood, it is also important to study teachers' lives. Studying the life of Mrs. Rose Beideck and exploring her career development, enabled the researcher to draw conclusions about teacher growth throughout a professional career and to determine whether this teacher experienced career stages during her tenure.
Subject Area
Teacher education|School administration|Secondary education|Biographies
Recommended Citation
Hunter-Pirtle, Patrick Joseph, "A life history: Career stages during a thirty-four year teaching career" (1998). ETD collection for University of Nebraska-Lincoln. AAI9826087.
https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/dissertations/AAI9826087