Organizational Climate, Teacher Beliefs, and Professional Development: An Investigation of the Relationships

Abstract

This study investigated teacher beliefs and organizational climate constructs of collective efficacy, faculty trust, academic emphasis, enabling bureaucracy, and mindfulness as antecedents for implemented professional development. Researchers previously combined collective efficacy, faculty trust, and academic emphasis into academic optimism. Using Conscious Discipline as professional development and book study as delivery, in this mixed methodology study, 489 teachers in 17 suburban elementary schools completed surveys measuring organizational climate constructs, teacher beliefs about classroom management, and self-reported degree of imlementation. Morning greeting and classroom walkthrough observations collected evidence of implementation. Sixteen focus group teachers from four elementary schools explained the degree of implementation. This study found that (a) Teacher and school demographic data correlated with organizational climate constructs; (b) Teacher beliefs and faculty mindfulness explained 65.7% of variance in self-reported degree of implementation; and (c) Socioeconomic status, book club participation, and teacher beliefs explained 77.1% of variance in observation degree of implementation.