A case study of teacher collaboration at Duchess Park Secondary School

The purpose of this project was to identify issues and barriers to teacher collaboration within Duchess Park Secondary School (DPSS) and offer strategies to improve practice. An assessment of the successes and failures of the current mechanisms for collaboration was conducted through a broadly-distributed, anonymous questionnaire to DPSS staff, and through a narrowly focused interview process which targeted individual members of collaboration groups in varying disciplines and demographics at DPSS. Once data was collected it was analyzed using qualitative thematic data analysis. The main barriers to successful teacher collaboration at DPSS were individual personality conflicts, a lack of leadership within collaboration groups, a lack of predetermined collaboration objectives and agenda, and in some cases isolation and teacher work load. These barriers lead to feelings of dissatisfaction with collaboration sessions, frustration, and uncertainty, which further complicated the success of collaboration teams. Successful DPSS collaboration groups were those who: Exhibited a positive team mentality enabling the group to work together, had a clear group leader to organize and mediate the discussions, and who prepared an agenda and objectives for the group prior to the collaboration session so that each group member could prepare and participate. It was recommended that groups displaying the main barriers identified in this study work at primarily resolving these in order successfully collaborate. It was noted that individuals who do not believe in true collaboration or those who do not believe that change is needed within the PLC may not have participated in the general questionnaire and therefore their opinions may not have been reflected in this study. --Leaf ii.