Leading in neoliberal times : a critical examination of a professional learning community for college English teachers amidst curriculum reform

Abstract

This critical ethnographic study examined the layers of tensions and complexities that emerged in a professional learning community (PLC) for English teachers in a college in China, in the context of educational reforms under globalization. Under the influence of neoliberalism, higher education (HE) institutions worldwide have fostered a “promotional culture” (Fairclough, 1993) to commercialize their educational products for performance and competitiveness to attract more students for financial benefit. Correspondingly, under a neoliberal performativity culture (Ball, 2013), new requirements have been put forth for teachers’ working lives and their professional development. During the last two decades, professional learning communities have been widely advocated for their importance in “breaking isolation” and fostering collaboration (e.g., Darling- Hammond, 2006; Hargreaves & Fullan, 2015). Although PLCs are neatly depicted as unproblematic for teachers’ professional development, there are layers of tensions in the implementation and development of PLCs in different educational contexts. Particularly, it is still unknown how PLCs are established and developed in a neoliberal HE context, and how individual teachers experience these processes. Drawing on critical social theories of performativity culture (Ball, 2003), I specifically explore how five English teachers designated as PLC “leaders” negotiated power relationships, their professional identities, and how they exercised teacher agency in a PLC in a private college in southern China. Adopting an ethnographic case study research design and qualitative research strategies (Creswell & Poth, 2016; Merriam & Tisdell, 2015), I spent three months in the college as a participant-observer, collecting observational data of PLC meetings and class observations, and documentary data related to the department’s curricular reforms. I conducted semi-structured individual interviews with leader teachers about their perceptions, understandings and experiences of their professional lives in the PLC. Critical discourse analysis was used as a method of inquiry to analyze policy texts and leader teachers’ cases in the PLC under neoliberal discourses. This critical ethnographic approach yielded a holistic and detailed understanding of the formation and function of the PLC, tensions in the negotiation of different roles and relationships, and the process and nature of teacher agency. The study reveals that within a neoliberal ideology, the PLC was characterized as the product of commercialization and commodification, and that leader teachers had difficulties in recognizing their roles as ‘leaders’ in the PLC. In addition, the study reported that different types of teacher agency and power negotiation resisted and challenged the oppressive professional environment. The study indicates the possibilities of having PLCs as practices for teacher professional development in neoliberal times in the HE context in China. The study also lends support to an expanded notion of professional development that leader teachers should draw on to empower themselves. Although this critical study may not necessarily bring about apparent changes since neoliberal ideologies are unconscious and pervasive globally, the study illuminates social agents’ intentions, ways, and attempts to disrupt neoliberal ideology. Further research is needed to examine the discursive practice of PLCs in multiple educational contexts in different regions to further problematize the notion of the professional learning community.