The time of our lives, learning from the time experiences of teachers and administrators during a period of educational reform

grantor: University of TorontoThis research project documents teachers' and administrators' experiences, feelings and thoughts about time in their lives during a period of profound educational change. While issues related to time as a limited resource and a way of scheduling activities are investigated, the research study is also concerned with time in intensely political circumstances—when the development of policy and the implementation of that policy are shaped by time constraints. In particular, the research focuses on the way that time as subjective experience is or is not phenomenologically different for educators positioned differently within the schooling system. The stories of teachers and administrators are used to study the meaning of time in everyday situations—to show the pervasive way that time influences actions. Based on the premise that individuals render their everyday social world visible through the stories they tell, this research sets out to understand the perspectives and meanings of time in the lives of these educators. How time relates to personal feelings, values, relationships, the implementation of curriculum reform, intensification, and power relations in the context of contemporary organizational life are of particular interest. In this research study, I collected data through semi-structured interviews of about one hour's duration with twenty teachers. Analyses of these data provide rich descriptions illustrating teachers' experiences with time for an educational world in rapid transformation. Subsequently, I identified an opportunity sample of three educational administrators and I invited these individuals to participate in four one-hour in-depth interviews about temporal issues in education. The conversation-based interviews highlight lived experiences of time through narrative. The thesis captures the intensity and the implications of time in the lives of teachers and administrators. It describes the taken-for-granted actions involving time and helps to unravel the meaning of time for these educators in the context of significant and politically driven change. Implications for reconceptualizing time are also considered.Ph.D