Sandra Rubin Glass: "Markets & Myths"

Vol. 5 No. 1    Education Policy Analysis Archives

Findings: Teachers' and Administrators' Perceptions of Their Autonomy

This section presents a discussion of teacher and administrator beliefs about autonomy. In a subsequent section, teacher and administrator beliefs about constraints to autonomy are examined.

Teachers and administrators in both public and private schools reported, to a strikingly similar degree, a general feeling of autonomy. Teachers describe ways in which they experience autonomy: opportunities to participate in decision-making, support from the administration, and the ability to work around or ignore selected policies. School administrators also tell of having a sense of autonomy. Participants in this study described the effects of organizational size on their feelings of autonomy, how the administration acts to protect their autonomy, and the effects of teachers associations on autonomy. Their conversations brought to light the question of autonomy versus like-mindedness.

Teachers and Principals Experience Autonomy

I chart my own course through my pinball machine of life and I don't hit the bumpers unless I want to hit the bumpers.

Throughout the interviews numerous instances of expressions of autonomy can be found. Teachers in private and public school settings frequently expressed great difficulty, even frustration, in trying to rank the areas of control in their classroom work life. Participants in this study reflected Sedlak and others' (1986) contention that teachers today enjoy more freedom and autonomy than their predecessors (p.115). Certainly stipulations about professional codes of conduct of the 19th and early 20th century, sometimes viciously enforced by unbending administrators, are no longer the standard. The experiences reported by teachers in this study support the popular belief further pointed out by Sedlak and others (1986) that once they close their classroom doors, teachers are "able to exercise enormous discretion" (p.121). Public school teachers join private school teachers as they describe their sense of autonomy:

I'll tell you what; we as teachers have a lot to say about all of these [items listed on questionnaire]. So, I would want to say that up front.

It's kind of hard [to respond to the questionnaire] because I think . . . I could have number one, most control, on all of them; on every single one of them.
[Click on the icon to the right to see this quotation in the context of the original interview.]

They are joined in their views by private school teachers:

I'm very autonomous actually as far as my own classroom goes.

In terms of my autonomy--you can see from my responses there--I feel a great sense of autonomy here.

Participation in the decision-making process.

Teachers in both public and private schools find expression of control through participation in curriculum or policy- setting committees. Many feel encouraged by the school administration to participate in decision-making; others feel they can participate by direct communication with the principal or head of school. Public school teachers described opportunities for participation in school decisions:

In this district, anything that becomes policy has input from the teachers. . . . There are ongoing committees, and they are made up of a conglomerate of representatives. We have advisory boards in various areas. I think our school is one that utilizes teachers.

What we have gone to is a system where the faculty itself has more of a hands-on approach to the administration of their particular program rather than going through chairs. Chairs still exist, but we are more of a local autonomy school now. We have a committee that meets and decides things with the principal.

A public school principal reported:

Everything that I do is a collection of information and input from teachers in this building, the department chair people in this building . . . They give me an awful lot of input. I'm constantly asking them for direction.

Private school administrators talked about how teachers are encouraged to create avenues of participation:

The faculty have a big role in curriculum development . . . and usually it's a grass roots kind of thing . . . . curriculum change comes from faculty within the department . . . .

There are many decisions that I'll just leave up to the faculty. The bottom line is that if you're going to have anything happen, you have to have the people who are responsible for enforcing it . . . part of the decision-making process.

A teacher in a private school typified the feelings of many in the small private school where faculty members feel and act like family members:

If the headmaster does something which offends me, I go to the headmaster and we work it out.

Yet this same teacher allowed,

I would say the majority of the senior faculty are at a stage where they know even if he [head] doesn't like what I say I have a right to say it and he needs to listen to it . . . . Junior faculty might be a little too young to handle that.

Administrator support and encouragement.

Teachers in great numbers report they feel freedom in their work life because the principal or head or department chair has confidence in their expertise in content area and teaching skills. These are, in most instances, the very same principals and heads of school who hired those teachers in the first place. A school head tells how private school teachers gain autonomy:

. . . [I] find very well qualified people with good imaginations to create good curriculum, and I support them and give them all the encouragement in the world to be able to do that.

Private school teachers described the atmosphere of autonomy due to administrative support:

[We have] highly competent people. [The administration] lets them do their work and they either stay away by design or they are so busy they don't have too much time to get involved.

I just really feel that she [department chair] has confidence in me and I have a pretty free reign.

Administrators have confidence in those they selected to be part of the school family. Yet, some teachers admit that this confidence may be tenuous. Support is evident as long as there are no parent complaints. Autonomy and administrative attention are felt by these teachers, but with the caveat added by McNeil (1986): "as long as the school runs smoothly". A private school teacher confirmed:

The headmaster's role here--I look on it that he is very encouraging, that the office handles details like the scheduling and that kind of thing, but as far as how I run my classroom, it is pretty much up to me. I have a feeling that if there were a lot of parental complaints, I know I would hear about it. As far as structuring my curriculum, my teaching methods, even the way I handle discipline, I am pretty much free--as long as the head feels that I'm effective in what I do.

Private school teachers respond to the invitation of their administrators to utilize their perceived autonomy:

Every creative thing that I've ever attempted has been encouraged at this school and people love my ideas and I've tried some pretty, you know, some things that I'm taking some risks doing.

I get to design the whole course for the year of what I'm going to do in my classroom myself. I mean people know I've got a body of knowledge that I'm an expert at.

A public school teacher added:

He [principal] really relies on the department chairs . . .and as a department chair, I rely on what the teachers in my department want. It's a lot better way of communication and they feel like they have input; I feel like I've got input.

Another public school teacher shared:

All the principals that I have had have trusted me as a professional to handle my professional work the way I see fit. I have never had anyone tell me specifically what to do.

Ignore selected rules and regulations.

Despite what might be construed as constraints imposed by the larger bureaucracy of state departments of education on public schools or large district level administrations, public school teachers frequently maintain autonomy. They take control by ignoring, working around supposed constraints, or using what Sedlak and others (1986) refer to as "passive circumvention" (p.120). Using such methods, teachers are able to experience freedom in a bureaucracy that is unable to monitor actions or provide consequences for offenders. Kozol (1981) found that "imaginative teachers . . . have used their ingenuity and skill in order to arrive at a way out [of following mandates]" (p. 51). Indeed federal, state, and district regulations may operate in such a way as to limit the range of possibilities available to teachers; but, as Ball (1987) noted, "They certainly do not exercise absolute control within that range" (p. 247). A public school department chair stated:

His [district administrator's] proposal was to decrease failure rates by changing the syllabus, by changing what we do. Of course, this is one we would love to mount the barricades for, and I side-stepped it at this school . . . by finding a creative way to enhance student performance in a real sense. . . . something called an Algebra Homework Initiative. . . . It reduced our failure rate by about 50%. It really side-stepped the issue of failure rate without diluting the curriculum to accomplish it.

Another public school teacher related:

Individual teachers pretty well make up their mind as to which text they are going to use. The state has a list that they give out to districts. The department discusses the different kinds of textbook . . . . but individual teachers [make their own choices]. I teach from an entirely different textbook than my fellow teachers at [the other high schools in the district].

The same teacher went on to discuss the effects of a state mandated curriculum:

The coursework that you are to teach and the other requirements that you have to have by law are really minimal. . . . You have the standard things you go by ... but for the most part, it is pretty much that you do your own thing.

Even those teachers in private schools not subject to the same government mandated policies as apply to public schools, also find themselves in the position of ignoring or working around school policy to preserve control of their work life:

There are certainly plenty of rules and policies that I don't agree with, but very often I just ignore them. . . . in the faculty handbook, teachers are supposed to wear shoes, not sneakers. So I wear them [sneakers] and nobody says anything and that's that.

One time they [school administrators] imposed an in-service program on us. We behaved so badly they have, since then, let us determine what goes into them. So I would say currently we have a great deal of control.

I resist bitterly and strongly changing my teaching style . . . I resist and I do it either overtly by speaking out--expressing it; or, if that fails, one can very simply do it covertly in the classroom. Simply not do it.

This last response is exactly what Ball (1987) referred to as "omissive action;" simply not to do what one is instructed to do ( p. 268). The teacher stated the obvious fact that behind the classroom door is where the greatest teacher autonomy exists, whether public or private.

Principals, heads of school, and other administrators also speak of feelings of autonomy. Although they may admit to sensing pressures from an administration or state regulators from above or parents, they perceive themselves as charting their own courses on behalf of the faculty and students to whom they acknowledge a responsibility. Both public and private school administrators who participated in this study were mature individuals. They have many years of educational administration experience behind them and understood how to work within their given system. They know how to make the system, public or private, work for them. In this sense, they were able to express a great deal of autonomy. A public school principal spoke about his feelings of autonomy:

There are always parents in asking for this, asking for that, wanting this . . . . I work personally on a scheme of a frame of reference that does not let or works at not letting people impact me. It's my own personal--my wellness program of "I'm not a yo-yo and I'm not a pinball machine.

Heads of school firmly stated these convictions:

It is our responsibility to be service-oriented and to be responsive to our parents, but it is not our responsibility to place them in the position of calling the shots. . . . Our job is to please, our job is to serve, our job is not to allow parents to run the school.

You can say I have a lot of authority and it would be a great deal on one hand. On the other hand, one could say the teachers have a great deal [of autonomy] determining what the curriculum is.

There seems to be a conflict of ideas here. If teachers are given a great deal of autonomy on issues of curriculum, hiring of faculty, and other policy issues, the autonomy of the principal is eroded. Powell (1990) questioned the compatibility of the an empowered principal who is to function as a leader and site-based organization which empowers teachers. He suggested that one must forfeit some degree of autonomy for others to become empowered. Yet, as Apple and Teitelbaum (1986) found, within Weick's model of a loosely-coupled organization different types of professionals can retain control and authority without changing or being changed by the decisions of other professionals. Teachers in public and private schools conduct their individual classrooms as they see fit without reducing the autonomy of the principal.

Organizational Size and Autonomy

In the public school we have a bigger organization so there may be more levels of bureaucracy because there are more people involved.

Both public and private school teachers and their corresponding administrators describe a work life with few constraints on their autonomy. Common sense, however, dictates a focus on some obvious differences between the public and private institutions which create different reasons for a feeling of freedom. An obvious difference between the public and private secondary schools in this study is their size. Montevideo, Sunset, and Portales High Schools have student populations of 2750, 2400, and 980, respectively. The independent schools have populations of 275 (St. John's College Preparatory, grades 7 - 12), 104 (Verde Valley Country Day School, grades 9 - 12), and 169 (Crestwood Country Day School, grades 9 -12). Questions of size, who gets hired, the role of the principal and head of school will be discussed in terms of how public and private school teachers acquire autonomy.

Some of the autonomy in curriculum matters reported by private school teachers derives not from the organizational structure but from the fact that private schools are small requiring fewer demands for cooperation and coordination among teachers teaching the same subjects. In this section the necessity of a standardized curriculum to maintain continuity in large districts, layers of authority required of large organizations, and response time will be discussed. These issues are matters of the size of an organization that distinguishes between a public and private high school.

Curriculum decisions in large schools require discussion among the department faculty. The math department at Sunset High School, for example, has a faculty of sixteen. Faculty representatives in each content area pursue curriculum discussions with their counterparts in the other high schools within the district as well as coordination with the middle schools which send students to the high schools. There is a close articulation of curriculum to preserve continuity in both the scope of a subject and its sequence. Teachers influence curriculum through participation on curriculum and textbook selection committees.

Contrary to Lortie's (1975) description of the isolation and separation of teachers into the eggcrate conception of teaching, teachers in modern high schools have centrally located conference and work areas. Each of the public schools in this study had such a meeting area available for each subject area department. It is in these areas that teachers held department meetings, met with students, conferred with parents, collaborated on instructional and student needs, and prepared for instruction. A number of interviews were conducted in rooms of this type. The small size of the private school precluded a convenient area for teacher collaboration. A combination workroom and faculty lounge was where teachers could meet and confer unless a classroom were available.

A new teacher to the public school is expected to build his or her course around a given district curriculum to maintain continuity among the schools of a large district. While the public school expects teachers to follow the district curriculum guides, they are just that-- guides. An established curriculum does not mean there is no room for innovation. The presence of a curriculum does not deny creativity. An assistant principal of a public school stated:

I think it came out when we had district-wide curriculum meetings, when the high schools were talking to middle schools and other high schools and we sat in rooms made up of representatives of the various schools. We talked about their relationship in the curriculum. I think there was discussion about the rigidity and that you shouldn't impose this upon teachers, but let teachers be more creative. I think that discussion was there and I think the realization was there that you also are tied in to some curriculum guide.

Teachers in public schools talked about how a district curriculum does not constrain autonomy:

On the district level we have curriculum that we must follow. . . . there is no specific pressure or anything like that, but in a district the size of [ours] you have to have some coordination and articulation. . . . we have committees that work out curriculum problems, et cetera and select textbooks . . . we are expected to abide by those guidelines. But I don't consider that to be something that has come from on high. That is something that is logical. You would want all the schools in one district to basically follow the same core curriculum, but the core curriculum is only meant to be about 60% of the curriculum. Forty per cent of the curriculum we can decide on.

In a private school, new teachers will generally define the curriculum predicated on their own content knowledge and interest. Because of smaller faculty numbers, there may be two or three other teachers with whom to coordinate curriculum; yet each teacher specializes in a particular facet of that content area. While each of the three independent schools in this study have either a middle school or middle and elementary school as part of its organization, students come from a variety of other schools. Consequently, coordination is a matter of interest only within the upper school. Any coordination of curriculum is accomplished within the institution, as described by this private school teacher:

I think we're all on the same track, which you might attribute to the fact that it is a small school. It is a college prep school. They're [students] all basically going through the same thing, and that certainly could be a strong positive as opposed to a larger school, particularly a large public school where you're serving many, many different peoples and one of those might be the college prep oriented students.

It was during a discussion of size of the institution and teacher autonomy that the head of a private school stated:

I stress that not only can they have the pleasure of a great deal of autonomy here, they have the responsibility of it. No one will hand them a course outline and for some candidates that's very uncomfortable . . . . They'll even say, "You mean no one will tell me what book to use and what materials to use?"

Layers of bureaucracy appear to be necessary for the functioning of large districts and large high schools. A principal of a public school plainly states, "In the public school we have a bigger organization so there may be more levels of bureaucracy because there are more people involved". Despite the large size of the public schools, autonomy need not be compromised as confirmed by many of the public school teachers and principals in this study. It is because of size that the department chair functions in a role similar to the principal in terms of leadership and support. The department chair involves teachers in decision-making and communicates their position to the principal. The chair can also be another buffer to protect teachers from external pressures as will be discussed in the following section. It is size that requires teachers to work together, as these public school teachers reported:

The principal has picked department heads that are facilitators, that can help that department be cohesive and bring out the best in the people there. . . . he [chair] has an interest in everything and can build a rapport and make this a cohesive, dynamic group. No one is ever stuck with all the dribble courses. You know, we always laugh, "Into each life some freshmen must fall."

I don't have a lot of department meetings because I'm always seeing them . . . . I teach three classes and because it's such a large department, I can get out the rest of the day and be with them. I'll be in the classroom and I do most of the observations. I'm in the classroom even if I'm not observing, and that's when you really see what's going on anyway.

It is generally acknowledged that size slows down the response time of problem solving or making changes in policy or curriculum. In a public school there often is a hierarchy to be accommodated: one or two levels of administration, perhaps the school board, committees, and others from whom response is necessary. A comparison between public and private school life was made by a public school principal who had former experience as a head of school:

I get frustrated here sometimes in that between the conceptualization of an idea and implementation it takes time; but the danger of the [private school setting] is that you are relying entirely on the head to make all those decisions. . . . It is not always so good . . . I'm not always right and sometimes I make mistakes. I think sometimes it's better if an idea is looked at carefully, if it's bounced off other people . . . but I don't feel in most cases that our classroom teacher performance is held back by that.

This same principal of a large public school states:

Things that hold back the classroom teacher performance probably deal with other factors to me. One deals with class size. . . . When I see the teacher too busy to go back and spend a few minutes with one, two or three kids, that's a problem.

Principals Protecting Teacher Autonomy

I guess that's the one thing about my department head, my principal, my superintendent; they don't crumble when there's a cranky parent.

Although size of the institution plays a primary role in the perception of quality, the role it plays in the autonomy felt by public and private school teachers and administrators is more complex. The roles of the principal or head, superintendent, school board, and department chair; teachers' association; and the determination of who gets hired all contribute to the sources of autonomy that can be found in schools.

Contrary to the beliefs of some, administrators in both private and public schools often act more as buffers protecting teachers from pressures from outside groups than they act as sources of pressure themselves (Blase, 1991, p. 736). The image of the non-supportive administrator who saddles teachers with trivial tasks and burdensome paperwork (Boyer, 1983, p. 142) was not found among participants in this study. Nor was there evidence of the type of principal that talks at and delivers commands to teachers or staff meetings that concentrate on administrative details ignoring matters of educational policy as described by Boyer (1983, p. 224).

In the private school, the role of the heads is such that they act as both superintendent and principal. They determine the philosophy of the school and train the board as to their policy making and fiscal responsibilities. The head or superintendent, once hired by the board, is charged with seeing that the school board or board of trustees separates policy making function from that of the principal or head who sees to the daily management of the school. When heads or superintendents do their jobs well, the teachers feel no constraints from the school board or board of trustees. Teachers in both public and private schools generally agreed that the board "stay[s] out of the daily running of the school," as stated by a teacher in a private school. Another private school teacher opined:

There's a layer between me and them [board of trustees], and that layer is [head] and [assistant head]. . . . You know, I might be doing some things which are driven by board decisions and I just don't know it.

The head of a private school added:

We don't have an education committee on the board. I view an education committee on the board as potentially dangerous because, in fact, there was one when I came and I let it die . . . that is an area where they can easily lose sight of their responsibility . . . when you have a formalized structure it can get dangerous, as opposed to an informal structure where just some parents are saying that would be great if we has this or that . . . once you formalize it, it can become a problem.

A public school teacher acknowledged how the principal worked on behalf of the teachers:

Our principal was spearheading, and he did get permission of the board to do it, even though it meant working the system a little bit. It is a pilot program, but it's not being called that because, if it were called that, he would not be able to do it in the middle of the year.

Principals, heads of school, and department chairs are generally seen by both public and private school teachers as being supportive and protecting them from external pressures. Knowing these buffers exist allows teachers greater flexibility and freedom in their work life. Public school teachers commented on the support and protection their administrators provide:

I guess that's the one thing about my department head, my principal, my superintendent; they don't crumble when there's a cranky parent. All the lines of communication are followed in a correct way, and I'm helped along the way. They don't give in to that parent, parental pressure when it's just a cranky person out there not getting their way. They're very articulate about it. They're very professional, but the buck does stop here with the department head, with the principal and with the superintendent.

A public school principal related this story:

I recently went through hell, two weeks ago, with a mother and a father over a boy who didn't graduate and the parents were insistent that I graduate him. [They went] all the way to the superintendent level, bringing the assistant superintendent out here because we were not being fair with that kid. The teacher was being very fair with that kid, very fair, and I supported the teacher and the kid did not graduate . . . . They wanted the teacher to go back and change a grade and I'm not going to make a teacher do that.

Teachers in independent schools described similar feelings of support:

I think [the head] screens and keeps us away from parents who would stop some program. He very much wants the teachers to have the feeling of freedom to teach whatever they want to.

Basically what he said and I've heard him say publicly is that we aren't going to change our curriculum to suit an unhappy parent. We're willing to look at our curriculum and see if it's what we ought to be doing, but we're not going to be in the position of, you know, changing because a parent is unhappy about something. So we have a lot of support for that.

A private school administrator responded to parent pressure to fire a teacher:

You positively get a lynch mob going in a situation because in the second week we had people calling us to fire this woman . . . we toned them all down and even some of the other parents would say to the rabid parents, "Isn't it fair to give her a little time to get adjusted?"

Teachers Associations Affect Autonomy

Our teachers association is very active and it affects my work life every day.

There is an acknowledged criticism of teachers associations in the realm of public opinion and among critics of public school systems. This study was conducted in a right-to-work state in which teacher unions are virtually non-existent, but teacher associations are predominant. These associations are seen as variously strong or weak depending on locale. Only one of the three public schools is in a district having a very strong teacher association. Most, if not all, of its teachers are members of the association and quite a few are active in its leadership. The other two schools are in districts that negotiate teachers' contracts with the association, although the faculty are much less active. Teachers in all three public schools, however, reflect on the efforts of the teachers' association to preserve their autonomy. If educational researchers (such as Chubb and Moe) promote autonomy as the key to freeing teacher creativity and innovation, they should applaud the efforts of the teachers association which acts to preserve the due process upon which teachers have come to depend for a sense of freedom in their work life. It is the teachers association that can require a district to seek advice from teachers, to protect teachers from pressures to change grades, and to provide good working conditions.

While the association does protect specified areas of teacher autonomy, it also institutes a management system based on the model of industrial unionization leaving many teachers feeling more powerless than before (Russo, 1990, p. 193). Despite the price they may pay, Firestone and Bader (1991) credit the teachers association for the extent to which teachers participate in program design within a school system (p.84). Both public school teachers and principals, who at times may feel constrained by the presence of the local teacher association, express positive reactions toward the association. One public school teacher explained:

He [former superintendent] was dictatorial. It's this way because he would sit back and smoke his pipe and he would smirk at you, and his aim was divide and conquer . . . . I think that is when our association became the dynamic force it is because he was so bad and that was when the parents realized that there was a dynamic force out here called teachers, and their [teachers] main goal was good education, not paychecks. It was like we are your comrades, not your enemy.

A public school teacher who formerly worked in a union state on the east coast speculated about why unions or teacher associations are important in protecting teacher autonomy:

. . . . and there we actually had more autonomy and I feel that way because it was unionized. . . . The only reason that I believe unions have ever appeared is because they had employers who are less than honorable and kind of impose their will . . . they were autocratic and we wouldn't have a need for an association or union if you didn't have individuals such as that.

A principal in the public schools said:

The administration seeks their [teacher association] opinion. We let them know when decisions are being made that we think are going to have a significant impact on the faculty. . . . We include them a lot, we treat them as equals, we value their judgment and input, and I think there's a good working relationship.

The teachers association can interpose itself between the teachers and the principal and protect teachers from unfair or unjust decisions (Grant, 1988). One public school principal stated:

I have a reputation for dismissing teachers, that I'm Atilla the Hun, if you will, about evaluation and I am. People will tell you, "You can't do that with a professional organization." My organization works beautifully with me because I dot the i's and cross the t's and I treat the person humanely as I'm doing it. Therefore, they never have grounds to come in and say you didn't follow procedure or you treated these people like dirt. As such, I usually end up with very strong support from them.

Autonomy or Like-Mindedness?

I find very well qualified people with good imaginations to create good curriculum, and I support them and give them all the encouragement in the world to be able to do that.

Much of the autonomy felt by teachers in each school derived from the fact that they were in agreement with their administrator. Principals and heads hire teachers who agree with their philosophy. It is only on occasion, with declining school enrollments and concurrent reduction in teaching force, that a public school principal is forced to accept a possibly unwanted teacher on transfer from another high school within the district. Otherwise, they feel great control in selecting new teachers.

In both the public and private schools, the principal or head screens the potential teacher candidates before seeking advice from the faculty. At times the teachers in the private schools in this study had to fight to participate in the hiring of new faculty. Perhaps heads are less willing to share the task because their jobs rest on the selection of teachers who must be perceived by parents as effective to maintain the school's very existence. A head of school relates:

. . . [I] find very well qualified people with good imaginations to create good curriculum, and I support them and give them all the encouragement in the world to be able to do that.

Retaining control over the hiring of new faculty for both the public school principal and private school head ensures a faculty with a philosophy shared by the administrators. Teachers expressed their consternation over being left out of some aspects of the hiring process. These two private school teachers described their role in hiring colleagues thusly:

We're in the process of hiring a new teacher. It's been quite a frustrating experience. . . . I am not allowed to see recommendations, but I am the art department chairman. I have interviewed several candidates. I have looked over 85 resumes for this job, and I've yet to see one letter of recommendation. I don't know, I've never been told . . . . Apparently now the only person who sees them in this school is the headmaster, and one other person-- and I find that to be a little degrading.

They began the process of hiring a new drama teacher, reading through resumes and inviting some [candidates] without ever letting me know as head of the fine arts department that they were considering this person. And you don't do that. You don't do it. Well, I went in and jumped up and down and raised holy hell and the response there was copious apologies giving me the resumes to look at, asking for my opinion.

Knowing that faculty view education through a similar set of beliefs, principals and heads can comfortably allocate greater autonomy. They can give support and show trust in teachers with the knowledge that teachers are "like-minded." Also, as long as a school, public or private, is perceived by the community and parent body as successful the principal or head is less likely to interfere with teacher freedom. Perhaps the issue of autonomy is derived from the principal or head and faculty acting in ways that have the approval of the parents. Knowing what parents want and sharing those expectations translates into autonomy for teachers. The support of parents adds, as well, to the principal or head's autonomy. Private school teachers talked about fitting in at their schools:

In my last school where I worked my department chair caused me to be fired. . . . If it matters, I'm much better [off] here than I was there. I mean I was a square peg in a round hole there and here, it's a much better fit.

I'm pretty much free as long as the head feels I'm effective at what I do.

A public school teacher reported:

We were rolling along at this school. This school was a great school, and it was because of the teachers. We were heading in the right direction and so on, but the difference that I see is that he [principal] has come in and given us some direction, come in with some new ideas. The ideas we had before he has improved upon, given us freedom to do these things.

A head of school described his hiring practice:

I'm the one that will usually go through all the applications, bring it down to about ten, call them in, interview these different people, then I make the final three selections. Then I'll bring in at that point the department head or a couple of other teachers . . . . You know, it's generally my decision almost alone.

Public school principals reported having considerable freedom in selecting teachers. If a reduction in force is in effect in a school district due to declining enrollment, principals are required to accept transferring teachers. One principal explained that of his current faculty of 125, only about five were not of his choice. Another principal explained how the school organization is becoming increasingly more site-based. Department teams screen, interview, and hire new teachers for the department. The principal may be part of the team. Sharing the hiring process removes some autonomy from the principal, yet he has trust in the faculty to make good choices. Perhaps if there was a lack of trust, the process would be different.

Teacher Autonomy in Pubic and Private Schools Compared

"I think we have fully as much freedom in public school as they have in the private school."

The teachers who participated in this study view themselves as active participants in making many of the decisions that affect their work life. They describe many opportunities to participate in and influence policy decisions. They talk about having control over what happens in the classroom even if they retain control by ignoring or working around bureaucratic constraints. One public school teacher described what many of his colleagues also believed: "Bureaucracies within our district are . . . as far as influencing what happens to me as a teacher, almost nonexistent".

Private school teachers also report having a great deal of freedom in the same areas, but attribute it to a freedom from state and federal constraints: "Being an independent school, we aren't bound by the required [state] curriculum . . . . I don't feel shaped by the federal government. . . . I feel very fortunate that I sense control in an inordinate amount of things here". Principals also talk about taking control and responsibility for their work lives. A public school principal reflects the views of his colleagues: "I think we have fully as much freedom in public school as they have in the private school". Heads of private school view their position as one permitting immense freedom and having the ability to define the roles of others who work within the institution: "It's always up to the headmaster to help educate people when they are overstepping their bounds." Another head reflects: "We have the autonomy to change a program entirely if we want to . . . ."

Teacher and Principal Autonomy, As They Tell It

Teachers and administrators in public and private high schools in this study feel that they experience a great deal of freedom in their work life. Equally evident is the fact that none can claim unrestrained autonomy.

Whether public or private, teachers' explanations for feelings of autonomy are similar. Participation in decision-making gives them a sense of influencing school policy. When they are encouraged and supported by the administration, teachers feel free to take risks in teaching and they adopt creative and innovative strategies (Blase, 1988; McNeil, 1986). Often when externally imposed rules, regulations, or mandates infringe on this freedom, experienced teachers and administrators ignore them or work around these obstacles.

Teachers and principals in public and private high schools also described three features of school organization that enhance and protect autonomy: (1) the size of the organization, (2) administrators acting as buffers, and (3) the teachers association. First, teachers and principals in large public schools find that factors related to the size of the organization help to protect and maintain autonomy. It is acknowledged that there is a vast difference in size of organization between public and private institutions. Contrary to the popular belief that layers of bureaucracy act as obstacles to autonomy, the organizational structure of large schools enhances autonomy by clarifying roles so that public school teachers are faced with less ambiguity. Within the role and within the classroom, teachers described a sense of freedom. Public school teachers are expected to work within the curriculum guidelines of the district and state, but are given broad latitude within which to innovate and be creative. Size also requires some standardization to accommodate articulation of curriculum content from middle schools to high school and between high schools of the same district. Private school teachers, on the other hand, may enjoy even greater freedom in that they often write their own curriculum. Although two or three private school teachers of the same subject may share ideas, there is little need for cooperation since it is unlikely any two of them teach the same course to the same grade level student. If one could imagine a private secondary school of two to three thousand students, it would likely function in much the same way as an upper middle-class public school with regard to administrator and teacher autonomy.

Second, autonomy is protected and maintained as principals and heads of school act as buffers to protect teachers from external influences. In public schools, the assistant principal and department chairs form additional layers that protect teacher freedom. Even the public school board can act to support teacher autonomy in the classroom. Heads of school do the same. All of these groups expressed, orally or in writing, a philosophy of management that shields teachers from external pressures. The board of trustees of a private school does not share this perspective since they are kept away from the daily business of running the school. Rather, the function of a private school board is to establish or approve policy and to raise funds, both roles lying far from the classroom door.

Third, public school teachers are given some guarantee of protection of working conditions by the teachers association. They cannot be subject to unjust firing. The association protects teachers in ways that leave them fearless in the face of some external pressures. For example, public school teachers cannot be pressured by parents or administrators to change a student's grade, the number of student contacts (number of students per class) is limited, and teaching responsibilities are often specifically delineated. The teachers association also negotiated mandatory teacher participation in decision making through committee work. Private school teachers have no similar protections though they are subject to few of the public teachers' concerns because of the size of the organization and the heterogeneity of the student body.

Findings: Constraints on Teacher and Principal Autonomy

Any attempt to clarify and elaborate the concept of autonomy would not be complete without an investigation of those pressures that act to constrain autonomy. Despite the strong sense of autonomy reported by those interviewed, they also acknowledged areas that compromise their autonomy: pressures exerted by parents of college-bound students, a context of laws that apply to both public and private institutions, financial constraints, and maintenance of an atmosphere which is responsive to parents. Public and private school teachers and administrators are often subject to similar, if not identical, constraints.

College Admissions Pressures

When you sign on for an AP, you're largely signing on to mandated curriculum.

Teacher autonomy in both public and private secondary schools is sharply compromised by the demands of parents wishing that their children gain admission to prestigious colleges. It is not uncommon in private schools to hear of parents and alumni wholly preoccupied with admittance rates to colleges (Lightfoot, 1983, p. 295). In its marketing materials, each private school in this study included a lengthy list of prestigious colleges to which their graduates have gained admission. The principal of each public school boasted a high graduation rate with many graduates being accepted at the best colleges. Each also expressed pride at offering a wide range of advanced placement (AP) courses and producing a number of National Merit Scholars. Parents in both the public school and private school communities are acknowledged by the faculty of each school to be highly educated, professional, and generally to be upper middle to upper socioeconomic in social class. It can be presumed that one of the reasons parents place a child in a college preparatory independent school or locating the family in a particular school district where the school has an reputation for academic excellence is the strong desire for the child to be accepted by a prestigious college. These parents are often actively involved in school activities or participate on committees. The demands of these parents are made known to administrators and teachers through direct contact or participation on school committees. Administrators may be more intrusive in this arena because the stakes are highest where parents are outspoken. Private school teachers described parent pressures:

Occasionally you see parent pressures. Sometimes we have parents that are pretty pushy with their kids . . . we're dealing with some parents who are, you know, where both the parents are professional people and very busy and they essentially think that once they pay their tuition that you're going to take over dealing entirely with the student's education.

Parents wanted that course [AP calculus] . . . . if there are enough [parent] voices behind there, it would have an effect [in making these curriculum changes].

In college counseling, parents play a tremendous role, and they can put incredible pressure on me as a college counselor. "Johnny has got to get into college. I want you to do everything you can to get him in that school." And often people like that, and it doesn't mean just Harvard it can be Westminster College, will try to wield power over you. Again, it's [not] that you have to do this work, but, "I'm telling you how to do it," undermining in a sense maybe your professionalism, your training, your experience and expertise.

This year AP class had to be geared to college expectations. I really had to adhere to what would be tested. In some ways, [I] lost some of my freedom in that class because I had to focus on college expectations.

Private school heads and administrators similarly described parent pressures:

Parents who send their children to private schools occasionally behave as if they owned the faculty, as if their amount of tuition were paying the faculty, each faculty member's entire salary.

. . . if it [what a teacher is doing] also achieves all of our other goals for college preparation, things that we are trying to be sure we are doing for kids, we're able to allow more autonomy and we're able to try to work with parents in terms of informing them in a more cohesive way.

Pressure exerted by parents of college-bound students are felt and reported by public school teachers as well. Textbooks and curriculum choices are seen as examples of teacher responses to these pressures:

I've been department chair now, it's been about seven or eight years. . . [principals] override specific decisions about placement into honors courses. . . . placement is not supposed to be determined by parents or principals, it's supposed to be based on certain criteria . . . . I should say at least once a year, principals override those decisions because of parental pressure.

Our particular community here around [school] is very achievement-oriented most of the time, so there's a lot of pressure for kids to get good grades, and getting a B for a lot of students is a disaster. . . . I think there's pressure there to offer more AP courses because more and more parents are allowing their students to take advanced placement and try to get college credit before they get out of high school.

Most of our kids talk college. We do have an academic program that is very heavy in that regard . . . more advanced placement classes being taught . . . a number of A level classes that would be appropriate for a kid going to a four-year or to a highly selective school; and we put a lot of emphasis on that, because the public is asking us to.

The public school principals in this study are very supportive of advanced placement courses and programs geared to the academically talented or college-oriented student. One principal boasted:

We have the largest advanced placement program in the state . . . .When we began to excel in advanced placement and did a lot of publicity, [the superintendent] mandated that all the high schools in [the district] would have advanced placement programs. . . . . We're about the top three percent in the United States in advanced placement participation and success.. . . . we've had a remarkable run. I've had great influence that way.

A private school administrator added,

". . . when you sign on for an AP, you're largely signing on to a mandated curriculum."

College requirements and the College Board which produce the advanced placement exams influence public and private high schools to an equal degree. Parents of college-bound students in both public and private schools expect to have such courses available to their children. Teachers of core subjects, therefore, tend to look to these requirements when selecting textbooks and planning curriculum. All six high schools in this study contain college bound student populations. Preparing those students for college is a high expectation of parents and, consequently, a priority for the schools.

Since there is so much emphasis and concern placed on advanced classes in the core curriculum areas, it is interesting to look at how the teachers of non-college preparatory courses view their work life. Teachers in both public and private schools experience greater autonomy when their subject is not a college preparatory course.

I may have more freedom than teachers in some academic areas . . . there is no set of standards and curriculum in the arts that high school students are expected to have by the time they finish high school. Therefore, I don't have anyone breathing down my neck to say, "You aren't doing this and this standardized test requires that you do that." So the subject area allows for considerably more freedom.

Threat of Litigation

We all feel the influence of lawsuits and insurance demands.

Autonomy of both private and public teachers is limited to an equal degree by a system of laws. Laws that have to do with civil rights, health, and safety are binding on the private institution as well as the public. These laws and the possibility of legal action compromise autonomy. Teachers have forgone some of their freedom knowing that lawsuits have only multiplied in recent years (Grant, 1988, p. 141). Heads of school explained how they are subject to the same constraints placed on their public counterparts:

Any time that regulations come down through the federal government, it's pervasive in terms of health reasons, you know, it's pervasive throughout our society. We obviously have to adhere to those things. . . . We have to adhere to, of course, general health standards that exist in [the county] and the state. We test our water on a regular basis . . . we adhere to fire regulations; we have our fire drills once a month.

We are subject to virtually all federal laws regarding discrimination. We publish a disclaimer in all of our publications stating that [the school] does not discriminate on the basis or race, creed, color, et cetera. A violation of that would and should mean that we, as an institution, should be closed or lose our non-profit status.

The teachers, principals, and heads of school were very aware of the threats of a litigious society and make conscious efforts to avoid such difficulties. Fear of lawsuits constrains public and private school decisions alike. Private school teachers reported how the fear of lawsuits has altered their work life:

We all feel the influence of law suits and insurance demands than we used to . . . . It's that level of influence. I don't feel quite as free to do some things just because people sue each other these days.

One head of school described how he felt somewhat more secure in a small, private school setting than he would anticipate in a large, public school when it came to thoughts of being sued:

Now it's not that we can't get sued as well [as public schools], but at a smaller institution you're more family-oriented. Things are based on more of a civil way of handling things, and you try to figure out how you're going to manage the problem other than just automatically jumping to think you're going to get sued.

External forces mandate and regulate schools and teachers so as to "provide adequate instruction to all their students, to equalize access to knowledge" (Sedlak et al., 1986, p.118). Ball (1987) reported, "The more diverse the school community, the more difficult it will be for any school to respond to all expectations" (p. 251). Even in public schools with little diversity, these constraints are experienced. The fear of litigation was felt by public school teachers and principals to the same degree as their private school counterparts:

At the beginning of the year, we had a parent who came to us with an order from her attorney that they were going to proceed with bringing action against the district if, in fact, we did not change a grade that her son received because he was diagnosed late in the year as having attention deficit disorder and she felt that not every teacher did make adjustments in the teaching procedures to reach that child . . . . we met with the teachers a number of times and finally the teachers, out of a sense of inadequacy and frustration, felt that they did not want to go through a legal situation, so they changed the grades in some cases.

Financial Pressures

. . . we are becoming more like the private school, where the willingness to fund the institution determines its success

Yet another constraint placed upon both public and private schools is finances. Private and public schools are plagued to an equal degree by the shrinking value of the dollar and an unstable economy. The tax base upon which school funding rests is dwindling while the number of families who can afford a private education is stable, at best; certainly the numbers are not rising. The private school is also necessarily dependent on its fund-raising abilities; tuition alone does not cover the cost of educating each student. A head of school described the private school's quest for financing:

Our [private school] burden is raising money. The tuition pays for maybe 80 percent of what we do and the other 20 percent we have to raise one way or the other; through fees or through fundraising or whatever . . . . they [public schools] don't have that same burden, although they have to go through elections and bonds and trying to get the public vote.

A public school principal dispelled the myth that public and private efforts to acquire funds are so different:

We are attempting to work more closely with the community, with business and industry partnerships, things like that which is more like fundraising. It's more like what's being done in the private schools . . . . In that way we are becoming more like the private school, where the willingness to fund the institution determines its success.

Decisions on class size, the ability to offer additional classes and to purchase books and equipment are all dependent on the financial support available to each school. Some of these decisions are made by school boards and Board of Trustees, others are made by the principals, superintendents, or heads of school as they prepare their budget requests. The results affect the autonomy and work life of the private school teacher and the public school teachers in vastly similar ways. Frustrations in the private institutions were heard:

Many constraints that we have are bottom-line dollar kind of restraints. . . . That doesn't mean we sell out to the dollar; it does mean, sometimes, that we have to give in or buy in where we would prefer not to. . . . because of the monetary factors alone, because of fewer people doing more different jobs, some of the autonomy is not quite as great as one would like.

And from the public schools came teacher and principal comments:

The school board, two years ago, did away with a cap that we had on English class enrollment. We wanted to limit it to 125 students a day or 25 in a class and we'd had that cap for eight or ten years and because of budget constraints, they did away with that two years ago and now our classes are 30, in the 30s, up to 30, over 30. That's had a great deal of effect on us.

Well, constraints, in terms of the amount of staff that we have, money becomes the bottom-line issue. If we could have five more teachers, we could have more and smaller classes.

Parental Expectations and Demands

I mean, one call [from a parent] in a district as large as this means a lot and that's just the attitude of this district.

Proponents of school choice often describe private schools as small businesses that must be responsive to clients, assumed to be the parents, in order to survive. Indeed, teachers and administrators in the private schools who participated in this study affirmed the expected and incorporated the language of business:

You know, private schools are small businesses essentially, and you have to do business. The customers are the parents, but give them what they want, not as far as grades; don't give them the grades they want for their kids, but what the heck, if they want more feedback, they've got it.

In a private school . . . you've got people paying $6500 a year to send their kids to school. You tend to appease parents a lot more than would ever happen in a public school. . . . a situation where perhaps I would have come down pretty hard on the situation . . . and if caught in that position, well, what do you do? You have to consider where your bread and butter is coming from.

. . . you've got to be smart about it; you have to know how to market your school properly. You have to keep your customers satisfied . . . and you have to have good communications. So those are things one has to consider and therefore, parents are a very important aspect of the school.

Contrary to the myth that has been perpetuated by some, the existence of a bureaucracy does not necessarily imply insensitivity to the desires of parents. Indeed, there appears to be no lack of sensitivity to parents among public school teachers who report frequent and important contacts with parents, no more or less than occurs in private schools. Both teachers and administrators understand the expectations of the parents and make considerable effort to be responsive to those expectations. Some public school teachers acknowledged that limits to their autonomy are frequently set by community standards. If teachers are of like mind with the parents in the school community, they have a greater sense of freedom. If they do not, they feel constrained:

I've changed the way I react to a negative parent. I think I tended to put them on the defense too much, and I'm like, well, "What is it that you want from me at this point? What is it that I can do to make your child be the best they can be?" . . . . I've learned that from [department chair]. . . . he makes them a member of the team rather than a member of the enemy.

The assistant principal of a public school explained the kind of response to parents mandated by the district:

Parents' calls mean a great deal. We have a procedure here that if they're not satisfied with my answer, they can go to [the principal] who is very, very responsive and receptive to parents and if they're not satisfied there, they can go to the assistant superintendent who, again, will direct-- call back to the school and say, "Remedy the situation. Do something about it." Sometimes we have to tell parents things they don't want to hear, but I do think we go out of our way to accommodate parents. . . the reason we do that is not for fear they're going to drop out of school because we don't think that's going to happen, but I think it's because of an attitude in this district that says that parent calls are very, very important. . . I think that the tone that the school board even sets. They have these open microphones at every board meeting . . . . the superintendent will receive a call, for example, and she will personally call the school and ask what the situation is. I mean, one call in a district as large as this means a lot and that's just the attitude of this district.

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