Slipping through the cracks: One early career teacher's experiences of rural teaching and the subsequent impact on her personal and professional identities

Abstract

This paper presents experiences and responses of a first-year teacher, Emily, who participated in research exploring the identity work of early career teachers. This research explored the experiences and responses of her and thirteen other teachers working in disadvantaged schools across South Australia. The participants were drawn from a diverse range of schools and worked in a broad range of teaching roles. Emily was one of four participants working in a rural school in her first year of teaching. What emerged from her experiences and responses were issues of acute personal and professional isolation, absence of professional and personal dialogue and support, and a seeming lack of acknowledgement of the implications of deteriorating personal and professional wellbeing. In the midst of this disparaging context, and in the face of inevitable personal and professional distress, focus shifts to where responsibility lies for recruiting an early career teacher into an unfamiliar social and professional context without adequate relational supports. This raises questions about how understandings of these challenges can be translated from research into practice in rural schools with high staffturnover and limited resources. These questions are particularly pertinent, given the available literature on the early career stage as a critical time of professional survival, exploration and traction. These questions are especially pertinent to Emily and those like her, who attempt to author an identity for themselves, as individuals and teachers, in rural schools that regularly employ first year teachers.