WE CAN DO THIS: HOW LEADERS INFLUENCE THE TEACHER BELIEFS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO FOUNDATIONAL LITERACY EQUITY

Reading reforms in U.S. schools have provided important but insufficient support for improving reading equity. Measures of early reading continue to demonstrate that schools have failed to equip historically marginalized students with the early literacy skills and knowledge they require to become skillful readers. Prekindergarten through second grade teachers must know how to deliver evidence-based instruction. Equally important, teachers must believe that they can deliver effective instruction and that their students can achieve ambitious foundational literacy outcomes. This study sought to understand the role that school leaders at one public elementary school played in promoting teachers’ beliefs about their school, themselves, and their students. With foundations in self-efficacy and frame analysis theory, the study followed a mixed-method, two-stage design uncovering how school leaders’ beliefs compared to those of teachers and how school leaders could adapt and frame systems and structures to influence teachers’ beliefs. The study found that school leaders prioritized influencing teachers’ beliefs about students in order to increase implementation of evidence-based instruction, while teachers believed their overstretched capacity most limited foundational literacy success. The study also uncovered a persistent paradox: teachers reported high levels confidence in their ability to offer effective foundational literacy instruction even as they held relatively muted expectations for student success. One implication confirmed the importance of supportive systems and structures for influencing teacher beliefs as well as the need for more collaboration among teachers and school leaders when shaping them. Another implication highlighted the need for teachers to experience success in order to believe it is possible. Recommendations for the school context include adjusting data collection practices as well as allotting more time for teachers to plan effective responses to data. Recommendations for the district and education community echo a need to reconsider teachers’ planning time, but also call for a revaluation of school enrollment policies that may increase student mobility and concentrate poverty at so-called high needs schools. The researcher's positionality and how it influenced the study is discussed throughout.