Agency, Context, and Growth: Teacher Educators’ Professional Development in Nepal

Abstract

Professional development is the most widely known phenomenon for enhancing language education, yet limited research is available on how English language teacher educators in Nepal engage with and make sense of their learning processes. This paper explores the meaning and negotiation of professional development by English language teacher educators in Sudurpaschim, Nepal, in terms of their institutional and sociocultural i contexts. The study is based on the ideas of an interpretive phenomenological orientation and uses in-depth interviews with six teacher educators in higher education. The meaning-making of the participants is analysed, and how the opportunities, constraints, and relationships influence professional development is tracked. The results depict professional development as a continuous, self-directed and socially mediated process as opposed to a sequence of discrete training events. Respondents talked about exercising agency by thinking, working with their peers and exploring new digital spaces, despite mixed access to resources, geographical marginalisation, and insufficient institutional support. The process of professional learning was directly connected with the changing sense of identity, responsibility and devotion to future teachers. The study adds a context based understanding of the professional development of teacher educators and builds on the existing models as it describes how growth is attained through negotiation between individual action and structural circumstances. Implications point toward the necessity of long-term, locally attentive professional learning systems that acknowledge informal networks, enhance affiliations of collegiality, and extend fair opportunities in various higher education contexts.