Educational quality largely depends on the availability of qualified teachers; consequently, teacher turnover is an important concern internationally (Hanushek et al., 2016). The induction phase – the transition from teacher education into the job – is particularly challenging and vulnerable for teacher attrition (Feiman-Nemser, 2001; Kelchtermans, 2017). The case of Vietnam is no exception. In fact, certain distinctive features of the education system may further intensify this, such as existing rigid policies and malpractices in teacher recruitment (Tran & Huynh, 2019), as well as the fact that the Ministry of Education and Training has the ultimate control on “macro-level planning” (Le, 2015). However, empirical research on the issues of teacher induction and retention in Vietnam remains scarce (Tran, 2021). This project seeks to address the research gap by analyzing the experiences of Vietnamese early career teachers (ECTs), with a focus on Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL) teachers, as the outcome of the meaningful interactions between individual ECTs and the dynamic organizational contexts of the schools.

The project builds upon Kelchtermans’ research on teacher induction and ECTs’ needs for support, which calls for moving beyond the “deficit thinking” that depicts ECTs as “lacking essential professional competencies” and “formally qualified, but not yet fully capable” (Kelchtermans, 2019). In addition to the theoretical stance providing an alternative perspective on ECTs’ capabilities and potentials, this research explicitly includes the school’s geographical location as a relevant dimension in the working conditions of ECTs, thus further joining the growing volume of research on the impacts of schools’ physical locations on teacher education and professional development (see e.g. Roberts & Fuqua, 2021; White & Downey, 2021). The professional challenges for ECTs are not only related to the “what” and “how” questions, but are also influenced by the “where”. We will specifically study the impacts of starting one’s career in the remote, mountainous areas of Vietnam, where ongoing inequities in education, a serious shortage of qualified teachers, and a high rate of teacher attrition have been observed (Giacchino-Baker, 2007; World Bank, 2019). Similar to the situation in Australia (White & Kline, 2012) and European countries (Fargas-Marlet & Bagley, 2022), it is challenging to attract, recruit, and retain qualified teachers in understaffed rural, remote regions of Vietnam. Furthermore, it is noteworthy that once assigned to such areas teachers are seldomly permitted to transfer or relocate (Hamano, 2008).

This research, therefore, aims to explore and share the voices of ECTs in these demanding teaching conditions as compared to their counterparts in urban areas. Apart from the geographical perspective, the study’s theoretical framework builds on the concept of teachers’ personal interpretative framework (Kelchtermans, 2009), including their self-understanding and subjective educational theory underlying their professional judgement and agency, and the micro-political perspective (Kelchtermans & Ballet, 2002). As such our study strives towards offering a holistic depiction of the fundamental factors within ECTs’ induction period, the interrelation of these factors, and the context of the school as an organization, with an emphasis on geographical diversity of the schools’ locations (and tentatively cultural and multi-lingual diversities from local ethnic minorities). These objectives lead to the following research questions in the context of Vietnam:

1. How do the experiences of early career TESOL teachers affect their professional self-understanding and subjective educational theory?
2. How do the micropolitics in the school as an organization affect early career TESOL teachers’ experiences?
3. In what way does the geographical location of the school affect early career TESOL teachers’ experiences?
4. What are the critical elements in early career TESOL teachers’ experiences of their induction phase that are to be acknowledged and included in the design for effective support programs?

As the study aims at mapping and unravelling Vietnamese early career TESOL teachers’ induction phase drawing on the theoretical framework, the interpretative analysis focuses on reconstructing and understanding ECTs’ sensemaking of their experiences in the first phase of their career. The methodological set-up is that of a multiple case-study design (Yin, 2018; Silverman, 2014), in which narrative data through semi-structured interviews constitutes the main method (Goodson, 2013; Kelchtermans, 1994). This methodology offers “practical, specific insights” into personal experiences in real life settings (Creswell, 2012), enables ECTs to comprehend their lived experiences better (Clandinin, 2013; Goodson, 2013), and consequently helps researchers discover more about teachers’ self-perceptions (Creswell & Poth, 2018). The data collection procedure consists of a questionnaire, two biographical interviews with each ECT, interviews with the ECTs’ direct supervisors, interviews with TESOL teacher educators, and examination of official regulation documents. Firstly, a questionnaire will be sent to the ECTs to initially determine the fundamental factors of the induction stage, regarding various aspects of their professional selves, their teaching knowledge and beliefs, and their professional interests. The responses serve as a foundation to prepare the following biographical interviews’ questions. The first interview is to elicit and elaborate their narratives based on their answers to the questionnaire. The outcome of the interpretative analysis of the first interview is fed back to the teachers for member check and as the starting point for the second interview, which will focus on the respondents’ feedback on the accuracy of the re-storied versions of their narratives, as well as create an opportunity to address particular issues in more detail. Their supervisors will also be interviewed regarding ECTs’ job requirements, performances in the initial years working at the high schools, collaboration with colleagues, etc. Next, teacher educators from TESOL teacher training programs will be interviewed for their remarks on the current teacher training curriculum and their experiences of preparing pre-service TESOL teachers for different teaching contexts. The data from ECTs’ supervisors and the teacher educators serve as additional information to provide a triangulation of data sources for a better comprehension of the ECTs’ stories and the context from which they evolve. The official regulation documents that outline early career TESOL teachers’ job requirements and responsibilities, including their contracts and the Vietnamese national labor laws in education and training field, will also be examined to ensure a full comprehension of their teaching contexts.

This doctoral research hopes to contribute the voices from Vietnam, a developing country in Southeast Asia, to the international research-based knowledge on the issue of teacher induction and teacher retention/ attrition. The findings from emerging themes will reveal the most influential factors in ECTs’ induction phase, and subsequently serve as indicators to determine the most important elements in a support program to retain qualified early career TESOL teachers in Vietnam. This support program will not only be feasible and effective but also potential to remedy the “deficit thinking” (Kelchtermans, 2019) in previous efforts to support ECTs. By specifically focusing on schools’ geographical locations, this proposed program also strives to equip ECTs with the contextual knowledge that is currently missing from the current curriculum of their pre-service training programs, such as knowledge of the school organizations, administration, school cultures (Pham, 2001; Nguyen, 2013), and especially knowledge of learners’ ethnic diversity (Nguyen & Huynh, 2021). Furthermore, the geographical lens will also contribute to the growing body of place-conscious research on (early career) teachers.

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