ABSTRACT

Teacher preparation is critical work that has significant potential to improve public education. While research suggests the positive effect of social interactions and self-efficacy in a risk-tolerant environment, little empirical work has documented the interplay between these important factors and social ties that foster innovative climate over the course of a teacher preparation program that adopts a cohort-based, network approach to teacher development. The purpose of this chapter is to report findings on data over multiple time points from a high-performing teacher preparation program. We focus in particular on the influence of such deliberate cohort design on the pattern of social ties among pre-service teachers, as well as the association with perceptions of self-efficacy and innovation-oriented action during preparation.