Counting on colleagues: New teachers encounter the professional cultures of their schools

Within the context of an impending reacher shortage, this article considers the professional cultures that new teachers encounter in their schools. Us ing new entrants' accounts, we characterized three types of professional cu ltures or subcultures within schools: veteran-oriented cultures, novice-ori ented cultures, and integrated cultures. In veteran-oriented cultures, new teachers described norms of professional interaction determined, in large p art, by the veterans, with little attention to the particular needs of begi nning teachers. In novice-oriented cultures, an the other hand new teachers described norms of professional interaction determined by novices, thus le aving them with little experienced guidance about how 10 teach. However; in integrated professional cultures, new teachers described being provided wi th sustained support and having frequent exchanges with colleagues across e xperience levels. principals proved to be important in developing and maint aining integrated professional cultures where the particular needs of new t eachers were both recognized and addressed.