A Comparison of the Acceptance of Technology Education between Idaho and Nebraska Teachers.

Overview & Synopsis

Although technology education has been discussed for a decade, it is still uncertain how teachers feel about this new curriculum. Industrial technology education teachers from Idaho and Nebraska were randomly surveyed about their acceptance of technology education. A questionnaire was sent to a sample of 73 teachers in Nebraska and 58 teachers in Idaho (total of 131). Evaluation used Hall's Stages of Concern (SoC) model. The questionnaires of the 80 teachers who returned them (about 60 percent in each state) were grouped for data analysis by state, educational level, years of teaching experience, age, school type, and school size. The SoC profiles indicated that 24 percent of the teachers had accepted technology education, whereas 76 percent had not accepted this educational change. Idaho teachers indicated a 76 percent higher acceptance rate than Nebraska teachers. Analysis indicated that school size had a statistically significant impact on teachers' acceptance of technology education, with teachers in medium-sized schools most likely to have accepted technology education. Possible explanations for the overall lack of acceptance include the following: (1) technology education advocates have failed to show any relative advantage of the curriculum to the teachers asked to implement the change; (2) the technology education curriculum was externally developed; (3) technology education change agents, especially in Nebraska, ignored the feelings of industrial technology education teachers by failing to provide inservice training; and (4) the previous change experience of the industrial arts teachers may not have been positive. Recommendations were made to increase teachers' acceptance of technology education by taking their feelings into account and by providing inservice education. (Contains 14 references.) (Author/KC)