Getting Along: Negotiating Authority in High Schools. Final Report

Appropriate responses to the authority problem in schools can be informed by a more complex understanding of the issue. Also of importance is knowledge of the ways in which schools and society at large are involved with both the creation of and the solution to the problem of student/teacher authority relations. School people are referring primarily to discipline problems when discussing authority. Reasons for their concern include these facts: schools need cooperative students to exist, students' academic knowledge cannot be improved without their support and confidence, and schools are a forum in which social relations are reworked. Authority in the school must be based on trust and accountability and come from persuasion, compromise, and negotiation. The erosion of a teacher's traditional authority in the school today appears to be due to slipping of the teacher's status. Data suggest that students' willingness to grant teachers personal authority is based on a combination of the teacher's respect, social skills, and technical expertise. Teachers must call on the personal capital they have accumulated to encourage compliance. When that fails, they should negotiate to find a standard with which students will comply. (YLB)