Journal of K-12 Educational Research 9 served students in poverty. The researcher conducted one-on-one participant interviews, drawing upon their thoughts, knowledge, beliefs, and feelings about the training they received as teachers and about the school culture where they have chosen to continue their careers. The interviews were audio recorded, written transcriptions of the interviews were prepared, and the results were grouped accordingly. Interviews were conducted with 14 teachers from the rural East Texas school district, which is approximately 14% of the teacher population in the district. Three campus principals were interviewed, which allowed for a representative from each of the campus levels within the district to participate in the study. Unique to the current study were participants who began their careers in public education as custodians, substitute teachers, and paraprofessionals and, with the support of campus and district administration, are now certified teachers. Setting The current study was conducted in a rural East Texas school district located on the state line of Texas and Louisiana, hereafter referred to as the District. According to the 2020–2021 Texas Academic Performance Report (TAPR) prepared by the TEA (2021), the single attendance zone district encompassed 536 square miles, serving approximately 968 students in Grades PreK–12th grade. By covering a vast area in square miles, some students ride the bus for an hour and half to arrive at school and then the same amount of time to return home, making the school day extremely long, which is often the case in rural school districts. The economically disadvantaged rate of students in the District was 77.3%, with the state having a rate of 60.3%. There were 45.1% of students considered at-risk, according to the TEA, in the selected school district, and 49.2% at-risk in the state. At the time of the current study, the District’s student population was 36% African American, 3.6% Hispanic, 53.8% White, and 5.8% who were two or more races. Approximately 15.8% of the District’s students qualified for special education services, which was higher than the state’s average of 11.3% (TEA, 2021). 15% of students in the District received 504 services, compared to the state average of 7.2%. Participants All case study participants were novice teachers who began their teaching careers in the District and have remained employed in the District. Campus principals were also interviewed. Their interviews focused on what they have observed and learned while working with novice teachers and with teachers who have chosen to remain working on their campus or within the District. Summary of Findings A total of 14 teacher interviews and three principal interviews were conducted. The three themes that surfaced from the current study include: (a) support for novice teachers, (b) training for novice teachers, and (c) effective work culture. Of the 14 teacher participants interviewed, 11 participated in alternative certification programs to become teachers, while only three participants originally attended college to become teachers in a traditional teacher certification program with a clinical teaching component. The first research question pertained to novice teachers’ perceptions of the support they had in their district. Research Question 1 (RQ1) What are the perceptions of novice teachers of the support available to them in their district? The subthemes that emerged within system support were routines and classroom management. During the study, all 14 teacher participants referred to their struggles with classroom management or keeping students on task in some way during their interviews. In the current study, 71% of the teachers interviewed mentioned classroom management as a challenge for them as novice teachers. The teachers explained various reasons they struggled with classroom management, ranging from not having an established management system to keeping students on task and the challenges of maintaining set consequences for misbehaviors. Three of the 14 teachers interviewed shared that they did not have to ask anyone for assistance. Their mentor or principal saw they were struggling and provided guidance on managing their students better. The remaining 11 teachers asked their mentor teacher, a grade-level team member, or the principal for advice on how to address student behavior issues in their classroom.
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