Work Satisfaction in Focus: Photovoice with NC A+ Educators
Exploring the impact of Arts Integrated Models for North Carolina Educators and their Students
About the Collaboration
This project is a collaboration between the North Carolina Arts Council and NC State University’s Friday Institute researchers, College of Education faculty and students, with a shared focus on A+ Schools. Together, we document and share the stories of educators and students in A+ Schools to better understand how arts-integrated, whole-school approaches shape teaching, learning and school culture.
About A+ Schools
A+ Schools of North Carolina transforms whole schools by putting the arts at the heart of teaching and learning. Schools foster a creative culture where the state’s curriculum is taught through collaboration, multi-discipline integration, and the arts woven into every child’s experience. Founded in 1995, A+ Schools is a signature program of the North Carolina Arts Council and the nation’s longest-running arts-based whole-school reform model.
“When you’re giving students those experiences, you’re also giving that to yourself—you’re giving yourself the creativity as a teacher to express the way you teach. It’s about literally figuring out who you are and who you want to be in your classroom, and then sharing that with them. So, not only are you giving them those beautiful experiences, you’re allowing yourself to teach in a way that makes you happy, expressive, and creative.”
-A+ Educator
Project Overview
Telling Our Stories: A+ Schools Photovoice builds on two years of previous research (2022–2023 and 2023–2024) examining how arts integration affects educator experiences and student outcomes in North Carolina A+ schools.
- Educator Experiences (Qualitative): Using interviews, photovoice, and publicly available secondary data such as teacher vacancy rates, researchers explored educator satisfaction, resilience, and retention. Photovoice allows participants to share their experiences through photography and narrative, contributing to a co-developed conceptual framework describing the work climate benefits of A+ schools: Legacy, Alchemy, Agency, and Legitimacy.
- Student Outcomes (Quantitative): A matched-case design compared student achievement data from A+ schools to non-A+ matched schools. Findings indicated that A+ schools had lower day-one teacher vacancies following the pandemic compared to their respective Public School Unit (PSU) averages.
Research Questions
- RQ1: How do teachers who work at an A+ school describe their professional environment?
- RQ2: How do student achievement proficiency and growth data compare between North Carolina A+ schools and non-A+ match schools for AYs 2023–2024 and 2024–2025?
- RQ2a: What shifts and trends are observed across AYs 2019–2025 in student outcomes (achievement proficiency, growth)?
Impact and Significance
Even as arts education funding faces pressure, this project explores how whole-school arts integration benefits both students and educators. Arts-integrated schools can enhance teacher engagement and retention while supporting student learning and well-being. Using photovoice to amplify educator and student voices, Telling Our Stories provides a ground-up perspective on job satisfaction and well-being, while also examining barriers to implementing arts-based education, such as funding instability and systemic challenges, offering actionable insights for policymakers, school leaders, and arts education advocates seeking evidence-based strategies to improve school climate and support teachers.
Partners
Friday Institute
NC State college of education
The North Carolina Arts Council
Lori Cozzi
Contact Us
Stay Connected
Sarah Bausell
[email protected]