Affective Experiences of U.S. School Personnel in the Sociopolitical Context of 2021: Reflecting on the Past to Shape the Future

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The study focusing on the emotions and well-being of school personnel is both innovative and significant, particularly because much of the existing literature has primarily concentrated on teachers and professors. The study's population and sample size also add to its value. However, several concerns need to be addressed, along with additional suggestions for improving the study:

 

The most significant concern is the timing of the study. Since the pandemic has passed, the relevance of researching such a topic, particularly one centered on the pandemic, is questionable. If the authors believe it is still important to investigate this topic, a clear rationale should be provided in the introduction, explaining the study's ongoing significance.

 

This concern is not unfounded but stems from several observations. First, since all data were collected in 2021, readers may question why the data analysis and manuscript preparation have extended until 2024. Furthermore, the use of SPSS version 28, which was current in 2021, confirms that the data analysis occurred that year, further highlighting the delay in submitting the paper. Lastly, the literature review does not include any references from 2023 or even 2022, which raises concerns about the study's currency.

 

The authors need to prioritize addressing the above concern. Additionally, the following suggestions are provided:

1. Abstract: The abstract is well-structured. However, more emphasis should be placed on the research findings, which could be explained in greater detail. For instance, in the sentence “Differences were found across time and between racial groups and state politics,” the term "Differences" could be elaborated upon.
2. Introduction: The introduction is coherent and logical. It discusses COVID-19 as the sociopolitical context, K-12 teaching and learning within this context, and the emotional experiences of K-12 school personnel. Relevant literature is appropriately cited, leading to the proposal of four research questions. However, the inclusion of literature published in 2024, if available, would help ensure the study remains at the forefront of this research area.
3. Materials and Methods: This section details the study's cross-sectional survey design, which collected data at five different time points with different participants in each group. However, there are a few typos and formatting issues. First, “2. Measures” seems to be a typo and should be corrected to “Measures.” Additionally, the format of “Participants” should be revised to align with the other subheadings. The "Crisis Response Educator SEL Survey (CRESS)" mentioned in Line 252 could be moved to the beginning of “2. Measures” (Line 233) since this is primarily a quantitative study.
4. Results: The results section answers all research questions logically, supported by informative tables and figures. However, attention should be paid to formatting issues, such as inappropriate spacing in the table header on Line 427.
5. Discussion: This section relates the study's findings to the relevant literature, reinforcing the study's significant results. Moreover, the study's inclusion of various school personnel, not just classroom teachers, provides new insights into the findings. However, “Research Question Three:” in Line 610 should be changed to “Research Question 3:” to match the format of the first two research questions.
6. Conclusions: The conclusion summarizes the key results and calls for further research on supporting the well-being of all school personnel. It highlights the study's contributions and suggests directions for future research.

 

Additionally, some redundant sections should be deleted, including but not limited to Lines 20-28, 166-177, 284-286, and 430-433.

 

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Moderate editing of English language required. Typical suggestions seen in the above overall comments.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This paper describes the primary outcomes of a large-scale study into the experiences of school staff in the US during and just after the Covid-19 pandemic.  It uses a survey to gather data from thousands of school staff, and presents the analysis of this data in a variety of ways to make comparisons over time and between racial/ethnic groups.  I found the paper interesting but with some flaws in the presentation of the analysis which can be quite easily addressed.  Some of these are to do with providing a better explanation of the US context for international readers, and some with making stronger connections to other studies of teachers’ working lives.

The abstract offers a good summary of the paper, although could be improved with a little more information about the data collection methods.  I was left wondering how the authors gained access to so many school staff, and why the data were so biased towards those in democrat-voting states. This can easily be addressed by a couple of minor amendments to the abstract.

The introduction (and indeed the rest of the paper) sets the context of schools in the US currently, and then during COVID and other issues in the US in 2021.  As a reader not based in the US I found this interesting. The focus is on 2021 which is fine but I wondered how generalisable that particular time period is to the time which follows.  Is there more to say about this, and/or about how the data presented in this study compares to other studies of school personnel (or teachers) in the US at other times, or in other countries?  There are other studies, internationally, which could be referred to here, to help to set the paper in context, such as the OECD’s work around COVID.

From the perspective of both ethics and the limitations of the study, I would like to know more about the online course the participants were engaging in (e.g. was it compulsory, targeted at particular groups of staff, its content etc) and how the survey connected to this (e.g. how were the participants directed to it). 

Data analysis and findings:  In the paragraph beginning line 350, I wasn’t sure what the percentages refer to.  I think it means that, for example, 11.5% of all Black and African American participants were stressed by COVID, and that the equivalent percentage was lower for other racial/ethnic groups. However, I’m not sure.  Also if that is what this means, then it seems surprisingly low!  There are other places in the presentation of the data where percentages are given and again the authors could better explain what these are percentages of.

The breakdown of findings across state demographics (using the ‘binary variable’ of democratic or republican) is given quite a lot of weight by the authors, but I wasn’t convinced of its utility. This may be because I lack understanding of the US context, so more information might be provided by the authors for international readers.  For example, is this about geography rather than politics, e.g. that some states have more varied student populations than others, and this brings both challenges and benefits, or is it, as the authors suggest, about different states’ responses to COVID (do these break down along political lines?  I don’t know), or is it about how school staff might respond to working in environments that don’t align with their own politics (I assume school staff are likely to be democrat-leaning and so working in a republican-majority state may bring challenges).

The democratic/republican breakdown doesn’t seem very meaningful to me.  Perhaps this is because I lack understanding of the US context, but why should the state be defined by majority democrat- or republican-voting have any impact on participants’ emotions and attitudes?   Is this just a geographical thing, rather than a political thing, based on different states’ responses to COVID, or is there a connection to the difference between working in what I assume is much more multicultural environment on the coast compared to central states of the US.  I suggest this analysis might be removed or further explanation added.  The authors do raise the limitations of this breakdown, but I wonder whether it should be fully removed, or given significantly less weighting, or at least a better explanation of its value provided for international readers.

Related to the analysis of data, I would have been interested in a breakdown of experience/time working in schools. This would help the study to add to the body of work around teachers’ career trajectories.  I don’t know whether this data was collected within the survey.  If not, this seems a missed opportunity.  If so, this seems very useful.  Either way, the authors can add some commentary around this. Similarly, in relation to the analysis of SEL supports (line 405):  the level of social and emotional support is 3.10 from a range of 0-5.  Is there any information about how this compares at other times? Is there any other study this could be compared to?

I didn’t feel confident in the representation of the findings around lines 588 – 590. The idea of “the smiling faces of those around them” feels a bit hyperbolic and I think could be toned down. There is evidence from other studies internationally of the ways in which working with pupils motivates teaching staff, so the authors can refer to these rather than assuming it is about pupils’ laughter.

Throughout, the first paragraph of each section still retains the journal’s instructions for authors, so this needs to be removed. Also there are a few places where the spacing between words needs to be checked. SEL is defined early in the paper in the introduction.  This could be reiterated a couple of times to remind the reader of its definition.

Throughout the Figures with representations of the data are very small and need to be made bigger so that they can be read. In some, the different data collection points are referred to as ‘groups’ and in some as ‘cohorts’; make this consistent.  It would also help the reader if there could be a reminder of when each of the cohorts took place so we better understand the variations over time.

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf