An investigation of the experiences of newly graduated English Language Teachers (ELT) in their first years in Libyan schools: a case study in post-conflict Tripoli

This thesis analyzes the experiences, perceptions and views of a group of newly graduated teachers in post-conflict Tripoli, Libya. The focus of the study was on the first year teachers of English as a foreign language EFL and the aim was to gain an insight into those teachers‘ experiences and the contextual factors that shaped them. The present study adopts communities of practice (CoP) as the conceptual framework for exploring the newly graduated teachers‘ experience and perceptions in post-conflict Libya. In particular, the study attempts to identify the elements within CoP: mutual engagement, joint enterprise and shared repertoire to allow me to interpret the data.
The data for the study come from three main sources: (a) semi-structured interviews with eleven teachers, (b) two expert teachers, (c) three headteachers, (d) the manager of the Education Development Centre and (e) focus group interviews with three inspection office managers and (f) documentary analysis.
The results suggested that the newly graduated teachers‘ experiences in the context of the study are influenced by several factors that interact together to make these experiences unique and a contextually situated phenomenon. These factors are: (a) the conflict, which has diminished the opportunities for integration, learning, and establishing relationships so that any CoP was precluded from existence, b) the social restriction, (c) personal characteristics, (d) the discrepancies between their teacher preparation programmes and the requirements of teaching. Within each of these broad categories, there are also sub-categories such as age barrier, the impact of the conflict which further demonstrates the complexity of this situation and how this shapes the development of teachers. The thesis finishes by recommending that further research is needed conducted to explore the experiences of newly graduated teachers in other parts of the country to obtain a clear picture of this category of teachers. A reform of teacher education programme in this context will contribute to the development of these teachers. Formal training sponsored by the government would be the means through which these teachers can be trained and developed in the absence of any professional communities due to the reasons mentioned earlier.