Conceptualising Teacher Professional Development in the Context of the Saudi Reform Vision 2030: A mixed-methods Approach

This study aims to explore teachers’ perceptions of the influence of professional development (PD) on their skills, knowledge, and practice, along with the broader contextual factors that influence their participation in and implementation of PD within the framework of Saudi educational reform Vision 2030. The main research question that underpins this study is: What are teachers’ perceptions of professional development in light of the Saudi Vision 2030? Drawing on Opfer and Pedder’s (2011) theoretical framework, the study conceptualises teacher PD as shaped by the interactions between and within individual teachers, learning activities, and school contexts.This study employed a mixed-methods approach and was conducted in two phases in one public high school in Saudi Arabia. The first phase was quantitative, conducted through an online questionnaire, and involved a total of 25 out of 35 teachers. The second phase was qualitative and conducted via face-to-face, semi-structured interviews with 27 stakeholders, including 17 teachers, a school leader, a deputy leader, and 8 educational supervisors. A document analysis of national PD policies and reform-related initiatives was purposefully selected. The questionnaire was analysed using descriptive statistics, while the qualitative data was analysed by applying thematic analysis.The findings revealed that understanding teacher PD is not a matter of examining factors related to teachers, learning activities, or school contexts in isolation, but instead requires attention to the interactions within and between them and the wider professional environment that can both enable and constrain teacher learning. This study calls for the need to move beyond a “one size fits all” approach to teacher PD toward an approach that is more coherent, flexible, contextually relevant, and responsive to teachers’ evolving needs. Implications for policy and practice as well as recommendations for future research were drawn from the findings of this study.