Research engagement, teacher identity, and the alignment of teacher careers with the future direction of institution

This study provides an in-depth examination of how university English language teaching (ELT) teachers conceptualize research as part of their professional job and discusses the issues of balancing these two roles. The results show ELT teachers, despite having different conceptualization of research and varying levels of research engagement, considered it an integral part of their job that could better inform their teaching performance. Revealing this group’s pressure of being evaluated by both roles on their professional performance, the study charts their research engagement constraints resulting from a lack of academic resources and research community, a mono-research culture in the institution, poor financial reward, and heavy workload. These constraints hold implications for teachers’ identity and autonomy and institutional policy and management. Importantly, the paper suggests a typology demonstrating teachers’ behaviour and attitudes towards the research engagement policy of the institution, and the alignment of their careers with the future direction of the institution.