Power of policy narratives: administrative communication strategies for retaining highly effective teachers in high-need schools

Teacher retention remains a persistent challenge in high-need schools, particularly among highly effective, experienced educators, whose departures have significant consequences for student outcomes and organizational stability. While existing research has examined foundational working conditions and individual teacher characteristics, less is known about how administrators’ communication strategies relate to teachers’ retention intentions. Guided by the Narrative Policy Framework and Social Identity Theory, this mixed-methods study examined how narrative-based leadership communication is associated with highly effective teachers’ intent to remain in high-need schools. Using a convergent mixed-methods design, quantitative survey data were collected from teachers in high-need school settings and analyzed using descriptive statistics, reliability analyses, correlations, and multiple and hierarchical regression models. Qualitative data were then gathered through semi-structured interviews with a purposive subsample of highly effective teachers to explore how leadership communication, narrative credibility, professional belonging, and emotional sustainability were experienced in practice. Findings from both strands were integrated using a joint display and cross-theme synthesis. Quantitative results indicated that leadership communication constructs (clarity/transparency, narrative meaning and credibility, professional belonging and identity, and emotional cost) collectively explained a substantial proportion of the variance in intent to stay. These constructs together accounted for a substantial proportion of the variance in retention intention. Narrative meaning and credibility emerged as the strongest positive predictors, whereas emotional cost consistently functioned as the strongest negative constraint on retention intention. Demographic and professional characteristics did not contribute additional explanatory power once organizational variables were included. This pattern is consistent with a meaning- and identity-based explanation of retention, suggesting that organizational context may exert greater influence on intent to stay than individual characteristics. Qualitative findings revealed that teachers experienced leadership communication as an organizational meaning system rather than isolated messages, shaping perceptions of credibility, professional respect, and feasibility. Professional belonging supported retention when leadership narratives aligned with classroom realities, but its stabilizing effect weakened as emotional strain accumulated. Emotional cost was described as shifting retention decisions from being commitment-driven to being influenced by long-term sustainability considerations. These findings suggest that strong professional commitment cannot offset persistently unsustainable emotional and workload demands. Highly effective teacher retention in high-need schools is associated with the coherence and credibility of leadership communication, the degree of professional belonging and identity affirmation, and the sustainability of teachers’ emotional labor. This study extends the application of the Narrative Policy Framework and Social Identity Theory to teacher retention research and positions narrative-based leadership communication as an actionable organizational strategy for retaining highly effective educators in high-need contexts.