Teachers’ Job Commitment Matters! Longitudinal Evidence on the Role of Identity Facets in Facilitating Classroom Cultural Diversity Climate

Teachers in today’s schools work in classrooms characterized by growing ethnic and cultural diversity, a trend that poses important challenges for everyday teaching practice. Their job identity can represent a key resource for addressing these challenges. Thus, this study examines how personal (i.e., commitment, in-depth exploration, and reconsideration of commitment) and social (i.e., social identification with school and colleagues) facets of teachers’ job identity are related to their ability to implement a positive classroom cultural diversity climate (i.e., support for contact and cooperation, equal treatment, and interest in students’ cultural background). Participants were 480 teachers (68.3% females; Mage = 45.52 years, SDage = 10.30, range 22 to 65 years old) working in secondary schools in an Italian region characterized by one of the highest percentages of students with a migrant background. Teachers participated in a three-wave longitudinal study with one-year intervals between assessments. Cross-lagged panel analyses indicated that job commitment played a prominent role, positively associated with equal treatment over time. Additionally, teachers’ social identification with the school was positively associated with their job commitment over time. Overall, this study provides longitudinal evidence that job commitment matters for teachers’ ability to implement culturally responsive teaching strategies in the classroom.