‘At least I'm the type of teacher I want to be’: Second-career English language teachers' identity formation in Hong Kong secondary schools

A teacher shortage in Hong Kong in core subjects, such as English, has led to interest in the recruitment and retention of second-career teachers. Drawing upon Wenger's (1998 Wenger, E. 1998. Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) theory of identity formation and using data from interviews with eight second-career English language teachers in Hong Kong, this paper explores how second-career teachers may be better supported in their professional development. The study found that second-career teachers' skills and experiences were not valued within their schools and that this was reflected in a rigid division the participants drew between the institutionally endorsed identity positions made available to them and the type of teachers they wanted to be. In response to this antagonism, second-career teachers used their position of non-participation to establish identity territories that connected aspects of their first-career identities, such as engineers and managers, to their emerging teacher identities. It is suggested that non-participation, a potentially negative experience in Wenger's (1998 Wenger, E. 1998. Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) framework, was deployed by this group of teachers to create the space they needed to enact their own preferred teacher identities. Implications for attracting and retaining second-career teachers are discussed.