POSITIONS AND INTERESTS IN DISPUTES IN SCHOOLS: A REVIEW FROM VIETNAMESE TEACHERS

This study investigated typical conflicts in which teachers at high schools and college are involved. Positions and interests in disputes were examined for possibly alternative solutions to conflicts that teachers encountered within the context of recent trends in improving teacher quality of Vietnamese schools. Recently, the job needs of teachers have been changed due to requirements of public toward teachers. Job and learning opportunities become more critical. The needs of teacher mobility and learning opportunity in Vietnam increased and brought questions to their principals or supervisors if they were ready to solve conflicts.

On one hand, conflicts are reviewed in accepted and positive ways. Interests are referred to a feeling or a need of each party in a conflict while positions can be solutions to needs. Interests are very important in dispute resolution. Particularly, interests are discussed in Hawaii Mediation Model which was developed and implemented in Hawaii and in the Asian Pacific community. Also, it was very necessary to investigate the use of cooperative strategies in order to manage conflict and improve school climate because conflicts exist in schools naturally while teachers need supports from school leaders.

In this project, there were 26 participants (n=26) from high schools (n=20) and colleges (n=6). An explanatory design was used in order to understand the phenomenon while in-depth data were collected through semi-structured face-to-face interviews. Pseudonyms were used in order to protect the participants and enhance honest and candid responses.

Teachers agreed that types of conflicts in schools were related to students, teachers, and school principals or supervisors. Participants preferred to use the word ‘conflict’ to describe disagreements, problems, complaints, grievances, or difficulties. Conflicts occurred when there were an advent which was related to opportunities of learning and promoting. In addition, in conflicts, positions were described clearly in conflict stories. Three typical solutions were recognized by the participants: (a) The most popular one were to ask a third party for help; (b) The solution was from one of parties who were recognized as teachers in their conflicts; and (c) solutions might come naturally without taking any actions.

In terms of pattern of people involvement in conflicts, typical conflicts were found from teacher-principal and teacher-teacher while conflicts existed together with academic activities. Conflicts might be complementary to academic activities of a school due to its bringing about change. A school principal played a very important role in controlling or resolving disputes. Once conflicts occur, two extreme choices of cooperative and competitive solution resulted in a win-win or win-lose solution, respectively. In addition, although participants usually expressed their positions directly, positions might be implied from the phenomenon. An effort to solve a conflict was from the party who was not holding any stewardship positions rather than the party of higher stewardship. Besides, alternative resolutions could not be reached when no similarities in conflicts was found. Guessing the underneath or behind positions might help parties save time and effort in looking for a third party for help. Ironically, it was not easy to see interests or possible underneath positions at the first sight.