Meaningfully Becoming and Learning to Be: Graduate Learners' Professional Identity Development in Online Learning Communities

Abstract

Graduate study is a period of navigating new and changing professional roles, expectations, and attitudes. It is a time of becoming and learning to be, and for forming a greater sense of self. Opportunities for graduate learners to interact with others in their chosen profession play a role in professional identity development. In today’s digitally connected world, graduate learners are increasingly using online social networking sites (SNSs) to connect and interact with colleagues and to participate in online learning communities. This qualitative study explored graduate learners’ informal learning and professional identity development in online communities. The study examined meaningful connections, interactions, and learning experiences that contribute to graduate learners’ professional identity development. The researcher explored attitudes toward learning on social networking sites (SNS), along with the benefits, barriers, and opportunities not realized in formal educational settings. Drawing on critical elements of ethnography as a methodology, data was collected through field observations, online posts, and participant interviews. The researcher observed and collected posts from five online learning communities on the popular SNSs: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Additionally, 11 interviews were conducted with current learners or recently graduated learners of master’s and doctoral programs who participated in the online learning communities. Wenger’s (1998) communities of practice framework (CoPs) provided the theoretical foundation for this study and guided data analysis. Wenger’s broad framework of social learning in CoPs, includes four aspects: meaning, practice, community, and identity. The findings suggested that Facebook Groups, LinkedIn Groups and Twitter Chats are legitimate spaces for informal learning and identity development. Professional identity development was deeply tied to what was meaningfully felt, experienced, and learnt by graduate learners. The study includes an alternate perspective for exploring professional identity development, examining individual experience over task completion. The research suggested that Wenger’s broader framework of social learning (meaning, practice, community, identity) provides a solid foundation for understanding professional identity development in online learning communities. The study offers considerations for the practice of adult education and learning to graduate learners and adult educators about how SNSs may be used to support informal learning and professional identity development.

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