Rate My Professor Deirdre Cooper

Deirdre Joan Cooper (née Duncan) completed her Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Otago in the College of Education. Her doctoral thesis, titled “Why do teachers leave? Insights into the reasons that teachers exit the classroom,” examines the complex factors influencing classroom teachers' decisions to leave the profession. Supervised by Professor Jeff Smith, Associate Professor Jacques van der Meer, and Dr Rachel Martin from the Education department, her research addresses key issues in teacher retention within the New Zealand education system. Deirdre Cooper was listed as a current PhD research student in the College of Education's postgraduate programmes. In 2020, she was described as a Dunedin teacher and researcher who studied a diary written in 1884 by her 14-year-old ancestor Julia Edmonds, using it as part of a recent book on family history.