Articulating, reclaiming and celebrating the professionalism of teacher educators in England

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the cumulative effects on teacher educators of a series of ideological and policy changes in the English teacher education landscape since the early 80s. We argue that these rapid changes have marginalized the role of the university in teacher learning and resulted in narrower, more instrumental forms of teacher education. Within this landscape we see a distinct need to re-state (and reinstate) the importance of higher education-based teacher educators, and to reclaim and celebrate their practices and the nature of the professionalism involved. We invite the reader to rethink teacher educator professionalism as what is enacted by teacher educators, as engaged in their professional activities. A view of enacted professionalism gives central stage to and trusts the professional judgement of teacher educators to do what they deem is good, appropriate, or best – understood in a broad sense – to support the professional learning of newcomers in the profession.

KEYWORDS:

• Professionalism
• enacted
• practice

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The presented conceptual model has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 751294.

Notes on contributors

Eline Vanassche

Eline Vanassche is a Tenure Track Professor at the University of Leuven (Belgium). She is a former Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow at the University of East London (UK), Assistant Professor at Maastricht University (the Netherlands) and Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Leuven where she was awarded her PhD in Education. Her research interest includes the nature of teacher educators’ professionalism and its development throughout their careers. She was amongst the first researchers in Europe to raise and address the need for research focusing directly on teacher educators. This decision proved defining, and research on teacher educators’ professionalism is proliferating over the past decade. She has a particular interest in the interaction between teacher educators and the socio-institutional contexts of their work. Her more recent work turns to positioning theory to understand what a teacher educator ‘may do and not do’ in the complex relationships with trainees and schools. She is a member of the International Forum for Teacher Educator Development (InFo-TED) and has authored a significant number of publications in academic journals and books.

Warren Kidd

Warren Kidd is a Teaching Fellow of the University of East London. For the Cass School of Education and Communities he is Subject Leader for Secondary School Direct Humanities Initial Teacher Education and shares responsibility for leading the PGCE Secondary Geography programme. His doctorate was awarded in 2017 and investigated the identities and craft practices of novice teachers in the life-long learning sector in England while adopting a digital ethnographic approach to qualitative data. He is a Principal Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a member of the International Forum for Teacher Educator Development (InFo-TED).

Jean Murray

Jean Murray is Professor of Education in the Cass School of Education and Communities at the University of East London. She has worked in university-based teacher education for more than thirty years, publishing extensively during this time. Her research includes sociological and historical analyses of teacher education policies and practices in the UK and internationally. Jean is a founder member of the International Forum for Teacher Educator Development (InFo-TED). She was awarded a National Teaching Fellowship from the Higher Education Academy. She was the principle investigator on the ESRC’s research capacity project for teacher education (TERN). A Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, she is an editorial board member on a number of international journals including the Asia Pacific Journal and the European Journal of Teacher Education.