Cultivating sustained teachers’ professional learning within a centralised education system

ABSTRACT

This study investigates how sustained professional learning for teachers within a centralised system was cultivated. Specifically, the sustained professional learning was initiated by officers from the headquarters (HQ) and involved interested teachers across schools in Singapore. Qualitative instruments were used to collect and analyse the data in examining the partnerships perceived by the participants. The enablers responsible to bring about sustained professional learning are proposed. A contribution of this study is to clarify how resources in the HQ and its schools can be bridged. Deliberate bridging of resources is critical particularly at the initial stage of the partnerships. This bridging is made possible through dedicated appointed champions. The appointed champions are passionate about the educational innovations and are willing to invest their time to understand the teachers’ needs. This paper argues that the enablers can offer opportunities for lateral networks to be forged within a hierarchical system.

KEYWORDS:

• Learning partnerships
• appointed champions
• deliberate bridging
• lateral networks
• productive tensions

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by a grant from the eduLab programme jointly administrated by the National Research Foundation (NRF), the Ministry of Education (MOE), and the National Institute of Education (NIE) – Singapore. Project Name: edulab-community research.

Notes on contributors

Imran Shaari

Imran Shaari is a Research Fellow at the Office of Education Research, National Institute of Education, Singapore. His research interests are in partnership in schools, the concept of laterality, network of schools, community of practices, and the lateral and horizontal diffusion of innovations.

Victor Lim

Victor Lim has been working in the field of multimodal discourse analysis and linguistics for over a decade. He is Deputy Director & Lead Specialist at the Educational Technology Division, Ministry of Education, Singapore, where he has experience in translational research, policy formulation, and programme development, with a focus on how educational technology can improve learning in the classroom.

David Hung

David Hung is Associate Dean of Education Research at the National Institute of Education, Singapore. He has served as Contributing Editor and Associate Editor for several well-read international academic publications in the learning sciences field and has been appointed as journal reviewer for various well-established international academic journals. His research interests are in learning and instructional technologies, constructivism, and social constructivism, in particular, social cultural orientations to cognition and communities of practice.

Yew Meng Kwan

Yew Meng Kwan is a Deputy Director at the Educational Technology Division, Ministry of Education, Singapore. His research interests include community of practices and lateral networks. He was a vice principal and received his education from UCL Institute of Education.