Stepping Out Programme

Professionalism in Lifelong Learning sector

Teacher Education

Supporting Teacher Educators Partnership

Professionalism in LL Teacher Education

Gender balance• FE teachers in general are, in addition to being

mainly white and middle-aged, predominantly female.

• As FE teacher educators are overwhelmingly drawn from this constituency, in some ways it would seem logical that they too are mainly women. (Simmons and Thompson 2007)

• LLUK workforce data (LLUK 2010) - percentage of FT FE teaching staff who are female has been about 59% since 2004/5.

• Teacher Ed – some 77% of LLS Teacher Educators are female (Crawley 2010)

Professionalism in LL Teacher EducationThe LL Sector context• The FE teacher educator is highly likely to be a

woman; to have a heavy and varied teaching load; to be implementing a curriculum over which she has had little influence; and to be grappling with the problems imposed by limited resources.

• Although she may value the consonance between the qualities perceived to be required by her role and her constructions of feminine professional identity, she is positioned as an operative within an increasingly mechanistic, performatively focused model of teacher education. (Simmons and Thompson 2007: p 530)

Professionalism in LL Teacher EducationThe LL Sector context• Critically, unlike schools ITT, where the pre-service

model predominates, FE teacher training is predominantly based upon an in-service system, as is HE. ITT is a consequence of becoming employed in a college, usually after many years of gaining experience in another occupation.

• FE teacher training qualifications have evolved to meet the needs of a much more diverse group of trainees.(Lucas and Nasta 2011: p 446)

• The fragmented and impoverished professional culture in FE is well documented … many college workplaces present a barrier to professional development. (Lucas and Nasta 2011: pp46.7)

Professionalism in LL Teacher Education

The ‘making’ and ‘taking’ of professionalism • Both present and past governments have tried

to professionalise teachers by imposing national standards and regulations.(Lucas and Nasta 2011: p 448)

• Gleeson (2005: p 446) uses the term ‘making’ to refer to the external structural forces, most significantly interventions by government to shape professionalism.

• The term ‘taking’ refers to the role of the agency of FE teachers as unwitting recipients of external policy imperatives in shaping and defining their own definitions of what it means to be a professional FE teacher.

Bibliography• Crawley, J. (2010) Infinite patience and the capacity to

challenge self and others' actions and values . Presentation at UCET National Conference. London: UCET

• Gleeson, D. 2005a. On the making and taking of professionalism in the further education workplace. British Journal of Sociology of Education 26, no. 4: 239–46.

• Lucas, Norman and Nasta, Tony(2010) 'State regulation and the professionalisation of further education teachers: a comparison with schools and HE', Journal of Vocational Education & Training, 62: 4, 441 — 454

• Simmons, R. and Thompson R. (2007) Teacher educators in post-compulsory education: gender, discourse and power. Journal of Vocational Education and Training Vol. 59, No. 4, December 2007, pp. 517–533