Putting the 'person' at the heart of professional development - seeing beyond golden threads

In England we have entered an era of ever-increasing centralisation of continuing professional development for new recruits and existing staff in state schools.  The Department for Education (DfE) has created what it calls a ‘golden thread’ of Initial Teacher Training (ITT), the Early Career Framework (ECF) and National Professional Qualifications (NPQs). These have been welcomed by organisations such as the Education Endowment Foundation who suggest that these new initiatives and reforms are ‘hugely encouraging’ in recognising the importance of teacher quality in narrowing the ‘disadvantage gap’. They go on to say that it is essential that professional development is ‘well designed, selected, and implemented so that the investment is justified’.

Putting aside (not that we should) the existence of an ever-growing disadvantage gap – fuelled by economic and social policy that goes well beyond educational contexts, as well as evidence of continued negative impacts of DfE policy and budgetary decisions on many already disadvantaged schools – we should be careful that evocative and rhetorical phrases such as ‘the golden thread’ don’t incite a narrowly defined, acquisitory approach to professional learning.

We can do better. We can also think more critically and more expansively about the characteristics of professional learning and development to better meet the diverse needs of educators and those they educate. In CollectivED Working Papers Issue 15 we explore professional learning and development in a variety of educational contexts and for a range of purposes.  Perhaps most importantly the paper authors invite us to see the people (rather than the process) at the heart of professional learning. They connect us to the principle that ‘teacher learning takes place at the connection between theory, practice and person’ Korthagen (2017).

The papers in CollectivED Issue 15 are thus well worth a read.   In their paper UCET Continuing Professional Development (CPD) forum members Paul Vare, Justin Dillon, Lizana Oberholzer and Cathal Butler tackle head on the dilemmas produced by the CPD policy context in England. David Preece focuses on an alternative to the relatively generic DfE provision while aiming to address the shared concerns around teacher retention.  He proposes that an enhanced focus subject specialism can support retention.

Mhairi Beaton and Rachel Lofthouse offer insights from an Erasmus+ project examining the use of complex professional dilemmas as a vehicle for teachers’ professional learning. Another international perspective is offered by Claudia Gillberg and Emma Rosengren who explore the role of knowledge-based leadership in securing the education for disabled children.

A valuable feature of the CollectivED working papers is what we can learn from them about international contexts and also from across educational sectors. In Issue 15 Lou Mycroft draws on work in the further education (FE) sector which resonates far beyond on the practice of values.  Rachel Terry focuses on the learning of recently qualified teachers in FE, and Kevin Merry discusses the development of teaching excellence in the university sector.

Rachel Lofthouse reminds of the role potential of peer coaching as a means of ensuring the connection between theory and research in teacher learning is also with the ‘person’ and can be effectively designed into CPD. Finally, thinking differently about teacher empowerment is at the heart of Kathryn Grice’s work and she is our guest for thinking out loud. 

You can find CollectivED Issue 15 here CollectivED Working Papers (leedsbeckett.ac.uk)

For information about CollectivED at Leeds Beckett University please visit our website.