Applied professional formation: a conceptual framework for rethinking accounting education in the digital age

The Emperor Has No Clothes, But Does Anyone Really Care? How Law Schools are Failing to Develop Students' Professional Identities and Practical Judgment

Abstract: Community work and youth work are distinct but complimentary social professions which share a vision for a values-based practice, rooted in the application of justice, equality and human rights for social change. In Ireland, the professional endorsement of initial tertiary education in community work and youth work began almost two decades ago. Yet little is known about how exactly such programmes foster the professional formation of new practitioners, about how students experience the formation process or how they articulate their professional identity at the point of qualification. Addressing this gap, this article presents the findings of a study which explored students’ perspective (three cohorts, n=75) on their professional formation journey through a Bachelor of Social Science in Community Work and Youth Work in one Irish university. As collaborators in the research, final year students undertook and analysed a narrative style interview with a class peer exploring their learning journey across the programme. This was followed by a collective analysis by the authors which identified key themes in students’ articulation of their professional identity as well as the crucial elements supporting professional formation from students’ perspective. The findings reveal the centrality of critical consciousness raising to the development of professional identity of community workers and youth workers. The findings illustrate how a combination of classroom learning, fieldwork and supervision, theoretical reflection and a focus on ethics and values were key elements in generating students’ professional identity as community workers and youth workers. Furthermore, students articulated a view that their learning journey will continue into and throughout their professional life. This suggests that professional identity formation in community work and youth work is a journey, not a destination.

Professional Identity Formation -- Legal Education's Early Emphasis on Character, the Evisceration of this Priority, and What the First Law Schools Can Teach Us

Recent studies reveal that language teacher identity makes the difference in classroom teaching and has increasingly become a valuable focus in the field of language teaching research. However, a review of the research literature shows that there have been limited studies about the professional identity formation and even fewer studies involving teachers of English as a foreign language (EFL) in the context of mainland China.
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\nEnglish language teaching (ELT) has increasingly gained attention in mainland China, with the curriculum reforms, which promoted communicative language teaching (CLT) and later task-based approach (TBA), have been initiated since 1970s, yet the professional identities of English teachers acting as the key players of the curriculum reforms have not been given due attention. This is particularly true for those teachers in the Northwestern Hinterland areas with relatively limited resources and a challenging environment.
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\nIn order to fill the diverse gaps, this study provides valuable information and knowledge not only for teacher professional identity research area but also for Chinese ELT, CLT and TBA reforms, By exploring three experienced secondary EFL teachers’ professional identity formation in Lanzhou city, in Gansu province, a whole heretofore unresearched area has been brought into view.
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\nWith a case study approach, the study collected the teachers’ personal life experiences from their childhood to current teaching experiences. By building up a theoretical framework based on the features of professional identity formation proposed by Beijaard et al. (2004), the study has examined the teachers’ personal life experiences, school contexts and agency and achieved rich understandings about their professional identity formation.
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\nThis study shows that the teachers’ biographies, particularly their fathers and pre-service teacher education acted as important components of and exerted an enduring influence on their professional identity formation of the three teachers. Findings highlight that teachers’ three levels of professional contexts had an important impact on their professional identity formation; among the three levels of contexts, the macro context of the College Entrance Examination and the meso context of school leaders were the most influential.
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\nThe findings of this study extend the understanding of the complexity of teachers’ professional identity formation, and shed light on how to develop a more effective professional learning mode for pre-service teachers. This study also gives a voice to life history and offers the possibility of helping pre-service teachers to effectively understand the teaching profession in new ways in the teacher education programs.

This article presents a transition-to-practice program grounded in O'Rourke's Professional Role Identity Formation Theory. Addressing a persistent gap between technical competency and professional formation, the program explicitly aligns competency, epistemology, and pedagogy within nursing's professional and disciplinary foundations. The article offers nursing professional development practitioners a theory-guided framework for designing transition-to-practice programs that prepare new graduate nurses to perform safelty, and to think, act, and engage in professional nursing practice.

This symposium intends to broaden our understanding of individuals’ identity work within organizations by focusing on new sources and means of social influence. The burgeoning identity work literature has provided a rich understanding of how individuals in one’s immediate work environment – such as group members and superiors - affect identity work processes. In particular, this research illuminates how others contribute to identity formation, presentation, and maintenance. This symposium expands upon this scholarly work by (1) investigating additional sources of social influence within and outside of professional settings and (2) exploring how these social factors both contribute to and complicate identity work. For example, while mentors within an organization may be important for providing social feedback and serving as role models, influential figures outside of work may shape professional identity formation as well. Moreover, these myriad individuals may occasionally hinder identity work processes, such as when social feedback casts doubt on an aspirational identity. The combination of beneficial and detrimental influences from a variety of social forces creates a more complex, yet comprehensive, understanding of professional identity work. Collectively, the papers in this symposium expand the scholarly conversation in identity by illuminating how these less understood forms of social influence both enable and inhibit professional identity work and overall career advancement. Threat or Opportunity? Pathways of Leader Identity Development Presenter: Catarina R. Fernandes; Harvard U. Presenter: Lakshmi Ramarajan; Harvard U. Presenter: N Andrew Cohen; The George Washington U. Identity Work Within and Beyond the Professions: Toward a Theoretical Integration and Extension Presenter: Douglas A Lepisto; Boston College Presenter: Eliana Crosina; Boston College Presenter: Michael G. Pratt; Boston College Manufacturing Self-Authenticity: A Reflexive Process of Crafting Authenticity at Work Presenter: Beth A. Devine; INSEAD Presenter: Jennifer Louise Petriglieri; INSEAD Approach and Avoidance: How Parental Role Models Influence Professional and Family Identity Work Presenter: Rachel D. Arnett; Harvard U. Presenter: Robin Ely; Harvard U. Presenter: Kathleen L. McGinn; Harvard U.

Exploring Professional Identity Formation among Pharmacists in Pakistan: Barriers, Enablers, and Recommendations.

The intersectionality of professional and personal identity formation in a virtual pre-health pathway program

Educating the Future Accounting Professional: Actively Shaping Professional Identities for a Rapidly Changing World

Perceptions of professional identity and its formation during education at the Faculty of Social Work, University of Ljubljana Professional identity in social work can be described as a collection of identifiable and enduring professional qualities of social workers that bind them together as a professional group and make them different and unique compared to other professional groups. As the social work profession is devalued and stigmatized around the world, exploring the processes involved in developing a strong and positive professional identity is of great importance. The need to explore social work professional identity has been recognized in some places abroad and has mainly focused on researching professional identity formation during social work education. This paper presents findings on the definition and role of professional identity in social work, focusing on professional identity formation during education at the Faculty of Social Work, University of Ljubljana. Qualitative research on social work students' perceptions of professional identity is presented, as well as suggestions for a more frequent and discrete treatment of the topic during the education of future social workers.

Background and Purpose: As the nursing profession adapts to changing disease patterns and critical care environments, nurses' professional identity continues to evolve. However, empirical evidence suggests a lack of recently developed nursing professional identity formation scales that could serve as future diagnostic tools for assessing professional identity formation among nurses. The purpose of this study was to develop and test the Nursing Professional Identity Formation Scale specifically tailored to assess nurses' professional identity formation in clinical settings. Methods: This observational study involved 447 participants and used exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses with parallel classification. Results: We deleted 10 of the 32 original items from the exploratory factor analysis following the Delphi expert panel approach. Thus, the final Nursing Professional Identity Formation Scale had 22 items across four factors (fulfilling professional standards, continuous professional development, professional values and ethics, and maintaining professional roles), which together explained 72.04% of the total variance. A second-order confirmatory factor termed "nursing professional identity formation" with 17 items (root mean square residual = .054) was identified using a second-order confirmatory factor analysis. The Nursing Professional Identity Formation Scale scores differed across nursing position levels, indicating good convergent validity. The final Nursing Professional Identity Formation Scale had a Cronbach's alpha of .94 (range = .86-.90 for the four subscales). Conclusions: The Nursing Professional Identity Formation Scale was validated to fit the data adequately. It can evaluate clinical nurses' professional identity formation and can be used to develop educational strategies to promote their professional identity.

The professional identity formation of prospective physical and occupational therapists in the clinical practices process has been studied. The presence of the formed professional identity provides their orientation in the professional field and professional community that allows to realize more fully personal potential in a multidisciplinary team, to predict possible consequences of professional choice and to define own professional development prospects. There are three main stages in the formation of professional identity of the prospective physical therapy and occupational therapy specialists: an initial choice; a confirmation or refutation of the initial choice; an implementation of the initial choice in the activity. The dynamics of professional identity formation during the whole period of their professional training in a higher education institution has been determined.
 The peculiarities of early students` professionalization in the process of clinical practice have been revealed in a passive form, later - at the stage of active practice. Among the principles of professional identification development of future masters in physical and occupational therapy in the process of clinical practices, the principle of reflectivity and the principle of a value attitude forming to professional activity have been singled out. The clinical practice, taking place in medical and rehabilitation institutions, involving participation in the rehabilitation diagnosis establishment and in the rehabilitation program has been defined. Formation, development, a moral and psychological qualities complex, as an integral part of professional training of physical and occupational therapy specialists for their future professional activity; ensuring the growth of students` professional competence level; promoting self-identification and choosing the future professional activity direction are the main tasks of the research.
 The professional identification and personal identity formation of the prospective physical and occupational therapist is the unity of three processes: student`s self-acceptance as a prospective physical and occupational therapist; comparison with the professional ideal, norm and sample of a physical therapist; recognition by the external environment of the prospective specialist's affiliation to the professional group of practicing physical and occupational therapists. Throughout life professional identity is a product of continuous personal and professional development of the physical and occupational therapist.

Analysis of Laboratory Skills Curricula Surrounding Professional Identity Formation in Doctor of Pharmacy Students

Professional identity formation (PIF) is an integral part of educating professionals. A well-formed professional identity helps individuals to develop a meaningful professional self-understanding that facilitates their transition to and sustainability in professional work. Although professional identity and its formation are well theorized, it is largely unclear how the underpinning interpretive process of professional identity work leads to observable changes in thoughts, feelings and behaviours, and how these insights can be used in educational practice. To address this gap, we conducted an integrative review of 77 empirical articles on professional identity formation and inductively developed a four-fold typology of professional identity work, through which individuals reportedly make the shift from individual to professional. The theoretical contribution of this article is a more nuanced understanding of the practical manifestations of professional identity work. As a practical contribution, the typology may be used as a heuristic through which educators of professionals can support their students’ professional identity formation, particularly where this is halted or complicated by obstructions.

Recently, I attended an informative Education Grand Rounds at my institution on professional identity formation (PIF). It was delivered by a clinician and sociologist with most of the presentation focusing on the transition of medical students into residency and on how the residency curriculum might provide support for the development of professional identity. The presenters summarized the complexity of the history of professionalism in medical education (Coulehan, 2005; Hafferty and Castellani, 2010) and suggested that the utility of such a construct should not be limited to the assessment of student behavior, but should contribute to a student's formulation of their professional identity. Beyond merely "how to act," professionalism should speak to "who to become." Recent literature seats the professional identity at the core of medical education (Cooke et al., 2010; Cruess et al., 2016) with the emphasis on reshaping and modifying the academic discourse on professionalism to include the professional identity formation (PIF) (Cruess et al., 2014). For example, the Miller's traditional four-layered pyramid (Miller, 1990) which scaffolds knowledge ("Knows"—level), competence ("Knows how"—level), performance ("Show how"—level), and action ("Does"—level) into a four-tiered pedagogic hierarchy has been augmented (Al-Eraky and Marei, 2016; Cruess et al., 2016) to include a fifth "Is" layer (a new tip of pyramid) emphasizing identity. Educators now believe that health care professionals in training should "consistently demonstrate the attitudes, values, and behaviors expected of the one who has come to 'think, act, and feel like a physician'" (Hafferty, 2009; Cruess et al., 2016). Cruess et al. (2016) espouse the development of professional identity as a new principal goal for medical education. Now several reflective tools designed to measure the PIF have been developed (Bebeau and Monson, 2012; Kalet et al., 2017, 2018). Nonetheless, much work apparently needs to be done. One highly cited study examined the PIF in medical students through reflective essays. During orientation incoming, first-year medical students were introduced to the concept of PIF and assessed for the baseline PIF during orientation and then again, 15 months later, prior to clinical clerkships (Kalet et al., 2018). De-identified essays were scored by an adult developmental educational psychologist based on the Kegan's Subject-Object Interview platform for assessing the adults' identity development (Kegan, 1995). This study found that 46% of students in this medical class remained at the same stage in their professional development and 15% of students scored lower than at the time of matriculation to medical school (Kalet et al., 2018). While we can all hope that these results are not the norm, the prospect that half of our trainees might remain stagnant in their PIF through their first two years of training poses a distinct challenge to medical educators. I believe that the basic sciences should play a bigger role in teaching professionalism and in developing the PIF and that this process should commence as early as possible (Bryan et al., 2005; Pawlina, 2006). All our optics should be on the transition from undergraduate education to the medical school environment. Over a decade ago, I organized a plenary session and symposium at the 2007 Association for Medical Education in Europe meeting on the role of the basic sciences in medical education. One of the invited presenters, Dr. Ingeborg Netterstrøm from the University of Copenhagen, spoke on the role of basic sciences in the professional development as a physician (Netterstrøm, 2007). She cited a longitudinal study that followed a cohort of Danish medical students throughout the medical school. From this study, Dr. Netterstrøm learned that medical students have high expectations of themselves in their future role as a doctor. The scope of what they can accomplish in this role is expansive and hopeful. Dr. Netterstrøm was one of the first researchers who brought to the surface the notion that anatomy has a bigger role to play in the PIF than we knew before. Her work was published in one of the first issues of ASE (Netterstrøm and Kayser, 2008) and we are proud indeed to have an early outlet for this important message. In the preclinical phase (especially in anatomy courses), students are exposed to the medical school environment and to the intense study required to fulfill their own high expectations of the ideal doctors they hope to become. Helping students to remain emotionally attuned to this adjustment/adaptation period is necessary to ensure that students successfully navigate the first phase of their continued identity formation as professionals. And this is the work in store for the psychologically-minded anatomy professor. Here, the anatomy teacher is more than a dispensary of knowledge, more than a guide or coach for those with diverse educational backgrounds, cultures, and experiences. Here the anatomy professor has an opportunity to be a counselor and mentor to young doctors who are hungry to learn not just what they need to know, or how they need to act but who they are and who they might become. In the 2006 special issue of Clinical Anatomy on "Professionalism and Anatomy" (Pawlina, 2006), anatomists were in the vanguard of incorporating professionalism in basic sciences. Since then, several studies have indicated how anatomy and basic sciences have taken up the torch to hone curricular focus to develop a culture of professionalism (Pearson and Hoagland, 2010; Jones, 2013; Kissler et al., 2016; Kumar Ghosh and Kumar, 2019). However, anatomy is not alone in this effort. Identity development is a common denominator across health professionals and of the human condition. Professional identity formation is a multistage process and should start early in medical education (Barone et al., 2019). The early aspects of development involve directing students to follow social roles and norms (i.e., assignments in classroom, laboratories, learning in teams, and being a team leader) and to follow the instructions as specified by the anatomy course director (i.e., no photography or use of social media in the dissection room; be respectful for body donors). These social orientations are essential and foundational. Subsequently, students should learn to develop their own set of ethics and expectations and to govern codes of conduct among themselves through tools such as team charters (Pilette, 2017; Dougherty et al., 2018). Here students' develop an appreciation for the diversity of views and opinions of classmates and instructors—an awareness that is an important milestone in the early stages of PIF (Dougherty et al., 2018; Barone et al., 2019). Basic science education should not be limited to the expectations that students learn only the knowledge necessary to pass the course examination or to memorize facts that will help them pass their National Board of Medical Examiners' Subject or Step 1 examinations. On a daily basis, medical students must be made aware that they are not only learning for their own sake in terms of a grade or honors status, but that the investment of their time and energy will directly translate into the quality of patient care they will one day provide. They must relate the content they are learning to future patient problems through clinical correlates and begin to imagine how they will be better doctors in the future because of their investment in the here and now. Anatomy education is a setting for the development of an authentic curriculum (Pawlina and Drake, 2016) where students learn through clinical contexts that involve peer-to-peer and interprofessional communications, critical reflection through self- and peer assessments, and where professional imagination takes root. All educational activities should simulate a "community of practice" so that students in their preclinical years can imagine themselves in clinical settings, using the knowledge acquired and their communication skills to be effective for team members and problem-solvers. Students must develop a sense of duty to a larger group, which is usually a stark contrast from the solitary and "every person for themselves" manner of collegiate undergraduate courses (Gonzalo et al., 2017; Cruess et al., 2018). Let anatomy be the place where students learn that academic success is communal, not solitary. Professional identity is collaborative. As anatomists, we are integral to the identity development of our students. Anatomy courses clearly can provide more emphasis on the development of professional values, actions, and aspiration by role modeling and mentoring. The professional socialization of incoming students from diverse, often non-medical backgrounds into the anatomy laboratory allows not only an opportunity to develop an identity as a medical student, but as a member of a professional health care team when they join their dissection groups. Anatomy starts the development of collegiality as we see dissection team members unite over common goals and respect each other's diversity—both essential elements of early professional identity formation. We should not forget that PIF is heavily influenced by the hidden curriculum; thus, interaction with role models, modeling professional behavior, and the development of healthy social networks are essential aspects of the implicit education at work in the anatomy course (Goldie, 2012; Hafferty and O'Donnell, 2015). In this liminal realm, where feelings and schema contribute to the delicate psychology of PIF, frustration, anxiety, self-doubt, and an inadequate sense of belonging to the profession are conflicts that can be worked through sufficient mentoring and counseling along the way (Barone et al., 2019). It is important that we not dismiss these humanistic aspects of the educational experience which commonly emerge to the surface of student's experiences in the classroom (Evans et al., 2018). Millennial learners seem to be particularly sensitive and require authentic guidance through the challenges inherent in the PIF (Barone et al., 2019). Professional identity formation is a central psychological milestone for every person who aspires to become a professional. As such it behooves the anatomist to consider their role as an oracle to the student who, upon entering its gateway asks; "Who shall I become?" The dissection laboratory is a sanctuary of reflection on the human experience, both concrete and ephemeral. Writing exercises and narrative medicine may be useful modalities to explore further with regard to improving narrative competence and one's sense of story as it relates to the PIF (Miller et al., 2014; Wald et al., 2015, 2019). In the anatomy laboratory, we trace the limits of the physical and name all that can be seen with the eye, all the while wondering what remains nameable that cannot be seen. The anatomy laboratory is a place where students necessarily consider the end of their story (Hammer, 2010), at the beginning of their quest.