Professional development profiling as a key influence in the secondary level initial teacher education curriculum in a hostile climate

Abstract

The article reports on how research into professional development profiling has been implemented within undergraduate secondary initial teacher education programmes in a large United Kingdom university. At the time of planning (1995) of a new secondary teacher education programme there, there was an expectation from the University that recommendations for the inclusion of professional development profiling from the Enterprise Initiative for Higher Education should feature in all new courses. Several curriculum areas in the University, including initial teacher education, took up this opportunity and were able to access some funding for development costs. The subsequent research reported upon in this article covers the first 3 years of implementing the professional development profile and relates this process to the experience of using profiles in the USA, other United Kingdom teacher education organisations and the literature of professional development. Data were obtained over a 4-year period (1995–98) by interviews with students and school mentors, from an analysis of the contents of the portfolios and by questionnaire. This period of time was one of considerable change, in that the Government established the Teacher Training Agency and required providers to move to a competency-based model, which required conformity or a risk of cuts in the funding of student places. The main findings were that constructing a professional development profile for the duration of an undergraduate course raised many problematic issues about the nature of teaching as a profession, thereby ensuring that continued reflection on this matter and the issues involved would remain on the agenda. In the process it stimulated much debate between tutors, teachers with responsibility for students in schools and the students themselves, at a time when many concerned in the process had some major reservations about the new initiatives imposed by the Government.