Westminster Education Forum, January 2010

published:20 Jan 2010

Extracts from a speech by GTC Chief Executive Keith Bartley given at the Westminster Education Forum Keynote Seminar, 20 January 2010.

Keith Bartley spoke to the Westminster Education Forum which brings together the policy makers in Parliament, Whitehall and government agencies to engage with education professionals and stakeholders from industry, their advisors, interest groups, local authorities, the voluntary sector, academia and the press.

Keith’s speech, which focused on upholding professional standards, was one of the keynote addresses at the event where participants reviewed the future of the teaching workforce including licences, recruitment and development.

Text of speech
Thank you Chairman. I am delighted to be joining you all today.

Given the very wide range of colleagues here today, all of whom could confidently choose “the quality of teachers and teaching” as their Mastermind specialist subject; I feel rather privileged that I have the chance to talk on the topic and I look forward to a lively and possibly challenging discussion session.

I am also very pleased that entitlement to continuing professional development has also been included within this theme; as the evidence for the impact of high quality CPD on teaching quality is so very conclusive.

Yesterday, John Bangs and I gave oral evidence to the Children, Schools and Families Bill Committee.  The questions to me revolved primarily around licence to practise, and if it happens, it will be a major new area of responsibility for the General Teaching Council.  So that too is at the front of my mind. 

My overall theme today is 'upholding professional standards'.  That, in essence, is what the GTCE is charged by Parliament to do, in concert with our partners and with teachers themselves.  The quality of teaching can be influenced at every stage of the chain from initial teacher education, through induction, professional development, further study and qualification opportunities, practical lived experience; practice development including coaching and mentoring; and potentially, through licensing.

Qualifications for teaching

It is interesting to see that Conservative policy is currently focused on improving the entry qualifications held by aspiring teachers.  At one level, who could argue, at least with the intent?  It must be an aspiration for all of us, that teaching is a high status career choice, attracting the most talented and capable individuals.  Considerable progress has been made in recent years, with the proportion of PGCE students holding 2:1 degrees, continuing to rise. 

Women form three quarters of the teaching profession, and it is women students whose degree classifications have been improving steadily – but as I don’t think we expect a gender revolution in teaching any time soon, that improvement picture is good for teaching and good for children and young people.

I am less immediately convinced by the lasting relevance of GCSE grades for entry to initial teacher education.  Increasingly, entrants are coming into teaching as a second full career; or after a period of other post-graduate employment; or through the work based entry routes such as the Graduate Teacher Programme and through SCITTS – school based initial teacher training.  Motivation and commitment to teach, and the ability to harness other learning and experience, are vitally important here. 

I am, however, absolutely convinced of the importance of professional preparation, both academic and practical; and of the value of seeing an individual’s professional formation developing in the context of professional qualifications and a framework of professional standards. 

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We do, of course, need flexibility.  Some individuals need and will benefit from an extensive programme of vocationally-based higher education to prepare them for professional practice – that is why we have five year degrees for medicine, for example. Others will be able to demonstrate that they have “got it” much more quickly; drawing on natural aptitude, intelligence and motivation, or on previous working experience, whether inside education or outside.

We do have that flexibility. According to McKinsey, there are 32 different routes into teaching in England – probably a more diverse array of options than anywhere else in the world. 

Some routes are more enduring and viable than others.  But I counsel strongly against any notion that a framework of professional qualifications and standards should be optional.  It’s not a 'nice to have'; it is a 'must have'.  It may be OK to recruit a speaker of …… let’s say ….. Mandarin, who does not have QTS but could add value to your curriculum offer. It is not OK to put a bright but unqualified individual in charge of year 6 and expect the class and the teacher to thrive.

Regulation

We need a framework of qualifications and standards as a backcloth for the legitimate business of holding professionals to account for their practice. It will not surprise this audience to hear that I also believe we need a system of professional registration as part of the accountability picture.  I will come onto the case for licensing in a few moments.

Registration first.  What does registration confer, which goes beyond a professional qualification and a CRB check?  Registration provides a single, and simple, assurance to parents, to the employer, to the wider public, to the tax payer; that schools are employing properly qualified teachers, of good professional standing. 

I have referred to the very diverse entry routes into teaching.  The settings in which teachers work are also highly diverse, and becoming more so, possibly to the point of fragmentation.  And if, during the next Parliament, those settings become even more varied, with more and different types of school or academies; then a unifying Register will be an important safeguard of the public interest and may also keep trouble away from the Schools Ministers’ desk.

Accountability

Registration signals membership of a profession and that is an important component of accountability. I think we currently have a rather one dimensional view of accountability.  For many teachers, and I suspect for many other public servants, it is a line running in one direction only.  It is a line, or perhaps a leash;  a chain tugging on the individual, pulling them through a series of hoops, gathering more and more data along the way, running through to the head of the institution and on into Whitehall.

That is not intelligent accountability.  Arguably it is not accountability at all - it is simply compliance with reporting requirements. If we want to look at accountability more constructively, and if we are serious about respecting the commitment and professionalism of our public servants, we should start with the individual and her own understanding of professional accountability.

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We need to consider how teachers see themselves as professionals; what are their professional values and to whom do they feel accountable?  A 2007 research report by DEMOS, commissioned by GTC England, sheds some light on this.

Its title, 'DIY Professionalism', gives an indication of its findings. The researchers found that, for many teachers, professionalism was informal, localised and personal. It derives from and is inextricably linked to their commitment to doing what is best for children. So, if teachers’ motivation is for those children in their class, for helping those young people they work with to achieve and to enjoy learning, what may be seen as a more distant notions of professionalism, for example of belonging to the ‘world class profession’ aspired to by Government, won’t necessarily motivate or engage in the same way.

DEMOS reported that teachers do, indeed, feel highly accountable to their pupils, their parents, their local community, and to their school. Notions of being accountable to the tax payer, or concepts of the public interest, were much more remote.  At the same time, we know that many teachers feel burdened by central control and imposed initiatives, leaving them with little professional scope. Their sense of their own professionalism is undermined, not bolstered, by an overbearing accountability regime.

Returning briefly to the concept of professional registration; I would like to be able to affirm that all teachers see the value of registration.  But they don’t necessarily - particularly if they have been in teaching for a long time. Although new entrants do.  When we talk to trainee teachers, we encounter no resistance at all to the concept of professional registration and a very positive disposition towards an affirmative, values–based, Code of Professional Conduct and Practice.

Code of Conduct

Registration, and acceptance of a professional Code of Conduct and Practice, is another dimension of accountability that has been insufficiently valued by Government.  We are all aware of Shaw’s description of professions as a conspiracy against the laity.  It is no longer true.  Independent professions are a safeguard for liberty and a bulwark against the overweening state.

Excessive or intrusive accountability requirements infantilise the practitioners and institutions they are attempting to hold to account.

Teaching only deserves the status of an independent profession if it takes responsibility for its standards of practice; for developing shared professional knowledge, for articulating the art and science of teaching to the wider public; and for continual development and improvement in the public interest.

'The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.'

So, if we reject the status of underlings, how can teaching as a profession, seize hold of the accountability agenda and get a better balance between the expectations on the individual, the institution and the system?

Part of the answer has to be a relentless focus on quality.  Schools and teachers need to take responsibility for their own professional learning and development, rather than passively accepting or complying with every bright idea that emerges from Sanctuary Buildings.

The quality of outcomes for children and young people is crucially dependent on the quality of teaching and leadership in our schools.  Part of good leadership is knowing when to grab hold of a new idea and its related funding. To use marketing parlance, when to be an early adopter, and when to let it pass by because your school has other priorities, has a well developed capacity for self evaluation and a clear plan for improvement.

Professional development

That may sound as though I am arguing against an entitlement to continuing professional development.  I am not.  We support it and have advocated it for many years.  The entitlement sits alongside the personal, professional responsibility of the teacher to reflect on and improve their practice and the responsibility of the school to provide high quality opportunities within a thriving professional learning culture.

We now know a lot about effective professional learning; about the kinds of professional learning that do lead to improvements in practice and can then translate into tangible benefits for children, for learners.

Successive systematic reviews (EPPI) of research conducted over several years describe the characteristics of effective approaches to CPD as:

• having a clear focus on pupil learning
• involving teachers in identifying their needs
• using coaching and mentoring
• including observation, feedback and collaborative working
• providing opportunities for practice, research and reflective practice; and
• modelling preferred practice, such as active learning, both in classrooms and in adult learning situations.

Ofsted finds that CPD is central to school effectiveness and is a key to sustaining change. A prerequisite for this is for senior managers to understand its potential for raising performance, to see it as a key driver of improvement, and to allocate sufficient resources and time to it.

License to practice

Research that we, the GTC, conducted jointly with the Innovation Unit, found that the defining and essential characteristic of successful innovative schools is that these schools place continuing professional development at the very centre of school life.

Clearly, the possible advent of a requirement to hold a licence to practise brings the supply and the quality, and the nature, of continuing professional development into sharper focus than ever before.

For the GTC, there are some fundamental principles at stake here.

• licensing must add value.
• it is only worth doing if it brings real and tangible benefits to teaching and learning
• it must have enough rigour to make a difference and to enjoy credibility – the last thing we need is a bureaucracy in search of a purpose
• it should make a distinctive contribution to improvement that cannot be achieved via existing means or at lower cost
• it must be fair
• it must be proportionate and not unduly burdensome
• the licensing system must not stifle innovation – it should encourage development and improvement.

An effective model could bring direct, tangible and observable benefits.  First and foremost, it will require schools and teachers to reflect on the professional standards to which teachers are working; and reflection is the first step towards improvement. 

By requiring teachers to demonstrate that they have taken part in professional development and that the development has led to changes in their practice; we reinforce a culture of improvement and continual learning in schools.  And it should strengthen the ‘supply’ side - by applying a critical and demanding eye to the quality and nature of CPD, teachers should benefit from better provision – and pupils should benefits from better teaching. 

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There may be less immediately tangible benefits too. A licensing system sends a strong signal to parents that their school is committed to improvement and development and that should boost the reputation of the school in their eyes.

There could be benefits in term of whole-system learning.  Introducing a licensing system could drive out improvements in the use of performance management and its impact, and in the application of the professional standards framework. 

Is this enough justification?  Individuals and organisations have already adopted strong positions on the issue.  I suspect that if you support the proposal, you may wonder why I am sounding a few warning notes; if you oppose it, you may think I am touting for business.

My Council meets next week – so far it has kept its counsel on the policy.  Much depends on the detail of the model chosen.  Will it be seen by teachers – to quote John Bangs – as “another damn thing”?  Or is it an overdue step forward for the profession which enhances its standing and places it on a par with other professions like law and nursing.

It is important, and legitimate, to hold individuals to account.  It is important, and legitimate, to try to raise the standing of the profession.  It is vitally important, and legitimate, to keep trying to improve standards of teaching in the interests of children and young people.  Does this proposal help us with any or all of those objectives?

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I think we need to return to the issue of accountability in the round.  Accountability must be proportionate.  We should not simply add new layers, without reforming the whole.  Teaching is a complex and creative activity which requires the exercise of informed professional judgement and we should not stifle teachers’ capacity for innovation and initiative.

The quality of teachers is central to the quality of teaching and learning – and the quality of teachers is heavily dependent on effective professional development and learning.

Now, a licence to practise, encompassing an entitlement to effective professional learning, could support this but it will depend upon the nature of the licence, the entitlement and the supporting frameworks.

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