Context

In November 2010, the UK Coalition Government announced the launch of a national network of ‘teaching schools’ in England, as a central strategy in its drive for improvement in the school sector. Modelled on teaching hospitals, the schools’ remit was to take the lead of a wider alliance of schools in pre-service teacher training, the further professional learning of teachers, school-to-school support and research. Concurrent with this in England has been the introduction of ‘school direct’, a new demand-led route into teaching. The school direct route(s) (one salaried in which teachers train ‘on the job’ and one non-salaried pre-service training) are premised upon the fact that each year individual schools and/or teaching school alliances, anticipating their employment needs, request training places and commission a training provider of their choice to collaborate with them in providing training for the pre-service teachers recruited.

The rapid growth of the school direct training route, which has expanded to 40% of all pre-service training places in two years, has led to unprecedented levels of instability in the university teacher education sector. The expansion of the number of teaching school alliances (target 500 by 2015), many of which are cross phase/sector/ geographic areas, also brings fundamental change to organizational structures and working practices in respect of teacher education. Together these two policy interventions have major and fundamental implications for the role of the University, now designated as a ‘strategic partner’ in the provision of teacher education. On the one hand such changes offer the possibility of a test-bed for conceiving innovative and more effective ways of working, and can be viewed as a credible strategy to achieve a more integrative approach to professional learning and knowledge integration, but on the other hand both of these flagship Government policies were unpiloted and are under theorized.

Research Aims

• To investigate how inter-professional groups formed in the context of the newly designated teaching schools, learn with, from, and about each other.
• To better understand the relational enablers and barriers to achieving integrated professional learning.
• To inform strategic decisions policy and practice with regard to approaches to professional learning and knowledge integration.

 Theoretical framework

 The premise of this study is that collective action, as it relates to integration, is dependent on collective learning, through relationships and interactions, as the means by which self-organization is achieved. The processes by which this type of learning occurs remain poorly understood (Bechky, 2006; Mork,  Aanestad, Hanseth and Grisot, 2008; Van der Vegt and Bunderson, 2005). In reality, few studies examine learning processes that cross inter-professional and inter-organizational boundaries to examine: learning and knowledge sharing patterns; the conditions necessary for collective learning to emerge; and, the link between participant behaviours/interactions and inter-organizational learning (Soubhi, Bayliss, Fortin, Hudon, van den Akker,  Thivierge, 2010; Nembhard, 2012;  Rangachari 2009).

 Focusing on ‘teaching schools’ as complex-adaptive systems and drawing on complex-adaptive systems theory and methodology and practice-based theory of learning, this study tests it as a conceptual framework. Through its emphasis on interactions, complex-adaptive systems theory offers a unique and useful lens for considering how diverse professionals collectively learn in the workplace and thereby create new relationships and behaviours. A complex-adaptive systems perspective contrasts sharply with traditional theories of leadership and change, which promote orderly planning, forecasting, and control. In complex-adaptive systems theory, the relationship between leadership and collaboration is brought into sharp relief. The concept of ‘situated agency’ is also focused on, to explain why and how individual actors, working within the same political, financial and institutional context, arrive at different interpretations of leadership for collaboration, and what implications this has for local leadership.

Bechky, B. (2006). Talking about machines, thick description, and knowledge work. Organization Studies, 27, 1757–1768. Bradbury, H. and Lichenstein, B.M.B. (2000). Relationality in organizational research: Exploring the space between. Organization Science, 11, 551–564. Charmaz, K. (2009). Shifting the grounds: Constructivist grounded theory methods. In J.M. Morse, P.N. Stern, J. Corbin, B. Bowers, K. Charmaz, & A.E. Clarke (Eds.), Developing grounded theory: The second generation (pp. 127–154). Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press. McNamara, O, Murray, J. and Jones, M. (2014) Workplace learning in Teacher Education: International practice and policy. Professional Learning and Development in Schools and Higher Education. New York: Springer. Mork, B., Aanestad, M. Hanseth, O. and Grisot, M. (20 08). Conflicting epistemic cultures and obstacles for learning across communities of practice. Knowledge and Process Management, 15, 12–23. Nembhard (2012). All teach, all learn, all improve? The role of interorganizational learning in quality improvement collaboratives. (paper) Ozbilgin, M. (2006). Relational methods in organization studies: A review of the field. In O. Kyriakidou and M. Ozbilgin (eds) Relational Perspectives in Organizational Studies: A Research Companion, Vol 13, Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA, USA: Edward Elgar, pp. 244-64. Rangachari, P. (2009). Knowledge sharing networks in professional complex systems. Journal of Knowledge Management, 13(3), 132-145. Soubhi, H., Bayliss, E., Fortin, M., Hudon, C., van den Akker, M. and Thivierge, R. (2010). Learning and caring in communities of practice: Using relationships and collective learning to improve primary care for patients with multimorbidity. Annals of Family Medicine, 8(2), 170-177. Thornberg, R., and Charmaz, K. (2012). Grounded theory. In S. D. Lapan, M. Quartaroli, and F. Reimer (Eds.), Qualitative research: An introduction to methods and designs (pp. 41-67). San Francisco, CA: John Wiley/Jossey-Bass van der Vegt, G. and Bunderson, J. (2005). Learning and performance in multidisciplinary teams: the importance of collective team identification. Academy of Management Journal, 48, 532–547.