Approaching Teacher Educators’ Democratic Professionalism

Author(s):

Silvia Edling(presenting / submitting)Geraldine Mooney Simmie(presenting)

Conference:

ECER 2014

Network:

10. Teacher Education Research

Format:

Paper

Session Information

10 SES 07 B, Teacher Education: Identities, Practices, Professionalism

Paper Session

Time:

2014-09-03

17:15-18:45

Room:

B223 Sala de Aulas

Chair:

Chris Wilkins

Contribution

Education is an essential state tool for controlling and forming a population’s knowledge and values in a certain direction. For this reason Teacher Educations (TE) in Sweden and Ireland have in a higher degree than other colleges and universities, come to be closely regulated by the state. The features of TE are interlaced with national and international social climates and demands. Due to its political significance as a social shaper it has over the years been subjected to several major and frequently reoccurring reform packages (Öberg Thuleus, 2008; Eriksson, 2009, Lynch, et. alt. 2012). Moreover, teacher educators’ profession is interwoven with the features of general education. This means that if the social direction of education changes the future educator’s competences, knowledge and work tasks acquired within TE are bound to change simultaneously (Townsend & Bates, 2007; Eriksson, 2009). Both Sweden and Ireland have had two reforms approximately at the same time generating new policy documents for Higher Education, namely 2000/2001 and 2010/2011. The intention with this paper is to contribute in exploring the conditions of democratic professionalism (Day and Sachs, 2004) amongst teacher educators in Sweden and Ireland by comparing policy documents manifested in the two reforms mentioned above as points of departures.

Method

Overall four policy documents for teacher education are explored in the paper: two from Sweden (prop. 1999/2000, 2009/2010) and two from Ireland (Teacher Council act 2001, 2011). In order to approach the purpose we use an integrated method where the notion of teacher educator’s democratic professionalism defined in the four policy documents are explored by using both a qualitative and a minor quantitative study (Bryman, 2011). The minor quantitative dimension in the study is based on the amount of times certain words appear in the four documents analyzed. As concerns the qualitative aspects Faircloughs’ critical analysis is used to interpret and translate the material (Fairclogh, 1992; 1993; 1995). Similarities and differences between the policy documents of Ireland and Sweden as regards conditions for democratic professionalism amongst teacher educators are thereafter compared and discussed thoroughly (Cowen, Kazamias, 2009, Comparative Education, 2000).

Expected Outcomes

A preliminary analysis of the material indicates that the space for democratic professionalism has decreased drastically in both Sweden and Ireland as concerns the amount of times certain words related to the topic is mentioned. The qualitative interpretation suggests also an imaginary turn from pragmatic way of approaching issues of democratic professionalism where issues such as democratic values are regarded as to be in a dialectical relationship with knowledge acquisitions in the documents from 2000 and 2001 to a positivist approach where the documents from 2009 and 2010 not only tend to separate between (subject) knowledge and ethical values but place the main emphasis on the former.

References

Bryman, A (2011). Samhällsvetenskapliga metoder. Stockholm: Liber AB. Comparative Education. Vol. 36, No Special Number Comparative Education for the Twenty-First Century (Aug., 2000). Comparative Education vol. 36, nr 3, 2000, Special issue, Comparative Education for the twenty third century Cowen, R and Kazamias, A.M. (eds.) (2009). International Handbook of Comparative Education. Part one and two. London: Springer. Eriksson, Anita (2009). Om teori och praktik i lärarutbildning. En etnografisk och diskursanalytisk studie. Göteborg: Acta Universitatis Gothenburgensis. Fairclough, Norman (1992). Text and context. Linguistic and intertextual analysis within discourse analysis. Discourse and society, 3(2): 193-217. Fairclough, Norman (1993). Critical discourse analysis and the marketization of public discourse. The universities. Discourse and Society 4(2): 133-168. Fairclough, Norman (1995). Media discourse. London: Edward Arnold. Government of Ireland (2001). Teaching Council Act. Dublin: Author. Lynch, K., B. Grummell, and D. D. (2012). New Managerialism in Education Commercialization, Carelessness and Gender. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Prop. (2009/10:89). Bäst i klassen – en ny lärarutbildning. http://www.regeringen.se/content/1/c6/13/93/30/100696be.pdf Teaching Council (June 2011). Initial Teacher Education: Criteria and Guidelines for Programme Providers. Maynooth: Teaching Council. Tuleus, Öhman M. (2008). Lärarutbildning mellan det bekanta och obekanta – en studie av lärares och lärarstudenters beskrivning av levd erfarenhet i skola och högskola. Örebro Studies in Education 23. Örebro, Umeå: Örebro Universitet.

Author Information

Silvia Edling (presenting / submitting)

Gävle University Sweden

Geraldine Mooney Simmie (presenting)

University of Limerick Ireland

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