Over the past several decades, there has been a noticeable shift towards requiring teacher educators to become more ‘research-active’ (Cochran-Smith, 2005). This shift has been precipitated in part, by developments in teacher education such as the growing awareness of the need to connect theory and practice, as well as the changing structural conditions of teacher educators’ work, such that increasing levels of research accreditation and activity are demanded for employment in higher education institutions, particularly universities (Chetty & Lubben, 2010). Competing definitions of what counts as research and how much professional time it should occupy in teacher educators’ work further complicate this situation (Davey, 2013). Yet, the idea of doing research, and thinking about themselves as researchers is still rather new to many teacher educators, particularly in countries where, up until recently, they have been employed typically in teaching-only positions. Hence, reconstructing and reconceptualising their identity and practices to include that of ‘researcher’ presents a potentially demanding new dimension of teacher educators’ work: one that involves personal challenge, including taking risks and working outside one’s comfort zone; and requires support, both institutionally and from within the teacher education profession itself.

The 4 papers in this symposium examine issues and challenges around teacher educators engaging with, and in, research, and draw on a variety of different national and positional perspectives in doing so. Paper 1 discusses the concept of ‘researcherly disposition’ and reports about the process of operationalizing it into a measurable construct. Paper 2 reports on a Norwegian initiative to develop a National Research school for Teacher Education as a means of engaging and empowering Teacher Educators through a formal research trajectory; Paper 3 explores the development and sustainability of a ‘grass-roots’ self-study research community of teacher educators in the Netherlands, while Paper 4 presents a Belgian collaborative self-study project that examines the professionalising role of the research process for teacher educators, as well as its potential in further theory development. The symposium discussant will explore questions and implications from the papers with the presenters and the audience, to enhance understanding about how local issues connect with a broader international perspective concerning TEs relationship with research in its various formats.

The symposium members represent a newly established International Forum for Teacher Educator development (InFo-TED), a network of academic teacher educators aimed at creating a coherent set of strategies to support the development of the professional identities and knowledge bases of teacher educators. InFo-TED is currently establishing a European platform for teacher educators’ sharing of experiences and co-learning via an on-line, as well as physical space, in the form of an academy for teacher educator learning and development. InFo-TED seeks to re-position teacher education practices and the professional education of teacher educators within the academy and explores how teacher education as a ‘boundary-crossing’ profession might establish its professional identity in the face of such potentially shifting terrain.

Chetty, R., & Lubben, F. (2010). Challenges for the scholarship of research in teacher education in a Higher Education institution in transition: Issues of identity. Teaching and Teacher Education, 26(4), 813-820. Cochran-Smith, M. (2005). Teacher Educators as researchers- Multiple Perspectives. Teaching and Teacher Education, 21, 219-225. Davey, R. (2013). The Professional Identity of Teacher Educators: Career on the cusp? London: Routledge.