It is widely recognised that the quality of any education system cannot exceed the quality of the teaching within it. It is therefore important to understand and recognise the factors that enhance the ability of practitioners within the Adult and Further Education (AFE) sector to deliver quality teaching and learning within our colleges. Significant challenges in meeting twin funding and performance pressures within the AFE sector run in parallel with a clear drive to recognise and enhance the professionalism of practitioners, particularly through the acquisition of formal Teacher Education Qualifications and continuous professional development. Yet, teacher education and professional development within the AFE sectors in the island of Ireland is not well researched. We need additional research to understand the experience and impact of these changes from the perspective of practitioners and an identification of what is most effective in meeting their learning and professional development needs. 

This study aims to explore how and why AFE teachers seek to develop professionally, how they experience professional development programmes, and what learning spaces are needed to support teachers’ ‘readiness for change’ as they envisage future possible selves personally and professionally. We suggest that identifying the starting point, the predominant driving force, for the AFE educator, is critical in developing a different and fulfilling pathway towards professional development.

Key research questions that guide this study include:

• What is ‘professional learning and development’ for AFE teachers? What is the starting point for attaining further ‘qualification’?
• What is their experience of AFE faculty development programmes?
• In what ways do teacher’s perspectives shift during and after their professional development programme?
• What facilitates and inhibits AFE teachers’ journey in their professional development?

Transformative learning, framed by Jack Mezirow (1991, 2012), adoptsa cognitive/rational approach emphasising the critical role that experience and reflection play on existing assumptions about the world in order to arrive at a new worldview. He theorises about how adults interpret their life experience and defines learning as a meaning making activity. Described as a shift of consciousness that alters in both a dramatic and permanent way our ‘being in the world’, it changes how we know (Graham Cagney, 2011; 2014). It leads to a different kind of thinking and being that enables the individual to become open to revisiting their interpretations of the meaning of their experience: in turn guiding future action (Cranton, 2006; Tennant, 2012).

Inner’ Teaching-Learning Environment. Constructivist research, funded by the UK government into enhancing teaching-learning environments (TLEs) suggests that students’ perceptions of the TLE are strongly determined by the ‘a set of overlapping contexts that comprise of four elements: course contexts; teaching and assessing content; staff-student relationships; and aspects of the students and student culture within a particular programme (Entwistle 2003; Entwistle & McCune, 2009). The ‘inner’ TLE map acts as an organising framework when considering how to achieve a higher quality of learning through the creation of transformative learning spaces (Graham Cagney, 2011).

Identity self-states draws on a ‘motivational self systems’ framework that incorporates ‘possible’ and ‘ideal’ selves theory (Markus & Nurius, 1986) and self-discrepancy theory. Three seminal reviews of the literature on teacher identity in the last decade (Beauchamp & Thomas, 2009; Beijard et al 2004; Rodgers & Scott, 2008) highlight the importance of and interrelation of notions of identity, context, emotion and agency. Beijard et al (204) and Hamman, Gosselin, Romano and Bunuan (2010) identify a strong preoccupation with investigating characteristics or content, namely what roles and values, constitute teacher identity and less attention on the situational and contextual factors within the broader framework of teacher professional development. 

Beauchamp, C., & Thomas, L. (2009). Understanding teacher identity: an overview of issues in the literature and implications for teacher education. Cambridge Journal of Education, 39(2), 175-189. Beijaard, D., Meijer, P. C., & Verloop, N. (2004). Reconsidering research on teachers’ professional identity. Teaching and Teacher Education, 20, 107-128. Conway, P. F., & Clark, C. M. (2003). The journey inward and outward: a re- examination of Fuller’s concerns-based model of teacher development. Teaching and Teacher Education, 19, 465- 482. Cranton, P. (2006) Understanding and Promoting Transformative Learning. 2nd Ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. deMarrais, K. & Lapan, S. (2004). (Eds.), Foundations for research: Methods of inquiry in education and the social sciences. NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Entwistle, N. (2003). Concepts and conceptual frameworks underpinning the ETL project. OCC. Report 3, Higher and Community Education, University of Edinburgh: School of Education. Graham Cagney, A. (2011) ‘Finding the Red Thread’: The Role of the Learning Space in Transformative Learning in Executive Education. PhD Thesis, Trinity College, Dublin. Graham Cagney, A. (2014). Transformative Learning. In D. Coghlan & M.Brydon Miller (Eds). The SAGE Encyclopedia of Action Research, SAGE Hamman, D. & Gosselin, K., Romano, J. And Banuan, R. (2010) Using possible- selves theory to understand the identity development of new teachers. Teaching and Teacher Education, 26, 1349-1361. Husband G (2015) The impact of lecturers’ initial teacher training on continuing professional development needs for teaching and learning in post-compulsory education, Research in Post Compulsory Education, 20 (2), pp. 227-244. Mezirow, J. (1991) Transformative Dimensions of Adult Learning, SanFrancisco: Jossey-Bass. Mezirow, J. (2012) Learning to Think Like an Adult: Core Concepts of Transformation Theory, in The Handbook of Transformative Learning: Theory, Research, and Practice, (2012) Taylor, E.W., Cranton, P and Associates (Eds) SanFrancisco: Jossey-Bass. Markus, H. & Nurius, P., (1986), Possible selves. American Psychologist, Vol.41 (9) pgs 954-969 Rodgers, C.R. & Scott, K.H. (2008). The development of the personal self and professional identity in learning to teach, Handbook of Research on Teacher Education, 732-755 Roulston, K. (2010). Reflective interviewing: A guide to theory and practice. Los Angeles: SAGE. Tennant, M. (2012). The Learning Self: Understanding the potential for transformation, SanFrancisco: JosseyBass.