This special issue of Professional Development in Education, edited by Aileen Kennedy and Howard Stevenson (2023) explicitly sought to encourage a critique of much mainstream professional learning and development (PLD), while also offering a more optimistic vision of what genuinely transformative professional learning can, and should, look like. Several contributions explored the limitations of much current professional learning provision, but the main focus was on the development of the notion of ‘transformation’ at a theoretical level. An interesting feature of the SI is the broad range of conceptual frameworks that contributors drew on, often working with more than one approach and seeking interesting ways to meld different frameworks. Many of the contributors utilised Jack Mezirow’s work (1997), but a range of approaches rooted in critical pedagogy and radical adult education were also evident. The work often highlighted the importance, but also the limitations, of these valuable intellectual traditions. This presentation will offer an overview of how ‘transformation’ is conceived across all the articles in the Special Issue. While conceptual pluralism can be a value, it can also reflect an element of incoherence when considering what is being ‘transformed’, how and by whom. Such uncertainty can then contribute to the term being denuded of any real meaning, as happens frequently in those contexts where ‘transformation’ appears to denote little more than ‘substantial change’. This paper will make the case for a deeper theorising of the notion of transformative learning in a PLD context. It is an approach that sees personal transformation as nested within a wider collective transformation and, in turn, offering the prospect of a transformation of social relations (Stevenson 2024). Such an approach is necessary if those who position themselves as engaged in ‘critical professional learning’ (Parkhouse et al, 2023) are able to navigate the unavoidable tensions and contradictions that flow from working simultaneously ‘in and against’ work contexts that are exploitative and unjust (Mayo, 2005). This is a form of professional learning that goes beyond learning for work, or even learning about work, but takes seriously the notion of learning against work.

Aileen Kennedy & Howard Stevenson (2023) Beyond reproduction: the transformative potential of professional learning, Professional Development in Education, 49:4, 581-585, DOI: 10.1080/19415257.2023.2226971 Peter Mayo (2005) ‘In and against’ the state: Gramsci, war of position and adult education. www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/bitstream/123456789/1463/1/War_of_Position-Mayo-libre-1.pdf Jack Mezirow (1997). Transformative learning: Theory to practice. New directions for adult and continuing education, 1997(74), 5-12. Hillary Parkhouse, Jesse Senechal & Elizabeth Severson-Irby (2023) Laying a foundation for critical professional development through a research–practice partnership, Professional Development in Education, 49:4, 725-738, DOI: 10.1080/19415257.2023.2193198 Howard Stevenson (2024) Educational Leadership and Antonio Gramsci: The Organising of Ideas, Routledge.