This study is located within the context of the English education system but seeks to examine parallels with pan – European perspectives on teacher education. The paper resides in the work of two universities in the North-West of England, both of which is involved in initial and postgraduate teacher education.

The focus of the research derives from a perceived mismatch between notions of competency. This lack of congruence can be seen both within the context of UK teacher training (although this paper only addresses the English pattern) and emerging practice within the European Union.  It is suggested that this mismatch derives not from key drivers in developing ‘common principles’ such as those articulated by the European Commission (2006), but from an agenda common within educational systems such as those in the UK and increasingly, it is suggested, within the EU, that are premised on the notion that teacher competency can be reduced to a set of measurable outcomes.  An example of this process is the newly developed Masters in Teaching and Learning (MTL), which has much in common ideologically with the aforementioned EU perspective (2006), but which is Standards driven. Specifically, the MTL is written against a set of professional ‘Core Standards’ for teachers in England that detail the attributes, knowledge, understanding and skills that qualified teachers are expected to demonstrate.

As a response, this paper sets out to examine the perspectives of four groups of teachers, two in training, and two in service, and examines how their perceptions of teacher competency appear to change during different stages of their career. The two groups of trainees, one at the beginning of their Initial Teacher Education, and one who had just completed their final school placement, were selected to examine how ideas of competency develop during training.  The in service groups were selected to examine whether there was a divergence of ideas of competency between a group engaging in a Masters’ degree programme and another who had not engaged with Masters’ level learning.

This examination of the perceptions of a range of prospective and serving teachers reveals an interesting dichotomy of perspective. In particular, students in the latter stages of their training, with only a very few exceptions, and teachers who were not engaged with a Masters programme, demonstrated perceptions of competence in instrumental terms such as having the ability to deliver a nationally prescribed curriculum or accepting, often uncritically, government led interventions.  In contrast, the student teachers in the early stages of their training and the serving teachers on a Masters’ programme articulated a more reflective notion of competency that was learner-centred and holistic, and demonstrated a willingness to critique the political zeitgeist.

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