Across various countries, the privatization of instructional services through private practice teaching has been reported (Camphuijsen & Stolp, 2023; Caravatti, 2015; Goldring & Ogwa, 2002; Grimshaw, Earnshaw & Hebson, 2003; Pollock, 2007). Private practice teaching can take multiple forms (Camphuijsen & Stolp, 2023; Goldring & Ogwa, 2002; Pollock, 2007). One model involves teachers registering as self-employed workers, independently contracting with school systems to provide specific instructional services. Another model relies on private staffing agencies, which recruit and place teachers in schools. In this arrangement, teachers do not sign employment contracts with the school system itself but instead with the staffing agency, which becomes their formal employer. This rise of private practice teaching challenges traditional notions of the teaching profession, which in many contexts has been associated with long-term employment, job security, and a commitment to public service. Teachers have often been perceived as altruistic professionals, driven by a sense of duty to contribute to the public good rather than by economic incentives or managerial oversight. However, as private practice teaching expands, it raises the question of how this form of public-private entanglement influences and shapes teachers’ values, motivations, and professional identities. In this paper, we examine the phenomenon of private practice teaching in the Netherlands, a context where the number of private practice teachers has doubled over a decade (Camphuijsen & Stolp, 2022). In particular, the paper addresses how private practice teachers view and construct their professional role and identity vis-à-vis the larger school bureaucracy and understand and enact teacher professionalism. Theoretically, the study is informed by scholarship in the area of sociology of the professions. The analysis relies on 28 in-depth interviews with private practice teachers. Preliminary findings highlight how feelings of de-professionalization under regular employment contracts can nudge teachers to look for other opportunities to exercise professionalism and to bring their working conditions more in line with professional expectations. Self-actualization, entrepreneurship and more specialized tasks are at the core of how private practice teachers construct their professional duties and obligations. While most private practice teachers feel a strong sense of responsibility for the development, safety and well-being of their pupils, many of them feel more loosely connected to school bureaucracies. The implications of private practice teaching for the teaching profession and the functioning of schools as public institutions are discussed.

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