Since 2010, Teacher Educators and Education departments within the English context faced a wide range of challenges, ranging from changes to policy directives, as well as funding cuts and changes to the Teacher Education landscape via market reviews (Department for Education (DfE), 2021), as well as new requirements for accreditation processes, the rise of apprenticeships, and ongoing scrutiny via inspectorates. Teacher Educators often, due to their complex roles within this changing landscape, find that it is difficult to navigate their own career development as well as contributing effectively to the Higher Education (HE) sector, and as a result feels that they become marginalised within the HE sector.

This qualitative case study investigated perspectives from both Teacher Educators as well as Senior Leaders within HE to gain a detailed understanding of the perspectives and lived experiences of Teacher Educators as well as how they are perceived by Senior Leaders to gain insights into how Teacher Educators are positioned and how they need to respond to these challenges to contribute to the HE landscape. One of the key objectives was to consider how the study can help as an advocacy piece to make key recommendations on how practices can be refined, to enable Teacher Educators to contribute effectively within this space. The study makes key recommendations based on the rich data generated via semi-structured interviews from Teacher Educators across the different universities in the four nations as well as Senior Leaders across the sector. Qualitative data was thematically analysed using Braun and Clarke’s (2006) 6 phase model, and the key themes were used to draw conclusions and synthesise key points from the rich data.

The study outlined that teacher educators experience a complex landscape where their complex identity within the space, can become a barrier to their own contributions in a wider sense in HE. Teacher Educators’ Identities are often misunderstood by HE, and Senior Leaders, and they often don’t realise what qualities, skills and contributions Teacher Educators can make. As a result both Teacher Educators and Senior Leaders need to think carefully about how Teacher Educators can contribute and how they can advocate for their skills to contribute more specifically. Furthermore, Senior Leaders, need to actively seek how teacher educators’ expertise can contribute to enrich HE landscapes beyond Teacher Education too.

Braun, V. & Clarke, V. (2006). Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology, 3 (2). pp.77–101. ISSN 1478–088. Department for Education (2021), Initial teacher training (ITT) market review: overview, UK: DfE.