Continuing professional development (CPD) has been positioned internationally as a central policy instrument for reshaping teachers’ practices and professional responsibilities, particularly in relation to inclusive education. Within European and international policy agendas on continuing professional development, teachers are increasingly positioned as key agents responsible for responding to learner diversity across different areas of schooling, including physical education and school sport. At the same time, research has consistently highlighted tensions between inclusive policy discourses and the concrete organisation of pedagogical practices, especially in contexts where selection, performance, and hierarchical understandings of bodies continue to structure educational experiences.

Situated within these international debates, this paper examines how teachers make sense of continuing professional development for inclusive education, and how learning to respond to inclusion mandates is interpreted and mobilised within their professional trajectories. Rather than approaching CPD as a technical mechanism for the transfer of knowledge or skills, the study conceptualises professional learning as a situated, interpretive and contested process through which teachers negotiate what it means to enact inclusive education in practice. From this perspective, professional learning is closely connected to identity work, professional agency and decision-making within specific institutional and cultural conditions.

Empirically, the paper draws on an ongoing qualitative study based on teachers’ accounts following their participation in two continuing professional development courses focused on inclusive education and sport. These courses were developed within a collaborative and transnational educational initiative, involving partnerships between higher education institutions and professional organisations with recognised expertise in inclusive education and adapted sport. The courses aimed to deepen participants’ understanding of legal and pedagogical frameworks for inclusive education, to explore different approaches to adapted sport, and to analyse situations involving the participation of learners with and without disabilities across educational and community contexts.

Drawing on preliminary analyses of interview data, the findings indicate that teachers do not describe CPD for inclusive education in terms of linear impacts or straightforward professional improvement. Instead, they emphasise processes of reflection, questioning and reconfiguration of professional understandings, often marked by tensions between inclusive principles promoted through CPD and teachers’ attempts to translate these principles into professional practices, identities and decision-making within constrained institutional contexts. Participants also highlight enduring dilemmas related to the organisation of school sport, the persistence of selective practices and the perceived limits of individual professional action.

By foregrounding teachers’ voices, the paper discusses how continuing professional development for inclusive education becomes embedded in professional trajectories and identity work, shaping how teachers understand their roles, responsibilities and possibilities for action as inclusive professionals. In doing so, the study contributes to European and international dialogues on professional learning and development by critically problematising CPD as a policy instrument through which teachers are expected to learn how to become inclusive professionals.

This study adopts a qualitative and interpretive research design, grounded in the assumption that professional learning cannot be understood independently of the meanings that teachers attribute to their experiences, the contexts in which they work and the professional trajectories they construct over time. The methodological approach is therefore oriented towards exploring teachers’ perspectives on continuing professional development for inclusive education. Rather than evaluating the effectiveness or impact of continuing professional development (CPD), the study seeks to explore how teachers make sense of CPD for inclusive education and how such learning is mobilised in their professional practices, identities and decision-making. Empirical data are being generated through twelve semi-structured interviews with teachers and other educational professionals, working in educational and sporting contexts, who participated in two continuing professional development courses focused on inclusive education and sport. The courses were developed within a collaborative and transnational educational initiative and were designed to engage participants with legal and pedagogical frameworks for inclusive education. Interview guides were organised around four main dimensions: (i) experiences of the training process and its content; (ii) relationships with trainers and peers; (iii) professional expectations and future perspectives; and (iv) professional practices in relation to inclusion and sport. This structure was designed to capture both individual learning processes and the relational, institutional and contextual dimensions shaping professional learning for inclusive education. This narrative-oriented approach allows for an in-depth exploration of professional learning as a situated and contested process. Ethical principles of informed consent, confidentiality and voluntary participation guide all stages of the research. Data analysis is ongoing and follows a thematic and interpretive strategy. Interview transcripts are being analysed through iterative cycles of coding, combining inductive attention to participants’ accounts with sensitising concepts drawn from critical perspectives on professional learning, teacher identity and inclusive education. This process aims to identify recurring themes, tensions and patterns across participants’ narratives, while remaining attentive to divergences and contextual specificities. Categories are developed iteratively from the empirical material, allowing patterns, tensions and meanings to emerge from participants’ accounts while remaining theoretically sensitised to issues of professional learning, identity and inclusive education. To enhance analytical rigour and reflexivity, the analysis process includes collaborative discussions among the researchers, through which emerging categories and interpretations are jointly examined and refined. This collective analytical work supports the critical examination of analytical decisions and contributes to the consistency and trustworthiness of the analysis.

This study contributes to current debates on professional learning and development by offering a critical and interpretive perspective on teachers’ continuing professional development for inclusive education (IE). By foregrounding teachers’ voices and experiences, the paper shifts attention away from instrumental and outcome-oriented understandings of CPD and towards an analysis of how professional learning is experienced, interpreted and negotiated within professional trajectories and institutional contexts. The paper highlights the importance of understanding CPD for IE as a process through which teachers engage with inclusion as a professional mandate rather than as a set of technical solutions. Preliminary analyses suggest that CPD for IE tends to re-signify teachers’ professional identities and to expand their understanding of education, sport and inclusion as inseparable dimensions of their professional practice. Professional learning emerges not only as a space for acquiring knowledge but also for rethinking what it means to act as an inclusive professional. The study also points to persistent tensions between inclusive principles promoted through continuing professional development and the organisational, cultural and structural conditions that shape everyday professional practice. These tensions are particularly salient in contexts such as school sport, where practices of selection, performance and hierarchy remain deeply embedded and often limit teachers’ possibilities for enacting inclusive approaches. Such tensions are described by participants as affecting not only their practices, but also their sense of professional agency and responsibility. Conceptually, the study reinforces the relevance of approaching professional learning as a situated and contested process, closely linked to identity work and decision-making. By critically problematising CPD as a policy instrument for IE, it underscores the need to attend to teachers’ sense-making processes, professional dilemmas and contextual constraints. It contributes to European and international discussions on how professional learning opportunities can support teachers in critically engaging with the demands of IE.

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