Professional Standards for Teachers and School Leaders

A Key to School Improvement

Howard Green

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781134310272
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

What do the professional standards mean for teachers and school leaders? Everyone working in education needs a clear understanding of the professional standards required of teachers and school leaders.

Written by a team of expert and well-respected contributors, this book provides the definitive guide to the standards that are now widely used for initial teacher training, induction, continuing professional development and performance management. In addition it covers the standards for subject leaders, which underpin the national programme for subject leaders, and the standards for headteachers, which are now used as an essential requirement for headship.

The main element of each of the standards reflects the broad dimensions of teaching and leadership, covering everything from planning and assessing learning to relations with the wider community and managing one's own performance and development.

Clearly explaining the nature of the standards the writers demonstrate how they relate to the real world of teaching and leadership and point out key issues for the future. The final chapters of the book set the application of standards into a more critical framework and suggest how the standards can meet future as well as current needs.

Part I

The national context

Chapter 1

The role of the Teacher Training Agency: the first set of National Standards

Hugh Lawlor

Introduction

The Teacher Training Agency (TTA) was established as a non-governmental agency sponsored by the Department for Education (DfE) in 1994. The Agency's statutory objectives are set out in the Education Act 1994 as:

to contribute to raising the standards of teaching;

to promote teaching as a career;

to improve the quality and efficiency of all routes into the teaching profession; and

to secure the involvement of schools in all courses for the initial training of school teachers.

(DfE 1994)

The TTA's functions were previously carried out by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), Teaching as a Second Career (TASC), the Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (CATE) and the Department for Education (DfE). The Agency had no remit in Scotland or Northern Ireland, but a Unit was established in Wales in 1996. In 1994, the Agency's main functions were:

the funding of teacher training;

the accreditation of providers of initial training for school teachers;

providing information and advice about teacher training and teaching as a career; and

carrying out or commissioning research with a view to improving the standards of teaching and teacher training.

(DfE 1994)

At this stage strategic thinking about continuing professional development was embryonic, but by the Corporate Plan 1995 (TTA 1995a) had been translated into an aim to promote well-targeted, effective and co-ordinated continuing professional development. Indeed, the Agency was committed to promoting a coherent approach across initial teacher training, induction and in-service training. Objectives in the Corporate Plan 1995 included:

to co-ordinate the identification of national priorities and targeting strategies for continuing professional development in order to inform funding decisions and aid planning;

to improve the management and leadership skills and abilities of newly appointed headteachers (with the implementation of the HEADLAMP scheme by September, 1995);

to disseminate information about effective continuing professional development practices;

to carry out or commission investigations in order to inform the Teacher Training Agency's work.

(TTA 1995a)

The strategic role for continuing professional development in the agency was influenced by the results of an extensive survey of headteachers’ and teachers’ views on continuing professional development carried out by Mori early in 1994/1995. One of the most significant and influential findings expressed by a large proportion of those surveyed was the absence of a personal/professional/career framework for teachers and those in leadership roles in schools. This view was held by a large proportion of newly qualified teachers, and indeed was quoted by many of them as a likely reason for leaving teaching after a few years.

By the end of 1995 the TTA was in a position to send a letter setting out its ‘Initial Advice to the Secretary of State on Continuing Professional Development of Teachers’ (TTA 1995b). The letter proposed the development of National Standards, which would help to set targets for teachers’ development and career progression and would establish clear and explicit expectations of teachers in different key roles. At this point, the four key points in the profession were identified as:

Newly Qualified Teachers;

Expert Teachers;

Experts in Subject Leadership; and

Experts in School Leadership.

The initial advice was to set the agenda for continuing professional development at the TTA for the next six years until responsibility for CPD was transferred to the General Teaching Council (GTC), and for leadership development to the National College for School Leadership. In both cases, however, the Department for Education and Skills remained the ‘sponsoring’ authority, and for CPD it retained a strategic role. The term ‘expert teachers’ caused considerable debate and some amusement within and outside the TTA. Although draft National Standards were prepared for ‘expert teachers’, they were never implemented. Later, however, these Standards helped to inform the criteria for Advanced Skills Teachers. National Standards for Special Educational Needs Co-ordinators were added at a later date, and replaced ‘expert teachers’ as a key point in the profession.

Back in 1995 there was no blueprint for a continuing professional development framework other than a consensus within the Agency that any pathway for development should begin with newly qualified teachers and cater for a range of different career roles, with an emphasis on leadership and management responsibilities and functions. One major announcement, in October 1995, was to act as a catalyst to the work on National Standards and the framework. Gillian Shepherd, as Secretary of State for Education, announced at the Conservative Party Conference that there would be a professional qualification for headteachers. Such a qualification would be different from courses and awards in higher education, mainly because of the clear and explicit focus on the professional needs and capabilities of aspiring headteachers.

By the Corporate Plan 1996 (Promoting Excellence in Teaching), National Standards were to be established in four key roles in the profession. The Plan also identified September 1997 as the implementation date for the National Professional Qualification for Headteachers (later changed to Headship). Priorities identified in the 1996 Plan included:

improving school leadership and management;

improving subject leadership;

increasing Key Stage 2 teachers’ subject knowledge, particularly in literacy, mathematics, science, and design and technology;

increasing the effectiveness of special educational needs co-ordinators.

(TTA 1996)

Early preparatory work on national standards

Prior to wide consultation on the National Standards, considerable preparatory work was taking place in respect of standards for qualified teacher status and standards for headteachers. Changes in terminology reflected the debate in the TTA at advisory group and Board levels. At one stage discussion on the standards for school leaders encompassed the concept of shared or distributive leadership, at least at the senior level in schools. However, it was the strong view of the DfE (and presumably the Secretary of State) that the qualification should be for headteachers and not other school leaders, and that the National Standards should reflect this specific focus.

In the case of the Standards for Headteachers, a small group of TTA officers, higher education staff and two deputy headteachers looked first at the current provision for training and developing headteachers. This provision included diploma and higher degree courses, local education authority and Diocesan Board programmes, professional association programmes, business management models, and the management standards from The Management Charter Initiative (MCI). The latter organisation was responsible for developing National Standards of Performance for managers and supervisors, with the standards forming the basis of National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs). Management standards are based on the concept of competence, which is the ability of a manager to perform to the standards required in employment.

The Standards set out in detail what managers should be able to do in a particular role, as well as the personal competences to perform effectively. Personal competences are those individual skills or behavioural traits which managers use to perform effectively. There was strong support within the DfE for a professional qualification for headteachers that was based on a National Vocational Qualification model, and hence on the management standards. The preparatory group resisted this approach, and decided instead to take the best practices from the MCI competence model and from what was generally viewed as the more intellectually demanding and divergent approach of the higher education provision. The overriding influence was the need to focus on the professional preparation of aspiring headteachers in a way that was relevant and contemporary. Clearly influenced by the management...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Figures
• Tables
• List of Contributors
• Introduction
• Part 1 The national context
• Part 2 National Standards for teachers
• 3 National Standards for school leaders
• 4 Looking to the future
• Index