Professional Development and Policy Input

Professional Development.

Two words which can strike fear into the heart of any teacher. Particularly when preceded by the tagline 'Full day of....' and followed by 'Lunch not provided.'

As the media has another swing at teacher training and professional standards and the Victorian state government considers raising the entrance requirements for education courses (see this huffy article from The Age), teachers around Australia are re-entering their school buildings to prepare for a new school year. Inevitably this means at least one or two days of focused professional development, usually where the whole-school focus is rolled out for the staff to get their heads around before descending into the madness of actually teaching curriculum, setting assessment and herding students. Sometimes this might be a school wide curriculum shake up, a new behavior management program, or bizarrely in one school I was a part of, two hours of guru-guided mindful meditation.

I must admit I have a low tolerance for most forms of professional development. Sometimes what is deemed PD is actually just a promo campaign that involves school leadership trying, successfully or not, to sell whatever new program that is sweeping through the five other schools in their leadership circles. Sometimes PD is paying for a so called expert to come in and speak for five hours, but none of their tips are actually relevant to your school context. Most of the time PD is actually admin stuff that could've been communicated much more succinctly, or is going to create more admin for you, and you spend the whole hour secretly plotting how you are going to buy the perfect file organizer from Officeworks, because, dammit, you are going to require a PhD in logistics to be able to complete all the paperwork that this new program requires.

The solution is, of course, to put power back into the hands of the teachers. Anybody who is a regular peruser of education blogs or part of the Twittersphere will know that teacher-led professional development is enjoying some incredible success, both here in Australia and overseas. It cuts down on costs because it utilizes the staff you already have, most of whom already know far more about their own classrooms then some visiting expert. It gives teachers autonomy to focus on what is important to them, and provides other staff members with tangible skills that are immediately helpful.

The solution is so simple. Ask the teachers. Der.

So I wonder why there is so little input from teachers into policy based decisions such as the one currently being floated by the state government. All teachers have gone through teacher education, and they are intimately aware of its faults and strengths. Judging from the comments sections on the Age website, there is no end of opinions from teachers as to the relative merits of such an approach. Why do I feel like I don't have a say in what happens to me in my school because of decisions my elected officials have made?

The union continues to represent teachers but often gets locked down in power struggles with whatever pay dispute or  wage issue that is at hand.

Is policy the domain of politicians, or is there room for policy to be shaped and led by the very people that will be enacting it? Can teachers be given the freedom and space to come up with innovative solutions to guide their profession? Is policy, nebulous and aspirational as it is, the way to bring about change?