Educators’ responses to policy concerns about the gender balance of the teaching profession in Scotland

Concepts of gender equity are changing and the necessity of actively developing a fairer gender balance is now enshrined in the Gender Equality Legislation implemented in 2007 that required public bodies to positively promote equality. This study examines, from the perspectives of educators, their understandings of gendered inequalities in teaching and the issues that they raise for the profession. Overall, respondents did not see the numerical domination of women as a problem but instead they saw the benefits of maintaining the diversity of the teaching profession, since all pupils could benefit from the range of interests and attributes offered by both women and men. Respondents were both embracing and disputing popular discourses about the gender balance in teaching but argued strongly that there should be no discriminatory barriers to the profession. It is concluded that a policy approach to gender equality should address the material and social disadvantage experienced by those working in female‐dominated professions like teaching and this would ensure people would be enabled to exercise gendered preferences without penalties or unfair advantages in income or status.     

Advanced skills teachers: professional identity and status

The teaching profession continues to struggle with defining itself in relation to other professions. Even though public opinion positions teachers second only to doctors and nurses in terms of their professional status and prestige research in the UK suggests that teachers still believe that they have much lower status than other professions. With teacher job satisfaction considerably lower today than the past and on-going issues with teacher recruitment and retention, new government policies have set out to enhance the status of teachers both within and outside of the profession. The Advanced Skills Teacher (AST) grade was introduced in 1998 as a means to recognise and reward teaching expertise and was framed as a way of also raising the status of the teaching profession. As to what a teaching professional should look like, the AST was in many ways positioned as the embodiment. Using survey data from 849 ASTs and in depth interviews with 31, this paper seeks to explores the ways that the AST designation impacts or not on teachers’ perceptions of their professional identity. In particular, the paper considers whether such awards contribute in positive ways to a teacher’s sense of professional identity and status. The results from the research suggest that teaching grades that recognise and reward teaching excellence do contribute in important ways to a teachers’ professional identity via an increased sense of recognition, reward and job satisfaction. The results from this research also suggest that recognising the skills and expertise of teachers is clearly important in supporting teacher retention. This is because as it allows highly accomplished teachers to remain where they want to be and that is the classroom.     

Codes of Ethics on Assessment Practice: confronting a quandary or inculcating ethical character? — overview of two sample documents

This article reviews two examples of ethical codes produced to provide a set of standards, principles, or guidelines for professional conduct relating to educational assessment. Both codes classify professional responsibilities under key functions of assessment described in the article. The commentary identifies as important uses of the Codes self‐regulation of ethical standards within the profession and facilitation of teaching about ethical conduct. Although institutions and bureaucracies are increasingly regulating professional and research practice through ethics committees, it is argued that ethical behaviour is likely to be more effective and more pervasive when developed through education, reflection and deliberate modelling. Similarly, such behaviour is more likely to be sustained through peer scrutiny and professional self‐regulation than through monitoring via bureaucratic control. Such a stance implies the need for ready access to ethics codes widely known and endorsed within the profession.     

Pushing Past Clichés: Latina and Black Women’s Perceptions of the Dietetics Major and Profession during Career Exploration

Diversity in dietetics, like other health professions, has remained stagnant despite the increase of racial and ethnic minority groups in the United States. We examined how Latina and Black women, enrolled in a university outreach program, make sense of a critical media literacy program during career introduction to dietetics. Our findings revealed that the women did not identify with the dietetics major and profession due to stereotypical images. Cliché messages were used as a discourse method. The need to explore public discourse to understand identity formation and barriers to entry into health profession careers is discussed.     

教师发展学校——教师专业成长的有效路径

教师发展学校是大学与巾小学的合作建设,是在合作研究的实践中实现教师的发展;大学与中小学合作是教师专业发展的保迁,教师专业发展学校突出中小学骨干教师在教师培养中的重要作用;教师专业发展学校的建立促进新教师的专业成长。     

Overlooked aspects in the education of science professionals: Mentoring,ethics, and professional responsibility

Science as profession is generally defined narrowly as research. Science education as preparation for a profession in research is usually perceived as course work and laboratory training, even though the necessary knowledge and skills to pursue a research career are more extensive and diverse and are learned in one-on-one interaction with mentors. A complete education of science professionals includes the values, ethical standards and conventions of the discipline since they are fundamental to the profession. Mentoring and education in the responsible conduct and reporting of research and in the ethical dimensions of science are among the professional responsibilities of scientists and need to be discussed as part of science education. Moreover, science as an enterprise is much more than research and includes a number of other components, including science teaching, science journalism, and science policy. Each of these contributes to the nature of science and its role in society.     

高职院校弹性人才培养模式的实践与探索

“大类招生,专业分流”是目前先进国家通行的人才培养模式,也是我国高职院校实施的弹性人才培养模式。但由于高职教育学制短、专业划分细、实践环节多等因素,以及受教学资源、教学条件、教学手段的限制,按专业群大类招生还处于探索阶段。深圳职业技术学院对部分专业实施弹性人才培养模式进行探索,实践证明,弹性人才培养模式对提高学生的复合能力、创新能力及实践能力起着促进作用。     

西方教学伦理研究的路向与问题

教学专业化的努力,以及有效教学实践范式之弊端的不断凸显,推动了教学伦理研究的发展。相关文献回顾表明,教学内在的道德本质与其作为专业所需满足的外在标准,为教学的伦理特性提供了辩护。作为哲学—规范探究的补充,实证研究深化了我们对教师伦理实践复杂性的理解。当前,有待思考的问题是如何寻求有效教学与合伦理教学的平衡,及如何拓宽实证研究论域,并将相关发现更好地纳入哲学—规范探究的话语体系之中。     

Ethical challenges of in-the-field training: a surgical perspective

The teaching of professions in which technical and manual acts combined with excellent judgment are used to enhance the safety of people, poses challenges to educators. Book learning combined with mock or simulated situations goes a long way, but ultimately “in-the-field” instruction and learning is necessary to qualify trainees for many occupations such as doctors, pilots, firefighters, police officers, and many others. The dilemma is how to teach potentially life-altering techniques in a real-life setting without compromising the safety of the recipient of the service being taught. Using the exemplary model of surgical teaching in the technology-heavy and high-tension world of neurosurgery, the authors attempt to explore this ethical and practical dilemma.     

Some Thoughts on Motivation in Sport

This paper examines the content and context of changes in the dominant discourses of physical education. It begins with an analysis of the role of language in publicly defining a role for new professions and defining the nature of that profession's expertise. It then briefly traces the reconstruction of university physical education as sports studies, sport sciences, and sport management and situates these discourses in a political and historical context. The final sections proceed to deconstruct the languages of sport science and sport management, to connect these with struggles to redefine the profession, and to point to some issues for professional education if physical education is to retain any of its traditional humanistic meanings. The argument is grounded in an interview study of technical and administrative professionals in Canadian high performance sport.     

The passion of teaching: learning from an older generation of teachers

This article reports on a qualitative small-scale case study that investigated what pre-service teachers learned from a former generation of teachers about the context and nature of teaching and teacher education during the 1950s and 1960s. Data comprised semi-structured interviews and a grounded theoretical approach was used to analyse the data. A process of coding and re-coding of the data resulted in the identification of emergent patterns and broad overarching themes and subthemes. Findings suggest that the pre-service teachers drew inspiration from the older teachers’ emotional connection to the profession, and their own passion for teaching developed or intensified as they came to understand teaching as a rewarding lifelong career. It is suggested that mentor relationships between pre-service teachers and those from an older generation have the potential to support novice teachers in developing a passion for teaching and, ultimately, resilience and longevity in the profession. Recommendations are made for the inclusion in teacher education of opportunities for intergenerational learning through such relationships.     

Professional Ethics in the College and University Science Curriculum

Scientific ethics is a subset of professional ethics, the special rules of conduct adopted by those engaged in one of the pursuits regarded as professions, such as law, medicine, engineering and science. Professional ethics derive from a moral ideal based on service. This ideal leads to a pair of bargains: an internal bargain that defines the internal code of practice within the profession, and an external bargain that defines the relationship between the profession and society. This article develops the internal and external bargains that are the basis of scientific ethics from both an historical and a philosophical perspective and makes suggestions as to how the teaching of scientific ethics can be integrated into the undergraduate curriculum.     

The ongoing education of engineering practitioners: how do they perceive the usefulness of academic research?

This study explores the usefulness of academic research to engineering practitioners. Issues such as knowledge transfer, the research-practice gap and the changing social/political environment are discussed. An empirical survey of practitioners is analysed to better understand the engineering professions use of academic material, such as research journals, with the medical profession acting as the benchmark. The study also examines the future role for academia from the perspective of practitioners, with areas such as engagement, relevance, dissemination and education highlighted. While the study found there was a reasonable level of utilisation of academic material, there are still some significant gaps. The study brings to the fore the issue of relevance in applied research fields and highlights the need to evaluate the usefulness of our research to practitioners and the betterment of society.     

根据道德取向选拔医学生的研究

本文在对来自澳大利亚、以色列、斐济、新西兰、苏格兰、英格兰的7864名医学生或医学生申请者以及84名澳大利亚心理学学生进行问卷调查基础上,研究道德取向对职业、伦理标准、伦理行为的影响。本文提出了一个比较新的观点,即衡量一名医学工作者或医学生的道德水准,通过道德取向来衡量,比通过道德决断来衡量更为准确。     

论数学教师专业化的内涵

数学教师专业化是世界数学教师教育的发展趋势，数学教师专业化的内涵包括：数学教师数学专业化、数学教师教育专业化和数学教师专业情意，数学专业化结构由数学学科知识，数学能力和数学素养构建起来，教育专业化结构由教育学科知识，一般文化科学知识、一般教学能力和数学教学能力构建起来，数学教师专业情意在数学教学中对激发学生学习数学的兴趣和动机，营造数学学习环境，提高数学成绩、完善学生个性、塑造学生人格，优化情感品质、提高数学认知加工水平等方面均有重要价值。     

民族院校师德建设的现状及其对策

民族院校是我国教育特殊而重要的组成部分,师德是提升民族院校办学质量和效益的关键。民族院校师德建设是民族地区政治、社会稳定的内在要求,是传承优秀文化的重要要求,是民族地区经济发展的迫切要求。当前民族院校师德存在的问题主要有政治观念淡漠、教师职业行为失准、对学生缺乏爱心、教学责任心下降、教书育人意识比较淡薄、为人师表的模范表率作用有待强化、治学态度不够严谨等。民族院校加强师德教育是关键,完善师德建设的制度保障是重点,健全师德评价体系是难点。     

Let right be done: trying to put ethical standards into practice

The development of ethical standards by professional associations, boards, councils and colleges of teachers, responds in part to a moral imperative that teachers and school leaders be accountable to the wider community, and in part to a desire to enhance the overall professionalism of educators' behaviour. This article explores the conceptual and practical complexities inherent in defining ethical standards for the teaching profession with a particular focus on their questionable capacity for implementation. In combining empirical evidence from previously reported research studies with newly fabricated first person narrative responses to the evidence, the article seeks to illustrate the difficulty, if not the impossibility, of applying ethical standards to actual situations in any professionally and ethically satisfying way. It argues further that moral dilemmas facing teachers are potentially resolvable only by communities of educators internalizing and applying principles of ethics, not formalized codes or standards.     

Clues From Dinosaurs,Mules, and the Bull Snake: Our Field in the 21st Century

Delphine Hanna was a pioneer in both disciplinary scholarship and the establishment of professional programs. In this paper I contend that we must follow her example if we are to survive in the 21st century. In the past half century we have evolved from a profession primarily associated with teaching to a group of subdisciplines and many different professions. We got where we are as we both reacted to criticism and conformed to university concepts of centrality. For optimal development of both the disciplines and professions of kinesiology/physical education, it is suggested that we must become a field that includes both the disciplines and professions. The field should reward the many different roles equally in the pursuit of its common goals. We learn from nature and history that working together is critical for survival. By working together, we can make kinesiology/physical education the renaissance field of the 21st century.     

Career choice motivation using behavioral strategies

Qualified teachers are a fundamental input for any education system. This paper presents the results of a large-scale intervention to attract high performing high-school students into the teaching profession in Chile. The intervention was a three-arm email campaign which made salient three types of motivations: intrinsic/altruistic, extrinsic, and prestige-related. The “intrinsic” and “prestige” arms reduced applications to teaching majors among high performers, while the “extrinsic” arm increased applications among low performers. A plausible interpretation could be that the “intrinsic” and “prestige” messages made more salient an issue that could otherwise be overlooked by high performing students (typically from more advantaged households), negatively impacting their program choice: that the social value of the teaching still lags behind other professions that are valued more by their families and social circles. In turn, the “extrinsic” arm made salient the recent improvements in the economic conditions of the teaching profession in Chile, thus appealing to low performing students who in general come from disadvantaged families and for whom monetary incentives are potentially more relevant. These results show that making salient certain types of motivations to the wrong target group could lead to undesired results.