Apprenticeship in England – the continued role of the academic–vocational divide in shaping learner identities

Successive governments have pledged to enhance the quality of apprenticeship in Britain so as to achieve ‘parity of esteem’ with academic study. Yet, at the same time, the discourse of the academic-vocational divide has dominated the academic, policy-maker and practitioner debates. This paper draws on two recent studies designed to explore the learner identities of apprentices on different apprenticeship programmes: motor vehicle maintenance (level 2) and engineering (level 3). Through this work, we are able to explore the role of the academic–vocational divide in identity construction and to challenge assumptions about vocational learners. It will be argued, that, far from being ‘naturally practical’, the young people draw on normative discursive categories in their construction of continuous identities. The findings raise important questions about the UK apprenticeship system as currently conceived, while at the same time drawing attention to the possibility for change.     

Caught up in the past? Social inclusion,skills, and vocational education and training policy in England

Since the mid-1990s, governments of different political persuasion have tried to reform VET policy to address problems in skills formation and social inclusion. Despite considerable policy activism, success has been somewhat limited, and England failed to overcome the problems associated with its liberal training regime. This article assesses the failure in vocational skills formation as a political economy and a public policy problem. It challenges the determinism in the political economy literature, points to poor public policy-making, and outlines possible policy levers.     

Datafying the teaching ‘profession’: remaking the professional teacher in the image of data

This paper explores how data-driven practices and logics have come to reshape the possibilities by which the teaching profession, and teaching professionals, can be known and valued. Informed by the literature and theorising around educational performativity, the constitutive power of numbers, and affective responses to data, it shows how different US educators experienced, and came to embody, new forms of numbers-based accountability. Drawing on interviews with teachers, and school- and district-level leaders, as well as relevant school-based documents, it is argued that such data are now both effective (i.e. they change ‘what counts’ within the profession) and affective (i.e. they produce new expectations for teachers to profess data-responsive dispositions over actual educative practices). This prevalence and use of data have combined not only to change teaching into a ‘data profession’, but also to change teachers into ‘professors’ of data.     

Lady Albemarle’s youth workers: contested professional identities in English youth work 1958–1985

This article examines tensions and developments in youth work following the Albemarle Report in 1960, which sought to revive the flagging youth service. It uses oral history interviews with former youth workers and club members in London and Liverpool, archival research looking at the documents of voluntary youth clubs and associations in London and Liverpool, and national policy documents to uncover ideas about the professional youth worker between 1958 and 1985. It examines three main areas of tension: between older and newer methods in youth work, between volunteers and those with a sense of themselves as professional workers, and the conflict between those in voluntary youth association management, allied professions (e.g. teaching and social work) and the youth worker. Ultimately it shows youth work was professionalising at this time but that its status remained unclear. This article aids our understanding of professionalisation, informal education, and youth in post-war Britain.     

The professionalisation of teaching: teacher training and education reform in Austria, 1867–1914

This article examines Austria’s efforts to reform teacher education during the period of the Dual Monarchy, 1867–1914. It offers insight into the role of teachers in Austrian society and how this role changed over time. It demonstrates that, during this period, teaching became an institutionalised and professionalised occupation. This process of professionalisation brought teachers firmly under state control, leading to conflict between teachers and the Austrian educational bureaucracy. This process also led to the development of a robust network of teachers’ associations to represent the interest of Austrian teachers and to contribute to their professional development. This article utilises documents from the Austrian educational bureaucracy, printed curriculum and pedagogical journals to illustrate that Austrian teacher training reforms offer crucial insight into the development of public education in the late nineteenth century.     

Is the restructured initial professional training in educational psychology fit for purpose?

Following changes to educational psychology training, the research aimed to examine whether the new training is considered “fit for purpose”, using a mixed-methods design. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected via semi-structured online questionnaires completed by recently qualified educational psychologists (RQEPs) who completed training programmes in 2009 and 2010, and principal educational psychologists (PEPs). 64 RQEPs and 15 PEPs responded to the online questionnaires distributed through the Educational Psychology Network (EPNET) and the National Association of Principal Educational Psychologists (NAPEP) forums, as well as via all initial professional training providers in the UK (excluding Scotland). Frequency counts were calculated for quantitative data. Thematic analysis was employed to analyse the qualitative data. Findings suggest that RQEPs gain skills and competencies that are used and valued by services, specifically, professional and interpersonal competencies to face demanding roles. Gaps were identified in relation to providing RQEPs with therapeutic competencies that they and PEPs would value. Discrepancies between the training provided and the realistic educational psychologist (EP) role were highlighted, in addition to the impact these seem to have on RQEPs. Facilitators and barriers to implementation of training were identified. The restructured initial professional training appears to have provided RQEPs with relevant training that is used and valued by services. It seems that some level of “mismatch” in training and job requirements will remain until a consistent educational psychology identity can be formed, either through the profession itself or due to enforced Government changes to the role. Recommendations for RQEPs, Educational Psychology Services, including PEPs, and future programme providers are presented.     

A language teacher’s agency in the development of her professional identities: A narrative case study

This narrative case study examined how a Hispanic language teacher invested agency while developing professional identities in different contexts. A recursive analysis of interviews and journal entries indicated that the participant’s English language learning experience, the discrimination and marginalization in the work environments, and the knowledge gained through graduate studies all shaped her agency and professional identities development. The findings highlight the complex links among and significant roles of ethnic and racial background, past experience, and power differentials in shaping the dynamic nature of teacher agency and identities.     

[RE]Visioning the academic–teacher divide: power and knowledge in the educational community

In this paper, we explore the divide between academics and teachers over the production and use of knowledge. Teachers' views (pre-service and inservice teachers from both Australia and the United States) on educational research are utilized to better understand and [re]vision this divide. These teachers overwhelmingly dismissed academic research on the grounds that it is not practical, contextual, credible, or accessible. Using these challenges as a starting point, we examine the way relations of power, particularly in terms of discursive and material conditions, bind the views and practices of both teachers and academics. This analysis suggests that the education of teachers is a crucial site for restructuring the relationship between teachers and academics.     

The vocational–academic divide in neoliberal upper secondary curricula: the Swedish case

A historical tension between a more general and a more specific focus in post-compulsory education is made visible in some educational systems by the division into more academic and more vocational programmes. Embedded in this tension are questions of social justice and the purposes of education. In addition, division into academic and vocational programmes has class dimensions since youth with working class backgrounds are often over-represented in vocational programmes. This study investigates how this tension is handled in the Swedish upper secondary curriculum, which reflects an international neoliberal policy trend in promoting competition, employability and employer influence over the curriculum. By analysing how the educational content of vocational educational and training (VET) programmes and higher educational preparatory (HEP) programmes is contextualised, we found that the two programme types were based on very different logics. In VET programmes, knowledge is strongly context-bound and often related to regulating behaviours. This contrasts sharply with the way knowledge is contextualised in HEP programmes in which less context-bound knowledge and skills such as using concepts, models and critical thinking are dominant. Students in VET programmes are trained to ‘do’ and to ‘adapt’, while the students in HEP programmes are trained to ‘think’ and to ‘imagine possibilities’. Thus, students from different social classes are prepared for very different roles in society.     

Managing the teaching–research nexus: ideals and practice in research-oriented universities

This paper demonstrates that while ideals of close linkages between research and teaching are widely embraced in research-oriented universities, a practice of division of labour between teaching-oriented and research-oriented staff persists. In an investigation of how the research–teaching nexus is managed at three Swedish universities, we identify a perceived misalignment between institutional incentives for individual academic staff and the needs of teaching. Under pressure from such tensions, managers are forced to deploy pragmatic strategies for the staffing of undergraduate education tasks. This includes allowing research needs and agendas to take priority over teaching needs. While managers seek to secure the participation of senior researchers in education, they often actively prefer to delegate the bulk of teaching activities to less research-active staff. Such strategies seem to reinforce existing patterns of division of labour among academic staff.     

Ambassadors of the Swedish nation: national images in the teaching of the Swedish lecturers in Germany 1918–1945

This article analyses the teaching of Swedish language lecturers active in Germany during the first half of the twentieth century. It shows the centrality of literature and literary constructions and analyses images of Swedishness and the Swedish nation present in the teaching material of that time in relation to the national image present in Swedish schoolbooks. The importance of language teaching to the transfer of knowledge regarding foreign countries is also discussed, in this case the knowledge and images of Sweden that were transferred to German students via their lecturers.     

Changing academic identities in changing academic workplaces: learning from academics’ everyday professional writing practices

In this article we examine issues of academic identity through the lens of academics’ everyday workplace writing, offering a complementary perspective to those already evident in the higher education research literature. Motivated by an interest in the relationship between routine writing and aspects of professional practice, we draw on data from interviews with 30 academics across three different universities. Our discussion is illustrated with excerpts from interview data, and is organised around three emerging themes: ‘reconstructing academic identities in a shifting academic workplace’, ‘considering new articulations of disciplinarity’, and ‘moving on from the golden age’. We conclude that the reconstruction of academic identities, through engagement with established and emerging workplace documents, may well be enabling academics to build new identities within the changing university.     

Teachers’ professional learning goals in relation to teaching experience*

In this study, we explored the relationships between teachers’ self-articulated professional learning goals and their teaching experience. Although those relationships seem self-evident, in programmes for teachers’ professional development years of teaching experience are hardly taken into account. Sixteen teachers with varying years of experience and subjects were interviewed. The results show different learning goals, related to communication and organisation, curriculum and instruction, innovation, responsibilities, and themselves as professional. Various relationships between learning goals and teaching experience emerged, which clearly reflect the development from early- to mid- and late-career teachers. Issues related to curriculum and instruction appeared to be learning goals for early- and mid-career teachers. This implies that regardless of increasing teaching expertise, curriculum and instruction remain central to teachers’ continuous learning. Late-career teachers were interested in learning about extra-curricular tasks and innovations. Models of professional life phases have been used to interpret these results.     

Revisiting the research–teaching nexus in a managerial context: exploring the complexity of multi-layered factors

Drawing on in-depth interviews and classroom observations with 14 academics from the field of applied sciences, this case study provides empirical evidences on the research–teaching nexus in the context of Chinese research universities by examining the multi-layered factors at the individual, institutional and organisational levels. The study sketches out several substantive social structures, including performative incentives, research culture and institutional emphases, that have significantly shaped the research–teaching nexus in a managerial context. Teaching beliefs that are rooted in traditional Chinese culture, however, have been identified as an essential factor to strengthen the research–teaching nexus. This study concludes that a more supportive environment based on the cultural beliefs of teaching can be created to alleviate the growing tensions between research and teaching.