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Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport

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Global Challenges and Opportunities for PhysicalEducation Teacher Educators

Mary O’Sullivan

To cite this article: Mary O’Sullivan (2021) Global Challenges and Opportunities for PhysicalEducation Teacher Educators, Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 92:3, 327-338, DOI:10.1080/02701367.2020.1730295

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/02701367.2020.1730295

Published online: 25 Mar 2020.

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Global Challenges and Opportunities for Physical Education Teacher EducatorsMary O’Sullivan

University of Limerick

ABSTRACTThis McCloy Lecture sheds light on the “hidden profession” of Physical Education Teacher Educators(PETEs) by sharing my perspectives on the challenges and opportunities faced by PETE scholars andteachers globally. I begin with an overview of my biography and how it has influenced my thinkingabout PETE. I present some scholarly critiques of PETE, a selection of PETE research findings andaddress key policy issues within teacher education across several national educational systemsdescribing how Physical Education teacher educators manage (or not) the challenges and opportu-nities in the practice of teacher education in modern-day universities. I draw on data from myinternational study of experienced Physical Education teacher educators about the nature of theirwork in academe and the status of physical education teacher education locally, nationally andglobally. I also draw on the perspectives of Irish teacher educators about the challenges of beingactive producers and users of research in a challenging national policy context. I concludewith a set ofobservations about how best to build capacity among Physical Education teacher educators so theycan thrive as research active and innovative teachers in the modern university.

ARTICLE HISTORYReceived 1 October 2019Accepted 12 February 2020

KEYWORDSPhysical education; teachereducation; PETE

It was a privilege to deliver the Charles Henry McCloylecture at 2019 SHAPE America and I thank theResearch Consortium for the honor. The purpose ofthis paper is to shed light on the “hidden profession”of Physical Education Teacher Educators (PETEs) andshare a global perspective on the challenges andopportunities faced by PETE scholars and teachers.Sport pedagogy is a field of study involving researchon teaching and learning of physical activity and sportacross the lifespan in school community and socialmedia settings. My intent is to engage readers on thepotential futures for Physical Education TeacherEducation (PETE) and Physical Education teachereducators, a subfield of Sport Pedagogy. I addressstructural issues for teacher education (accreditation,levels of programmatic control, and relationships withstakeholders) across national educational systems andhow Physical Education teacher educators manage (ornot) the challenges and opportunities in modern-dayuniversities. I draw on data from our internationalinterview study of experienced Physical Educationteacher educators (O’Sullivan, Parker, MacPhail, &Tannehill, 2018) about the nature of their work inacademe and the status of physical education teachereducation locally, nationally and globally. It alsodraws on the perspectives of Irish teacher educatorsabout the challenges of being active producers andusers of research (MacPhail & O’Sullivan, 2019) and

an international cohort of early career sport pedagogyacademics about their career ambitions and challengesin the modern university (Enright, Alfrey, & Rynne,2017).

Who was C. H. McCloy?

First, it is important to reflect on Charles Henry McCloy,a pioneering physical education scholar and teacher in theUSA and China and 2019 was the 60th anniversary of hisdeath. McCloy worked in China for 13 years. In 2016,Dr Bill McCloy (then Professor of Mandarin at U ofHawaii) was invited by the Chinese to the University ofNanjing to a celebration of the contribution of his grand-father to the development of Physical Education in China.McCloy worked in several US States before settling at theUniversity of Iowa for the last 29 of his life. McCloy wasa generalist scholar gaining a master degree in Sociologyand his PHD in Physical Education at the age of 46 atTeachers College where his research focused on the motorskill competence and physical fitness for children. McCloypublished 32 books and 290 articles, writing for specialistand nonspecialist audiences and supervised 46 doctoraldissertations and 230 master theses. He held many leader-ship roles including AAHPERD President and was the firstperson to receive the Luther Gulick Award. The NationalAcademy of Kinesiology (NAK) honored him with theHetherington Award. I recommend Cardinal’s (2015)

CONTACT Mary O’Sullivan Mary.OSullivan@ul.ie Department of Physical Education and Sport Sciences, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland

RESEARCH QUARTERLY FOR EXERCISE AND SPORT2021, VOL. 92, NO. 3, 327–338https://doi.org/10.1080/02701367.2020.1730295

© 2020 SHAPE America

article and the University of Iowa’s archives as fine sourceson McCloy’s life and contribution to Kinesiology.

Influences and influencers on my ownprofessional life

Like McCloy, there were many influencers on my scho-larly thinking. Daryl Siedentop was my doctoral advisorwho became a colleague and friend and I dedicate theseremarks to him. In 1980 Daryl offered me a GraduateTeaching Assistantship at Ohio State University and hewas an exemplar of professional and scholarly stan-dards. My doctoral peers, Hans van der Mars, MelissaParker, Richard Tinning, and Ken Alexander helpeddevelop my critical thinking and shape my understand-ings of teacher education. My first assistant professorrole was at the University of Victoria, BC and in 1986I returned to OSU to work with Daryl, and along withearly career scholars Deborah Tannehill and SandyStroot I was provided a research-rich environment forsupporting Physical Education teachers practice andexpanding the scholarship of PETE. The gifted doctoralstudents in Canada, USA, and Ireland kept me intellec-tually honest and enriched my thinking. Recently, atthe University of Limerick the talented Irish PhysicalEducation teachers and policymakers grounded me inthe realities and possibilities for innovation in PhysicalEducation. My scholarly outputs are borne from colla-borations with teachers and scholars who shareda passion for teaching, teachers, and teacher education.Such academic and professional environments are oftenfragile but, in my case, were sustained with reciprocalrespect (and enjoyment!) among colleagues, self-reflection and a willingness to rethink perspectives,sometimes requiring us move outside our curricularand/or ideological zones of comfort. Our researchteams enabled us to tackle what Lawson (2018) callsthe wicked problems in our field … I will commentmore on this later.

The following are just three of the experiences thatshaped my thinking about PETE. The first wasa conversation with Siedentop following his return in1980s from a speaking engagement to Ohio PhysicalEducation teachers. He had encouraged teachers to con-sider how the goals for Physical Education requireda commitment to schoolwide physical activity initiativesbeyond the Physical Education instructional time. He wasshaken (and he was a tough scholar to shake!) by a negativereception to his ideas around curricular change. Thosesame ideas were the precursor to what is nowComprehensive School Physical Activity Program(CSPAP) in the USA. A few years later the doctoral workof Pam Bechtel, Clive Pope, and Gary Kinchin highlighted

the challenges in supporting and sustaining innovativecurricular changes with Physical Education teachers.These teachers had no access to continuing professionaldevelopment (CPD) in Physical Education thus leavingthem unaware of curriculum and pedagogical innovationssuch as Sport Education, cooperative learning, etc. Mylearning was that one-shot workshops (however good)rarely lead to sustained change in teaching and learningcontexts. Instead, we learned the value of building teacherknowledge and capacities via teacher-led networks andsupported (as needed) by external facilitators to supportthem to plan and innovate in context-specific ways. Theselearnings led to sustained collaboration with PhysicalEducation teachers after receiving one the first of twoFederal Physical Education for Progress (PEP) grants tobuild teacher capacity and improve student learning inPhysical Education in a large suburban school district inOhio. We shared the evidence base from this work built anevidence base for a set of principles for effective continuingprofessional development (CPD) work with and by tea-chers (Ward & O’Sullivan, 2006).

A second learning was from a presentation to Columbuslegislators sharing evidence on the value of supportingCPD for Physical Education teachers. It was St Patrick’sDay and they were more interested in my Irish accent thanthe substance of our CPD message. In contrast, Judy Rinkhad persuaded State Legislators to create a PhysicalEducation policy framework with accountability for qualityphysical education programs across the state. Judy pio-neeredUS Physical Education policy work andmy learningwas that while research evidence may be hugely important,it is not sufficient (and sometimes not considered) to shapepublic policy. Engaging with policymakers is labor inten-sive but can impact the discourse and shape public policy.SHAPE’s national and state leadership around advocacyshould not be underestimated.

The third experience was when Larry Locke sought topersuade the National Academy of Kinesiology (NAK) tofocus on Physical Education/Physical Activity policy for itsannual meeting. The proposal was rejected out of hand aspeers saw policy work as daunting with limited power inKinesiology to influence government bureaucrats.Professional life was already busy and policy work notseen as a smart road to travel in building a publicationsportfolio in support of academic promotion. Dodds (2006)described the policy research in PETE as a “murky world[that is] complex, convoluted, confusing and contentious”(p. 540), which may account for the dearth of research onPhysical Education and PETE policy in the United States.While I understood the Academy’s rejection of a focuspolicy work and its potential to impact Kinesiology myconvection was that policymatterswith a direct impact onour practices and discourses in Physical Education and

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teacher education. Those involved in the accreditation ofPhysical Education programs (by NCATE, etc.) knowwell-such implications for practice and funding of Kinesiologyprograms. The early Physical Education and PhysicalActivity policy research by Evans and Penny in the UKand the teacher education policy research by CochranSmith, Zeichner, and Darling Hammond in USA high-lighted the critical importance for teacher educators ofengaging with policy work. Concepts such as policy slippage(Penny & Evans, 1999) and outsourcing of education ser-vices (Ball, 2012; Powell, 2015) shaped my thinking aboutteacher education, teacher educators’ work with teachersand external provision of school Physical Education glob-ally. In contrast to working in a large federal educationsystem like the USA, a small country like Ireland providesopportunities to impact policy and practice as relationshipsbetween academics, policymakers, and teachers are easierto establish andmaintain. The PETE team at the Universityof Limerick has influenced policy and practice related tothe national Physical Education curriculum and PhysicalEducation teachers’ professional development. SeveralIrish and international colleagues decamped to Limerickand, together with talented doctoral students, they supporttalented Physical Education teachers who have createdinnovative developments in Irish Physical Education.Irish PETE programs are preparing a generation ofPhysical Education teachers to support the innovativework of teachers and Physical Education CPD providersworking with government-supported Physical Educationinitiatives.

PETE and the global context of highereducation

The Irish PETE community includes teacher educatorsworking in two separate though related primary andsecondary teacher education systems that present differ-ent work demands in terms of teaching and researchproductivity. There is a growing Irish PETE communitywho is research active and innovative working withina system where teaching is still held in high esteem andgovernment policy remains supportive of research richuniversity-based teacher education centers of excellence(Sahlberg, Furlong, & Munn, 2012). Irish PETE isa potential exemplar for other PETE jurisdictions thoughthere are challenges for teacher education here too(Gleeson, Sugrue, & O’Flaherty, 2017; MacPhail &O’Sullivan, 2019). In Ireland as elsewhere, significantattention by policymakers to teacher education and itsrole in preparing high-quality teachers has resulted inchallenges to university-based teacher education withincreasing accountability measures. In some instances,contradictory policies from Government agencies seek,

on the one hand, to hold university-based teacher educa-tion to account given significant levels of public invest-ment in education while on the other hand, lack ofcredibility by some politicians in universities to deliverquality teachers has seen the growth of deregulation withmultiple pathways to teaching qualifications. The com-ments of the authors of Rethinking Teacher Education arestill relevant today: “teacher education has been at thereceiving end of rafts of government initiatives whichhave been designed to bring order and control to educa-tion, a social institution which is central to a knowledgeeconomy.” (Edwards, Gilroy, & Hartley, 2002, p. 3).

In the USA and England, we have seen the introduc-tion of multiple pathways to a teaching qualificationincluding exclusive school-based teacher preparationpathways often with limited pedagogical study and/orengagement with university teacher education. InEngland, government policy has shifted to school-basedteacher education funding schools directly to recruit andprepare teachers for their school contexts. A number ofschools create a School Alliance pooling their resources torecruit and prepare teachers to staff their schools. Theycan attract prospective teachers by providing salaries orgrants while learning to teach on-site. While recruits areintended to be above the school quota for teachers (i.e.supernumery teachers) a teacher supply crisis has seenmany pre-service teachers take on fulltime teaching veryearly in their teacher preparation. Many universities arenow external providers of teacher education services forthese School Alliances with a funding model makingteacher education less viable. As a consequence of thisEnglish government policy, several universities closedteacher education programs (including PETE programs)as they were not fiscally viable. Ellis andMcNicholl (2015)wrote of the unintended consequences of this approachthat “afford and constrain different kinds of developmentfor teachers, different types of and qualities of learning-and why this matters” (p. 9).

Critiques of PETE

Physical education teacher education (PETE) has notbeen immune to criticism globally (Lawson, 2018;McKay, Gore, & Kirk, 1990; Tinning, 2000). Ayers andRichards (2019) suggested USA Physical Education tea-cher education is at a tipping point with under enrollmentthreatening the viability of the field with survival of USAPETE in major institutions of higher education ques-tioned. There have been other critiques of the quality ofteacher education and how programs fail to prepare tea-chers for the realities of modern school life and not manyPhysical Education teachers have come to the defense ofteacher education in these debates.

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One critique is that PETE has a dominant focus ontechnical aspects of teaching rather than on preparingculturally competent educators who can appreciate whois privileged and marginalized in Physical Education andwho aspire to being agents of change (Fernandez-Balboa,1997; Lawson & MacPhail, In Press; Tinning, 2000).Another critique concerns PETE’s inability to diversifyits teaching recruits and PETE staff to reflect the diversityof the contemporary populations in schools. Social justicescholars argue teacher education and PETE specificallyneed to do more to prepare teachers as active agents ofchange in increasingly diverse schools and family contexts(Walton-Fisette & Sutherland, 2018). A third critique hasbeen the call (most vocal in USA) to refocus PETE pro-grams to better support a public health agenda and amorehealthy and fit population. An element of that agendapromotes school-wide physical activity for students andstaff complimenting the goals of a health-related PhysicalEducation (McKenzie, 2016). Seeking solutions to thechallenges faced by PETE and PETE educators involvesconsideration of this broader education landscape anda more nuanced understanding of the changing natureof the modern university and the changing expectationsfor academics. I comment on this shortly.

Research developments in PETE/teacher educators

In 1985, Metzler and Freedman referred to the paucityof research in Physical Education. Thirty years on,there is a flourishing research community globally anda plethora of quality peer-reviewed journals disseminat-ing research on Physical Education teaching and tea-cher education. Indeed the knowledge base for teachereducation is unrecognizable in terms of quality andquantity 35 years on. I share selective developments inthe paragraphs below to make my point.

A major development in PETE research was theresearch foci on teacher beliefs. In the 1990s we cameto understand that shaping teacher beliefs was a criticalelement of the value added (or not) of any PETEprogram. While there was evidence that PETE pro-grams required robust interventions to transform pre-service teacher dispositions (Matanin & Collier, 2003)this was not always evident in graduates. lisahunter andher Australian colleagues (lisahunter, 2012) evidencedthe power of the school staff room on student teachers“to wash out” key learnings during teacher educationand PETE programs needed to better prepare PhysicalEducation teachers for schools contexts as a powerful(and sometimes negative) learning space. Tsangaridou’s(2006) chapter in the Handbook on Physical Educationprovided a detailed review of that literature for PETEand is as valid today as it was then.

Second, the research base on effective principles of men-toring prospective teachers while on school placement (i.e.teaching practice) has been well documented in the PETEliterature demonstrating the impact (or not) of models ofpeer and tutor observation and assessment on the devel-opment of critically reflective early career teachers(O’Sullivan & Deglau, 2006). There is also a strong litera-ture base on reflective practice and contested view aboutthe nature and importance of critical self-reflection andreflexivity (Tsangaridou & O’Sullivan, 2003). Indeed, itcould be argued that recent performance-based assess-ments of graduating teachers (e.g., EdTPA or its equivalentin US states) had their precursors in these types of systema-tic observation of Physical Education teaching practices inPETE (Parker & O’Sullivan, 1983).

A third research area was the development of Contentand Specialized Content Knowledge in PETE. Research byWard, Tsuda, Dervent, and Devirlmez (2018) on the cen-trality of content and specialist content knowledge (SCK)showed that when taught explicitly during a PETE pro-gram, prospective teachers can learn to plan effective learn-ing progressions, diagnose errors, and provide authenticfeedback in support of student’s learning of motor skillsand strategies. Living the Curriculumwas another approachpioneered by Oslin and Collier (2001) and later Dillion(2012) in building simultaneously Physical Education tea-chers’ capabilities of content knowledge (CK), pedagogicalcontent knowledge (PCK) and assessment in time chal-lenged PETE programs. The approach developed teachers’CK and specific content knowledge (SCK) in strands (sub-ject content) of the curriculum (e.g., adventure education)in an interactive and authentic learning setting. Yet, inmany PETE programs, courses, or modules in physicalactivity content areas have all but disappeared with pro-spective teachers expected to have this knowledge on entryor build their knowledge base beyond the time allocation ofa teacher education program.

Fourth, there have been several new pedagogies,including social media and technologies introduced toPETE in recent years (Casey, Goodyear, & Armour,2017). Space limitations limit mention to a few interestingteacher education-specific pedagogies. Merseth (1996), aneducator at Harvard was an early adopter of a case-basedapproach in teacher education. In PETE, Collier (1997)and later Timken and van Der Mars (2009) provided anevidence based for the value of case-based teaching inPETE and some resources (casebooks, pedagogical casesand videos) have been created to support this approach.The evidence suggested the approach can develop tea-chers’ problem setting and problem-solving skills butthe resources required to sustain such an approach aresignificant and it has not seenwidespread uptake in recentdecades.

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Fifth, some teacher education program now use simu-lations. A government-funded teacher education simula-tion lab in Israel has impressive evidence of simulations inbuilding teachers’ communication skills (MOFFET,2019). Misty Neutzling’s work with PETE students atBridgewater State, using simulation technology to developPhysical Education student teachers’ communicationskills and reflective thinking in teaching PhysicalEducation, is impressive. It shows the potential of thisapproach to support prospective teachers learn a criticalbut difficult skillset (communication and critical think-ing) and research funds are deserving to build an evidencebase and resources for this innovative pedagogy in PETE.

Finally, there is a large research base on models basedinstructional approaches in Physical Education and PETE,including Sport Education, Teaching Personal and SocialResponsibility, Adventure Education, ContemporaryStudies, SPARK, HOPE, and Fitness for Life. The effectiveapplication of these approaches to support prospectiveteachers to competently use these models is varied inPETE but a discussion on reasons would require morespace that is available. This description of research devel-opments in PETE is just a small sample of a significantbody of work currently guiding the development of teachereducation programs. How this research is applied in realityis the focus of the next section.

Current challenges: voices of teacher educators

All is not well in some PETE communities, but more so inthe USA and English PETE communities. Globally, asteacher education struggles from a shortage of qualifiedteachers Ayers and Richards (2019) completed an analysisof current USA PETE recruitment and retention chal-lenges making a series of recommendations for USAPETE community. The monograph makes for interestingreading and I support their call for more comparativeresearch of PETE programs as a basis for possible recom-mendations for USA PETE (and elsewhere).

In this section, I share some findings from our teachereducation comparative research study where we soughtthe perspectives of 29 experienced Physical Educationteacher educators across the USA, Europe, andAustralasia (O’Sullivan et al., 2018) about their work asteacher educators and researchers in the modern univer-sity. These teachers educators (though in quite differenceeducational systems) highlighted four common chal-lenges impacting their work as teacher educators/scho-lars. Our research built on research by Irish teachereducation colleagues (Gleeson, Sugrue, & O’Flaherty,2017; MacPhail & O’Sullivan, 2019) and former PETEdoctoral students (Enright et al., 2017; McEvoy,Heikinaro-Johansson, & MacPhail, 2018).

PETE positioning in the neoliberal university

To understand the challenges facing PETE academics andunits, one must first understand the context and appreciatethe positioning of teacher education inmodern universities(not all universities are the same!). The concept of a Neo-liberal university reflects the university as a market-drivensystem, with modes of governance based on a corporatemodel (Ball, 2012). This ideology has transformed manyEnglish speaking and western universities in recent yearswith the creation of unit-based budgeting, market-drivenprogramming, increasing competition (marketing) for stu-dents, decreased state funding and with increased expecta-tions for academics to fund their research and graduatestudents. John Furlong (2013) a prominent UK scholar haswritten about the struggle for the centrality of teachereducation as a key agenda for the university sector (astruggle mostly lost in many English universities). TheSport Pedagogy/Teacher Education early career academics(ECAs) studied by Enright and her colleagues describedhow they had experienced crises of habitus as they workedto suppress their own ethical dispositions and values andadjust to “the rules” by which they felt they were expectedto play (Enright et al., 2017). Their findings identify thedesires of early career academics to construct new anddifferent academic identities carved and crafted not bymarket priorities but by sound ethics, intellectual curiosityand rigor, care for self, colleagues, students, and their fieldof inquiry. However, achieving such goals in many univer-sities at present can happen only if the early career aca-demics capacities and interests align with the values andpriorities of the department, school and/or faculty in whichthey reside (O’Sullivan & Penny, 2013).

In our comparative research of international teachereducators, one UK PETE scholar from a research-intensive university noted the shift in priorities fortheir PETE academic staff and the centrally of teachereducation moved to the margins:

The whole reason that our particular institution existedat one point in time was because of the physical educa-tion program. Now the physical education program ispart of the university [with] 24 degree programs in theSchool … . The priorities and the prioritization of ITEisn’t there … We’re just insignificant (ResearchIntensive University, UK).

In his AERA Scholar Lecture, Kirk (2014) recognizedthe challenges for teacher education in English univer-sities in particular and encouraged sport pedagogyfaculty to leave Colleges of Education and move toKinesiology units noting they have the scholarly skillsand capacities to be successful in these units. Kirkhighlighted the changing conditions for success in aca-deme and where PETE academics would be best

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positioned in the modern university to ensurea productive environment and a successful career (i.e.promotion). Among our international teacher educatorcohort, they described how the positioning of PETE inthe university structure has become must more con-tested and in many cases divisions among scholars ofKinesiology and education. Several US scholarsdescribed the lack of support for PETE in Kinesiologyunits because PETE was not aligned with senior admin-istrators’ agendas: a similar situation described well bya UK PETE educator: “We were in a College of Healthand the Dean … wanted [the unit] to be a School ofPublic Health. Clearly physical education didn’t fit inher plans … pedagogy wasn’t getting a whole lot ofsupport.” (UK teacher educator).

There have been some unintended consequences inthe USA for PETE in the renaming of CollegeDepartments/Schools from Physical Education/Sportand Exercise Sciences (to mention just two names) toKinesiology. Some readers will recall the robust aca-demic debates of the late 1980s ending with Kinesiologychosen as an overarching label for our field in the USA(Newell, 1990). There was a strongly held view that thefield of study needed a broader label to market tostudents the opportunity to study PA from multipleperspectives. Most units in the USA have renamedtheir units to Kinesiology. A consequence (mostlyunintended I suspect) has been to make applied studyof sport including Physical Education teacher qualifica-tion less attractive.

Thomas (2014), then Dean of Education at theUniversity of North Texas noted the adoption ofKinesiology as a unifying name has strong scientificunderpinnings and the name change has paralleleda substantial growth in undergraduate majors, (he esti-mated more than a 50% increase from 2003–2008).Thomas also noted Kinesiology in the USA is now thepreferred major for academic preparation in alliedhealth fields such as physical therapy and physicians’assistant programs. However, he warned such a growthhas come at a cost to other programs in Kinesiologyunits. Thomas noted as a result of these changes lessinterest among undergraduate majors in teacher educa-tion and athletic training. It is reasonable to argue thattrends come and go in what undergraduate majors’interests and what they might choose to study andunit leadership must planned for this volatility.However, in the USA, Thomas warned of a criticalturn in enrollment trends with the potential to makesome Kinesiology related programs no longer viable.The shrinking enrollment in teacher education mostgenerally and Physical Education more specificallywas commented on by several USA teacher educators

in our interviews with experienced teacher educators.The shift in undergraduate students’ interests and howit has affected this USA teacher education program’senrollment is captured by this teacher educator; “Wehave 500 in our kinesiology program and so we bring inabout 125 every year. About 8 out of 125 (are physicaleducation). I used to have 30 when I first started … ”(USA teacher educator)

Thomas (2014) shared data from his Texas kinesiologyunit which showed a similar trend and he voiced concernthat interest not just in teacher education and but even themost traditional focus on sport and exercise more gener-ally may be lost in these larger and more diverseKinesiology configurations: “In a department of 1600students, 14% do Physical Education, 77% do an alliedhealth degree … Should we be aligned to PublicHealth? … .Challenge: Will sport/exercise interest belost?” (p.319). These data at least should give us pause toconsider how must traditional Physical Education unitshave diversified and now reflect an allied health publichealth suite of programs with little interest among stu-dents or expertise among staff for issues of teaching youngchildren about sport and physical activity as part of aneducational enterprise.

University rankings and the dual economy ofteacher education

In 1985, Metzler and Freedman described the typicalPETE professor as a “Jack of all trades.” Their teachereducator profiles revealed that most USA PhysicalEducation teacher educators devoted small amounts oftime to graduate teaching (7.0%), and even less time toresearch and writing (3.1%), and preparing grant pro-posals (0.9%). About 70% of the PETE teacher educa-tors at that time reported no time spent in activeresearch. Indeed, the low involvement in research andin graduate teaching reflected the personal preferencesof most of the surveyed PETE faculty. This must becontrasted with PETE positioning in modern universitywhere academics have seen a shift in recent decadesfrom a focus on teaching to significant expectations forresearch productivity and research grant success. Theprominent US teacher educator Marilyn CochranSmith has lauded the research-based approach to tea-cher education and the development of teachers asresearch producers are now presented as a priority forteacher education suggesting that teacher educationmust be research-based with teacher educators as activeresearchers and perceived as “public intellectuals”(Cochran-Smith, 2004; European Commission, 2015).These raised research expectations for PETE teachereducators were highlighted by this PETE scholar and

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they feared it was at the expense of providing qualityteacher education programs: “The university is onlyinterested now in its world-leading research agenda.ITE [PETE] does not fit with that [agenda].” (ResearchIntensive University UK PETE teacher educator)

A “dual economy” in the teacher education, asarticulated by Christie and Menter (2009), describeda phenomenon where some academic staff are primar-ily teacher educators and others are primarily research-ers. Yet this had resulted in many teacher educatorsexperiencing tension between the two forms of aca-demic activity expected of them in the workplace(Christie & Menter, 2009).

PETE faculty have also struggled to adjust to thisshift in university priorities as clearly noted by thisPETE scholar we interviewed at a research-intensiveuniversity in New Zealand:

You need to be research active … That’s quitea cultural shift. When [new Dean] arrived,I remember … he said something like “I have 52publications and 3 in [high impact journal] … Ascultural capital, it meant nothing [to us]. Someonesaid “but have you taught? Which was our culturalcapital. What are we going to value, can you teach?

A leading US teacher educator Ken Zeichner, questionswhether the US research-intensive institution is a goodplace to do teacher education? Such a sentiment wasechoed by a number of US PETE scholars in our researchstudy with one noting that this issue has: “been raised bya number of the deans of the college … Within that it hasfiltered down to the impact in PETE; our PETE programsignificantly.” (USA PETE educator). I have written else-where about the sustained harsh critique of teacher edu-cation internationally coupled with rising expectations forresearch while teacher education staff also expected tobuild sustained partnerships in schools around teachereducation (MacPhail & O’Sullivan, 2019; O’Sullivan &Penny, 2013). There is the emergence of a “survival strat-egy” among emerging scholars to strategically redefinetheir interests and move away from teacher educationresearch and, in some cases from membership of depart-ments of education.

This phenomenon was commented on by the experi-enced teacher educators in our study with a leadingAustralian Physical Education teacher education scho-lar describing the challenge for PETE faculty but forearly career PETE academics in particular:

The research demands are almost overwhelming forsome people … .the waves of academics that nowcome into it (PETE) are probably more attuned toit … they know how to build their career. They arebetter at building their CV than they are doing thework (PETE).

The student experience, deregulation, and PETE

Research from Australian sport pedagogy scholars isinstructive as to the impact of the deregulation of uni-versities on student enrollments in teacher education andsport and exercise science more generally. In Australia,deregulation policy means universities can set their ownfees as well as the number of places they offer for pro-grams (a somewhat similar issue in the UK). A largeprestigious Australian university commissioned research,when the deregulation debate was at its peak, to deter-mine if undergraduate students would still choose theiruniversity when premium fees were applied to registra-tion at a research-intensive university.

The findings from this internal report as they relatedto Kinesiology were commented on by this AustralianSport Pedagogy colleague:

The Students in exercise science and teacher educationwere not the students prepared to pay a premium priceto come to a research intensive university like theUniversity of XXXX. [In contrast] law students wereprepared to pay [premium fees] … In fact theKinesiology students and PETE students were …quite savvy in thinking that their return on investmentwasn’t going to be as high.

The same university was also worried also about stu-dent litigation in this new deregulation environment:What might be the liability of a university if a studenthas paid a considerable amount to become a qualifiedteacher and they fail at the last hurdle? This pedagogyscholar believed these sorts of issues have the potentialto impact on the continued existence of teacher educa-tion and PETE at research-intensive universities.

Accreditation and levers of power

While we could fill many journal pages with critiques ofteacher accreditation and PETE accreditation processes,and some of it justified, an interesting finding from ourinterviews with senior Physical Education teacher educa-tors is that there have also been positive aspects to theseaccreditation processes which receive little mention in theliterature. More specifically where an accreditationrequirement was used as an opportunity to review thecontent and processes of a teacher education program, theprocess was noted by one US pedagogue as: “highlyvalued … the process has allowed us to reflect on ourprogram in very deep and meaningful ways so that wecould make adjustments and meet accreditation stan-dards … it is trying to find alignment.” Similarly, anAustralian Physical Education teacher educators noted:“It made us … be explicit about things that were implicit,check what we should be doing better, think about ways

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that we should be filling the gaps.” Another described howthey had used accreditation to their advantage with seniorleadership in arguing for program resources: “You use theaccreditation and the potential jeopardy of [de] accredita-tion to your advantage and send it to school review.”(Research Intensive University Australia).

In Ireland, policy changes to teacher educationaccreditation by the Teaching Council were met mostlywith energy and a willingness to comply by PETEteacher educators. Many welcomed these changes,viewing the process as a time to reflect and updateelements of their programs. However, the failure toresource the required changes (longer programs, newmodules/courses, increased expectations around colla-borative partnerships with schools in support of longerschool placements) has left some frustrated, feeling“squeezed between the demands for extended schoolplacements and … pressures to be research active”(Gleeson et al. 2017, p. 28).

Possibilities for PETE

In addition to teacher education accreditation changes,PETE developments in Ireland reflect and support somemajor changes in the Irish Physical Education andWellbeing curricula at the second level. I believe howthe PETE community has facilitated and responded tothese key changes at national level provide have thepotential to provide some important lessons for PETEinternationally. Physical Education and PETE have beeninvigorated in Ireland in the last decade. PETE scholarshave engaged with activist Physical Education teachersand innovative government curricular leadership thathas resulted in exciting new programs for schoolPhysical Education. These programs contribute directlyto the educational goals of the schooling system at theequivalent of middle and high school levels. PETE scho-lars were able to take advantage of the enthusiasm ofa young and physically active Prime Minister anda supportive Minister of Education to ensure the central-ity of physical education in the educational purpose andstatements of learning (NCCA, 2017) for children inIrish second-level schooling.

The creation of the Irish Leaving Certificate PhysicalEducation (LCPE) specification is a case in point. This isa national Physical Education curriculum program for16–19-year-olds and for the first time is one of the highstakes assessment subjects student can take in their final 2years of schooling. The Physical Education teaching andscholarly communities, together with government schoolinspectors and policymakers have maintained policyadvocacy over a 25-year period around the developmentof a Physical Education subject option for students as part

of the leaving certificate curriculum. There were multiplestarts and failures before getting this senior high schoolexaminable subject in Physical Education approved at thecabinet level. I was hugely encouraged when almost 50%of Irish secondary schools (350) applied to be part of thefirst phase of 70 schools to offer LCPE as an option for allstudents. Several schools who were finally chosen werechallenged internally with picking a cohort of 25–3016–17 year olds to take this two-year program of studygiven the high level of interest from students. In 40 yearsin PETE, I never witnessed such excitement during thelaunch of this LCPE program in March 2018. All theschool principals, school counselors, and PhysicalEducation teachers from the successful schools were inattendance with huge positivity around the engagementin phase one of this curricular innovation. My colleaguesand I received calls at the university from parents wantingto discuss with PETE teacher education staff the benefitsof their child taking this course for college entrance. Thistype of engagement with Physical Education as a schoolsubject was unprecedented.

There is no shortage of Irish high school students whowant to study Physical Education in senior high school, orPhysical Education/Sport Sciences at the university level.There is no shortage of students who want to be PhysicalEducation teachers (these prospective Physical Educationteachers for decades have scored among the highest marksof any cohort of students entering all university pro-grams). There is a growing interest by school principalsto recruit Physical Education teachers to take leadershiproles in the new School Wellbeing committees wherePhysical Education is a key contributor to Middle schoolwellbeing statements of learning. This is an example ofwhere national education policy has impacted immedi-ately on student choices and allocation of instructionaltime to Physical Education in schools. These changes toIrish Leaving Certificate secondary curriculum (withPhysical Education as part of a Wellbeing learning areaat Middle School level and Physical Education’s contribu-tions to high school curriculum with a high stakes assess-ment and a non high stakes subject specifications) aremaking a difference at multiple levels of the educationsystem. Physical Education teacher educators continue tobe a central player in these developments preparing tea-chers for these initiatives, supporting professional devel-opment providers working with experienced teachers,and using research to inform these processes (Scanlon,MacPhail, & Calderon, 2018, 2019).

Concluding observations

Addressing local or national challenges facing PETEand the hidden profession of Physical Education teacher

334 M. O’SULLIVAN

educators must be informed not only by PETE researchbut an appreciation for the policy contexts where PETEprograms and Physical Education teacher educatorsoperate. At a policy level, PETE is part of a largerteacher education policy landscape which in turn ispart of a government strategy (be it a state or federallevel) for the education of its citizens. In Europe,national education and teacher education policies influ-ence and in are influenced by the European policies anddirectives (European Commission, 2015). In countrieslike Canada, USA and Australia, state education sys-tems are influenced in differential ways by federal poli-cies and mandates. Physical Education teachereducators must be more critically aware of the prioritiesof the higher education system more generally and it’spotential to impact in their local contexts (e.g., univer-sity, college, school, department unit) if they are tosurvive and thrive as teacher educator practitionersand research-active academics in the modern univer-sity. PETE is part of a large higher education enterpriseand to ignore the realities of such policies will result infailure to secure the future of PETE and thus PETEscholars in research universities.

The development of critically informed PETE andPhysical Education teacher educator community is nota luxury but a necessity. The new generation of teachereducators needs not only research active and policyaware but competent practitioners who are supportedby senior sport pedagogy leadership to lead innovativeteacher education programs and programs of researchin a university context and will support them to thriveand remain passionate about Physical Education andPhysical Education teacher education. The followingfour observations and reflections are informed bydoing and reading about teacher education acrossthree countries over a career, researching the challengesand opportunities of Physical Education teacher educa-tors globally (O’Sullivan & Parker, 2018), and learningfrom my engagement with an international teachereducation community, the International Forum forTeacher Educator Development (Info-TED, https://info-ted.eu/).

First, unlike most academics, teacher educators arefaced with three distinct masters in the modern universityand PETE early career academics (ECA) in particular mustbalance the expectations of all three if they are to see theircareers flourish (internal promotion, accreditation, exter-nal professional service). Teacher educators need internalcross department and university networks that can supporttheir research and teaching ambitions and help ensure theymeet university promotion criteria (master one). Thestate/national teacher education regulator is a secondmas-ter for teacher educators. The accreditation process make

demands on teacher educators to evidence how their PETEprograms provide high-quality teacher education experi-ences for prospective Physical Education teachers that alignwith the current school level curriculum priorities. Theaccreditation process nowmandates school university part-nerships as part of the teacher education infrastructure butprovides neither the authority nor the resources for teachereducators to deliver on this mandate.While this is a hugelytime-consuming effort these school partnerships, or “thirdspaces” have created both opportunities and challenges(not always recognized for promotion) for teacher educa-tors. There is another external thirdmaster for the PhysicalEducation teacher educators. These are the professionaland scholarly networks who are look to access the expertiseof teacher educators to support their agendas and who inturn provide visibility to PETE scholars nationally. Theseinclude publishing houses who need pro bono academiceditors and reviewers to maintain scholarly journal output,writers of professional and scholarly texts, as well as inter-national and government agencies to curricular and pro-fessional development resources. In our interviews withinternational PETE academics they spoke of being “timepoor” because of these differential commitments. Theyfound themselves struggling to manage mentoring/super-vision of early career teachers while sustaining school/uni-versity partnerships along with university scholarly andprofessional obligations to meet expectations of all threemasters. Informed university leadership is a factor in sup-porting those PETE teacher educators who manage cred-ible and sustainable programs. This can allow fora professional quality of life for Physical Education teachereducators and continue to attract quality sport pedagogyscholars to PETE. Our findings suggested many prospec-tive teacher educators are seeking more sustainable ways toflourish within the university away from the multiple andcompeting demands of teacher education.

My second observation relates to where PETE programsreside within the academic governance structure of theuniversity. While many academic battles have been wagedand much written about where PETE best resides, my viewis that this is often less relevant to the sustainability of thePETE program that the leadership issues noted above.A key element for the success of a PETE program is if theacademic leaders (if whatever unit) understand the workdemands of teacher education/PETE academics, value thecontribution of teacher education to the departmental/school unit, and are effective advocates for teacher educa-tion with university leadership. Members of the PETE unitmust be able/allowed to exert leadership with departmentalleadership where Physical Education teacher education issupported within the budgetary and career promotion fra-meworks. If the differential demands (i.e. masters) on tea-cher educators as practitioners and scholars are appreciated

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by departmental leaders, they can align resources to servicethese needs. This is the critical factor for teacher educatorsand more important to the sustainability of teacher educa-tion programs that where in the university governancestructure the program is situated (e.g. in Colleges of Artsand Sciences, in Education, in Allied Health, or HealthSciences).

Third, the recent diversity of Kinesiology Departmentshas been important to the field’s sustainability in the uni-versity sector (the inclusion of allied health and publichealth majors in addition to exercise science, athletic train-ing, and physical education majors). This diversity has leddepartments to shift away from traditional majors ofPhysical Education, Athletic Training to what one admin-istrator has noted as a potential tipping point withinKinesiology departments. There is evidence in the USA tosuggest student interest in health-related programs is nowgreater in Kinesiology departments than an interest insport or Physical Education related programs. Thomas(2014), a leader of a Kinesiology department cautionshow the current leadership of these programs (often scho-lars with little or no connection to the traditional profes-sional degrees of sport and Physical Education) may notsee the viability of these degrees over time. To counter this,Thomas (2014) suggested no one academic program (e.g.Nutrition, Allied Health, Sport Psychology, SportSociology, Sport Pedagogy) at doctoral level should beallowed to dominate in US Kinesiology units. Thomasargued if such domination were to happen, units may notrecruit/have the staff in the longer term to educate the nextgeneration of Physical Education Professionals, FitnessLeaders or Athletic Therapists. Could what is happeningin PETE in the USA might be an early warning signal forother Kinesiology programs elsewhere?

My final observation is to support the researchagenda for PETE focused on how we prepare betterteachers to work as agents of change in contemporaryschools. This agenda requires cross-disciplinary colla-borations among Kinesiology/Human MovementSciences scholars. It has implications for how teachereducators/sport pedagogy scholars must collaboratewith Kinesiology scholars interested in researchingyoung people’s physical education and physical literacy.Here are some examples of potential collaborations bysport pedagogy scholars with Kinesiology colleagues:

(1) working with physical activity and health scho-lars to understand how we better teach andembed a sense of behavior change in our PETEprogram, in curriculum and practice in schoolsand building autonomous and supportivePhysical Education classrooms

(2) working with motor learning colleagues toensure teachers understand how a skill islearned and refined and rehabilitated

(3) Working across education sub fields like sociologyand curriculum assessment among others, we cantackle questions like “What pedagogies do teachereducation students need to develop the 21st centuryskills and knowledge base of an educated student?”

Physical Education teacher education in many univer-sities in the USA and England has faced significant resour-cing challenges in recent years though for some differentreasons. The changing nature of the university has placedincreased pressure on what some call the “hidden profes-sion” of teacher educators with the dual economy of theirworkload within the university (research and teaching/supervision) and increased pressure to also engage withschool partnerships, teacher professional development, andpolicy work beyond the university. A consequence of thesedevelopments has been somewhat of a paradox for thesport pedagogy academic community. On the one handthere is a worldwide cohort of highly trained and researchactive sport pedagogy scholars yet a reluctance by many ofthem to engage in the practice of teacher education becauseof the frustrations in managing competing and multipledemands of the role as I referred to above. To compoundthis, US departments now have more undergraduate stu-dents in Kinesiology departments favoring public healthmajors than the traditional sport and physical educationmajors. There have been knock on effects on staffing levelsand resources to support PETE programs making theprofessional lives of Physical Education teacher educatorseven more challenging.

The future of PETE and a thriving teacher educatorcommunity of scholars demands greater engagement witheducation policy at both school and university level. Sportpedagogy scholars must support the development of excit-ing and educationally meaningful Physical Education pro-grams for young people in schools. The Irish exampleshows that when this is done it will excite students whowill be the next generation of Physical Education teachers.Meanwhile, teacher education leadership at the universitylevel must be educated to advocate for PETE within thelarger context of teacher education and university policydirectives. This is the responsibility of Physical Educationscholars and practitioners alike. To avoid such engagementis to condemn PETE to diminished status in the modernuniversity.

Acknowledgments

I thank the Research Consortium for the invitation to deliverthe 2019 McCloy Lecture at SHAPE Conference, Florida.

336 M. O’SULLIVAN

I also acknowledge the assistance of Drs Ann MacPhail,Melissa Parker, and Deborah Tannehill who collaboratedwith me in interviewing a cohort of experienced teachereducators worldwide.

ORCID

Mary O’Sullivan http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6429-7427

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