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Journal of Education for Teaching, Vol. 23, No. 3, 1997

Reclaiming the Agenda of TeacherProfessionalism: an Australianexperience

1

JUDYTH SACHSFaculty of Education, University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia

ABSTRACT In response to wide ranging social and political conditions a variety of school

reform and teacher professional development activities have been implemented across Aus-

tralia with the view of revitalising teacher professionalism. In this paper I argue that during

the late 1980s and early 1990s award restructuring and school reform have provided the

political and professional conditions to facilitate the development of a public debate regarding

teacher professionalism and its enactment within educational institutions and bureaucracies.

Furthermore, these activities provide the opportunity for teachers collectively to be active in

reclaiming the agenda of what counts as teacher professionalism. In this paper I use the

experience of two national Australian projects The National Schools Network and the

Innovative Links Between Schools and Universities project as exemplars of how teachers, both

individually and collectively, have been active in the project of reclaiming the agenda for

teacher professionalism in Australia.

INTRODUCTION

Since the early 1990s a variety of school reform and teacher professional development

activities have been implemented across Australia with the view of revitalising teacher

professionalism. These initiatives have been in response to wide ranging social and

politica l conditions that have had direct impact on all levels of education. In their wake

teachers have had to respond to a variety of challenges at the structural and individual

level. At the structural level the challenges facing teachers and school education include

the following: pressure of external accountability from a variety of education stakeholders,

increased political pressure to direct the processes and provision of school education, the

provision of more economically and ef® cient education and the preparation of students

who are numerate, literate and able to take civic and social responsibility . Underpinning

all of these issues is that politicians and bureaucrats are demanding greater conform ity of

education offerings which are transparent and super® cially testable.

At the individual level major challenges confronting teachers include: the need to be

skilled practitioners who can work both collaboratively and independently; have the ability

to solve complex practical and theoretical problems; are able to re¯ ect on their practice in

0260-7476/97/030263-13 $7.00 Ó 1997 Journal of Education for Teaching

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264 J. Sachs

order to develop quality learning opportunities for their students and, are professionals

who are able to cope with rapid social and technological change.

Not surprisingly, these challenges have immense implications for the practice of

schooling and the development and maintenance of the profession of teaching. In order to

respond to these aims productively and responsibly the teaching profession needs to

establish and continue to establish a know ledge and skill base that is embedded in practice

and has as its central aim the understanding and improvement of practice. In many cases

achieving such aims will require a signi® cant reorientation of the conception and im-

plementation of initial and continuing teacher education programs. As a consequence of

these changes the very idea of teacher professionalism will need to be debated and

resolved. Indeed it will be teachers themselves who will have to take a leadership role in

reclaiming the agenda of professionalism.

These changes at both the macro systems level and the micro school level require

teachers to take control of their professional agenda and to reclaim areas of in¯ uence and

authori ty that have been removed from them as a result of system and school restructuring.

In this paper I argue that reclaiming teacher professionalism requires a recasting of

professional and industr ial issues and relationships between employers, unions and teach-

ers and other education stakeholders. I use examples of two contemporary Australian

teacher professional development projects to illustrate how this might be achieved in a

more inclusive and expansive way. The antecedents of this position have occurred through

award restructuring and school reform which provided the political and professional

conditions to facilitate a public debate regarding teacher professionalism and its enactment

within educational institutions and bureaucracies. In order to develop this argument it is

necessary to contextualise teacher professionalism within the broader framework of award

restructuring and school reform as it occurred in Australia during the late 1980s and early

1990s. Both award restructuring and school reform were signi® cant in shaping federal and

state policy regarding the teaching profession and how the profession would respond to the

broader social and political agenda.

THE CONTEXT OF RECLAIMING TEACHER PROFESSIONALISM IN AUSTRALIA

The renewal and reclaiming of teacher professionalism can be viewed as a political project

which has been seized upon by unions, government and teacher professional associations

alike. The project of reclaiming teacher professionalism had its antecedents in industr ial

and professional activities during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Speci® cally, award

restructuring at the federal level during the early 1990s provided the impetus for school

reform and restructuring and the promise for teacher professionalism. These two initiatives

created the necessary political and ideological conditions within teaching and outside of it

to facilitate debate about the nature and scope of teacher professionalism. The watershed

for this shift was the `Teaching Accord’ of 1993 which, as the then Minister for Schools

Ross Free pointed out, `constitutes a very tangible recognition of the fundamental role that

teachers must play in the continued development of the profession’ (quoted in Preston,

1996, p. 190). The Accord and its associated initiatives was later to play a signi® cant part

in having notions of teacher professionalism open for discussion from various education

industry stakeholders. This included academics, teachers, bureaucrats working within

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Reclaiming the Teacher Professionalism 265

education systems as well as professional development agencies and staff working on

teacher professional development projects. Indeed, it provided the forum for teacher

professionalism to be part of the political agenda and for the profession to be responsible

for de® ning itself and identifying opportunities for its development.

During the 1980s issues of teacher professionalism were one of the sites of struggle

when Australian industry was restructuring industr ial awards. According to Laurie

Carmichael, then General Secretary of the Metal Workers Union, award restructuring

marked a new era of productive and social life in Australia. In education, award

restructuring fuelled union activity, mobilised professional groups, and unsettled tra-

ditional relations between State government education authorities and between State and

Federal governments in education. Debate about the relationship between the industr ial

and professional dimensions of teachers’ work, and who represented teachers in those

areas, surged into prominence, as did inter governmental relations and authority (Seddon,

1996). However, by 1993 the political climate had changed and award restructuring had

disappeared from the public view. Nevertheless, it left a signi® cant legacy with regard to

the development of new types of relationships between the unions, the profession and

government, both at the state and federal level. According to Seddon (1996) a joint

industr ial and professional agenda was promoted which af® rmed that award restructuring

would provide a potent mechanism for reforming the work of teachers, and therefore, the

processes of teaching and learning which lie at the heart of education (p. 3). In 1993 the

Commonwealth Government negotiated a `Teaching Accord’ with the Australian Edu-

cation Union (AEU) and the Independent Education Union (IEU)2

The Teaching Accord

established priorities and detailed the commitment of the Commonwealth to the involve-

ment of the profession and its ® nancial support for professional development, curriculum

assessment and research projects, with seed funding for the National Schools Project and

the Australian Teaching Council. This agreement was established to provide a national

framework for `enterprise bargaining’ (Burrow, 1996). At the time several state employers

and teacher unions incorporated the priorit ies and the funding support into their agree-

ments. According to Sharan Burrow (1996) , currently the President of the Australian

Education Union, the Accord encouraged school reform, a move towards professional

standards, and some greater salary justice and equity through salary scales across the

profession. The Accord was contested and con¯ ictual but, on balance, it provided the

teaching profession with useful foundations for the future. Burrow argues that in parti-

cular, `award restructuring fuelled the further emergence of the education profession and

consolidated its determination to take more control over professional life’ (Burrow , 1996,

p. 114). An important premise underlying the relationship between the industr ial and

professional agenda was that the conditions of teachers’ work were the conditions under

which students learned.

The agenda developed through award restructuring and enterprise bargaining was

pursued through both the public industr ial campaign and behind the closed doors of the

National Project on Quality Teaching and Learning (NPQTL) and its progeny: The

Australian Teaching Council (ATC); the National Schools Project (NSP); and other forums

looking at teacher competencies and professional development. Unfortunately, by 1993 the

unity of the industr ial and professional issues created through the award restructuring

agenda had dissipated. The uni® ed policy agenda of the early 1990s had repolarised into

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266 J. Sachs

distinc t industr ial and professional concerns. At this time there was also a return of

conservative governments in most Australian mainland states. Industr ial confrontations

were also occurring between governments and Teacher Unions in Western Australia,

Victoria and South Australia. The collaborative endeavour between unions and employers

for teacher professional development had begun to fracture.

Despite the collapse of the joint union and government initiatives for professional

renewal that characterised the early 1990s, several national initiatives survived which had

as their focus the revitalisation of teacher professionalism. These projects offered teachers

the opportunity to reclaim the agenda for de® ning the nature and scope of teacher

professionalism. The National Schools Network (NSN), an offspring of the National

Schools Project (NSP) and the Innovative Links Between Schools and Universities Project

for Teacher Professional Development (Innovative Links)3 are two examples where

teachers and other interested parties were provided on a national level with professional

development funds and opportunities to debate and re¯ ect on issues of teacher profession-

alism.

Both of these projects seized two contemporary principles of organisational develop-

ment: networking and a learning organisation approach to change and development. Both

of them are concerned with raising questions and issues that confront what it means to be

a teacher, an academic, a policy activist and how to deal with the complexities, dilemmas

and tensions of contemporary educational life. At the core of both of these projects is a

commitment to improve the work practices and conditions of teachers and students, and

in so doing to improve student learning outcomes.

Throughout the various reforms and restructuring, matters of administration have

continued to be a central issue and concepts of devolution and decentralisation have been

pivotal in the organisational restructuring of Australian school systems. By the beginning

of the early 1990s every state and Territory government had carried out some form of

organisational restructuring designed to decentralise the management of its schooling

system (Harman et al., 1991). A range of management practices were introduced to

liberalise the school and to increase teacher responsibilities in instruction. Common

features of the new management practices included: an increased role for local manage-

ment through school councils, allocation of budgets to school councils, participatory forms

of administration, performance based review and accountability, the expectation that

schools will be competitive in the `marketplace’ and the requirement for administrators to

guarantee the implementation of central policies and priorit ies. The translation of decentra-

lisation and devolut ion into practice is referred to by terms such as the self managing

school, site-based management, local school management, school centred management and

school-based management. Harman et al. (1991) found that the move towards self-

management in Australian school systems had four main features:

· a network form of organisational structure;

· output and performance based accountability;

· the principal task of the head of® ce is co-ordination not control; and,

· the organisation is collegial rather than hierarchical.

They also found that the operational requirements of local management prompted

schools to develop open and participative decision-making practices; to establish perform-

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Reclaiming the Teacher Professionalism 267

ance indicators to monitor progress of goal attainment, processes and budget, and to

provide a performance and review evaluation pro® le for the purposes of public account-

ability. Dimmock (1993) identi® es six generic features as characterising school centred

management; autonom y, ¯ exibili ty and responsiveness, planning, participatory and collab-

orative decision making and self ef® cacy. These form the practical framework for school

centred management to be implemented in practice across a wide range of contexts.

In the context of the decentralisation of the management of teaching and learning

to the school level, a number of consequences follow that are profoundly signi® cant

for teacher professionalism. These include: principals are positioned to now assume

leadership for school-based management of teaching and learning. In practice this means

that principals have the opportunity to develop a unique teaching learning community

for their school; and consequently they are freer to delegate inside the schools in

ways which encourage leadership and innovative practices from their experienced

teachers. This principle of delegation extends to the classroom , where various types of

organisation such as teaming can be implemented to recon® gure teaching and learning

within the school.

These changes represent structural opportunities for principals and teachers enter into

a culture of school-based management of teaching and learning which asks them to assume

responsibility for their own learning and teaching practices in the context of the school as

a learning community (Yeatman & Sachs, 1995). They also provide a strong political

platform for teachers to reclaim the moral and intellectual leadership at the national level

for teacher professionalism. It is to this issue that I now turn.

RECLAIMING TEACHER PROFESSIONALISM

Elsewhere (Sachs, 1996, 1997) I have argued that renewing teacher professionalism means

moving beyond what Friedson (1994) calls a commonsense idea of professionalism. A

commonsense idea of professionalism is developed passively: it is not elaborated, system-

atised or re® ned self consciously so much as it grows out of everyday social usage.

Friedson (1994, p. 170) argues that:

commonsense usage is expanded to emphasise those characteristics of an

occupation that justify special standing and privilege: it becomes a profession’ s

portrayal of profession. Its content is determined largely by the political and

ceremonial needs of the profession, and it is used primarily to advance and

defend its position.

Through award restructuring and the various teacher professional development initiatives

that emerged during the 1990s as a result of Federal government support , teacher

professionalism in Australia developed beyond Friedson’ s commonsense view. It became

of vehicle for school reform and the political repositioning of the profession both in terms

of itself but more importantly in the eyes of the community.

One of the hallmarks of being identi® ed externally as a professional is to continue

learning throughout a career, deepening knowledge, skill judgm ent, staying abreast of

important developments in the ® eld and experimenting with innova tions that promise

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268 J. Sachs

improvements in practice (Sykes, 1990). Here lies one of the paradoxes for teacher

professionalism for as Fullan (1993) notes, as a profession, we are not a learning

profession. While student learning is a goal, often the continuing learning of teachers is

overlooked. While continuous learning and the improvement of our practice should be at

the core of teacher professionalism in many instances this is not so. Projects funded

through the NSN and Innovative Links attempted to address paradox in practical and

concrete ways.

The type of systemic school reform that has characterised education policy and

practices during the 1990s has established new sets of relations among governmental

bureaucracies and agencies, unions, professional teaching groups in both primary and

secondary areas, and research communities. The call for teacher professionalism, through

award restructuring and school reform related to a revisioning of occupational identity.

Signi® cantly, it gave value to school work that included greater teacher responsibility and

¯ exibility in implementing goal governed approaches of the state (Popkewitz, 1996, p. 30).

Under the guise of professionalism teachers became the vehicles to implement government

policy, which had as its central priorities, increased productivity by being more ef® cient,

effective and economic.

The occupational identity envisaged through education reforms in Australia recast

teachers as learners and researchers. This is certainly evident in two recent initiatives

aiming at revitalising teacher professionalism within Australia. These are the NSN and the

Innovative Links projects referred to earlier. I now turn to elaborate how these two projects

have contributed to reclaiming the professional agenda by teachers and other education

industry workers, and have contributed to teachers taking the initiative to shape their own

professional futures. Nevertheless, it must also be acknowledged that the kind of pro-

fessional development and conceptions of teacher professionalism implicit within the

context of reform that is driven by practitioners is highly problematic. Rethinking schools

and classroom practice is exceptionally demanding. It requires that teachers, administrators

and parents confront some of the taken-for granted assumptions that have guided their

professional work for years (Sachs & Logan, 1997). It means that these people have to take

risks about making public their successes, failures, reservations and anxieties. For some

this is an activity that has never been undertaken during their professional lives. Neverthe-

less, evidence gained from teachers involved in the NSN and the Innovative Links projects

indicate that this risk-taking has enormous potential for re-enlivening their life and practice

in schools (Sachs & Logan, 1997) and has provided teachers with local and national

opportunities to contribute to reclaiming the agenda of teacher professionalism.

THE PROJECT OF RECLAIMING TEACHER PROFESSIONALISM: TWO

EXAMPLES

The NSN and the Innovative Links Project have both attempted to broaden the base of

school restructuring beyond organisational change to incorporate the view of the need to

reclaim the political terrain of teacher professionalism. The aim has been to bring about

signi® cant changes in teacher practices, which it is argued will then improve student

learning outcomes. Fundamental to the NSN and the Innovative Links project is the view

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Reclaiming the Teacher Professionalism 269

that teachers working in the workforce will need to have a clearer grasp of the issues and

complexity involved in teaching in today’ s rapidly changing social and cultural context.

The NSN and the Innovative Links Projects have provided a legitimate vehicle for the

purpose of restructuring becoming one of changing the organisation so that good ideas and

strategies born in practice can ¯ ourish and not be hindered by existing bureaucratic forces

(Grimmett, 1995).

Sykes (1990, p. 92) argues that the task for the future is to construct a professional

model that accommodates teaching’ s distinct aspects. The National Schools Network and

the Innovative Links project are two contemporary examples of school based initiatives

designed to reconceptuatise teacher professionalism and which can be seen as contributing

to the overall vision underlying educational restructuring on a national scale. Both of these

projects are school based national projects and break with traditional parochial conceptions

of teacher professionalism. Because teachers participate as part of a national network of

teachers involved in professional development, they become part of the national reform

agenda, and are inclusive of a national professional group. Indeed, the national nature of

the projects has created a vigorous professional community within schools and across

system and state boundaries which has given life to the development of new ideas and

practices which move well beyond local needs and interests.

Furthermore, these projects work on the assumption that teacher professionalism

cannot be reclaimed simply at the individual or school level, it needs to be reclaimed at

the level of the whole profession. The Innova tive Links project in particular has provided

opportunities for teachers to renew their professionalism at both the individual but more

importantly the level of the whole profession. The profession was involved at a variety of

levels through union, systemic and university support and activity. Practitioner members

of the profession were actively involved in the oversight of the project through the

National Steering Committee and the roundtable activities. School based personnel and

university staff worked collaboratively in the conceptualisation and development of school

based projects.

The NSN and the Innovative Links Project has shown the signi® cance of developing

a national approach to the renewal of teacher professionalism in several respects. First, it

has provided teachers with opportunities to cross over state and system boundaries to

access information and best practice which is of professional value. It has facilitated

networking of the kind that is different from the traditional cross local school type. It has

broken teachers out of their local systems, and thus breaks them out of the parochialism

of that system and to attach their sense of professional identity to a wider, more open and

comparative system orientation. Second, the use of National Forums as a strategy for

bringing project participants together has helped to facilitate the `big picture’ view of

school reform and teacher professionalism, and to support the development of national

networks. Third, the presence of the University as part of a reform site known as a

Roundtable has contribu ted to the national character of the project (Yeatman & Sachs,

1995). Universities, unlike schools are federally funded. Teacher education academics

identify as members of a nationa l professional group, and see their professional networks

as national and international rather than state or local in nature. Finally, these projects have

contributed in constructive ways to actualising the possibility of revitalised teaching in

revitalised schools (Grimmett, 1995).

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270 J. Sachs

The National Schools Network

The National Schools Network (NSN) and its precursor the National Schools Project

(NSP) were conceived as tools for system reform, and had the employers, unions, and

Commonwealth Government locked into support ing the process though the `Education

Accord’ of 1993. As Angus (1996, p. 145) observes, `the primary target was not to enable

improvement in the over 200 or so pilot schools, but rather to produce systemic changes

that would enable the other 9800 schools in Australia to follow suit’ . Both the NSP and

the NSN were action research projects designed to ® nd out what was preventing schools

from implementing their own ideas about improving teaching and learning. Conceptually,

both projects operate from the follow ing assumptions. First, the Projects rejected the idea

that there was one single recipe for school improvement and teacher professionalism.

Second, it was recognised that if worthwhile changes were to occur both the identi® cation

of the problem to be addressed by the change and the implementation of the prospective

solution had to occur in the school community (Angus, 1996). Finally, both projects were

framed around the idea of work organisation, that is the ways in which teachers’ work was

structured by organisational parameters, in particular those governed by government

awards, industr ial agreements, and so on. NSN schools have developed projects which

have been concerned with asking teachers to examine and question the link between the

organisation of teachers’ work and pedagogy. The NSN currently provides support for

over 400 Australian schools that are rethinking their work organisation and teaching and

learning in order to improve learning outcomes for students and staff.

The NSN continually links teacher professional development with on-going school

based research initia tives. The NSN research framework involves building a research

culture among teachers in schools. It promotes and supports collaborative research and

collegial re¯ ective practices using critical action research methodologies. Through such an

orientation to school practice teachers in schools are rethinking and revitalising various

aspects of their practice. As a consequence teacher professionalism is being rede® ned from

within the profession rather than from outside.

The Innovative Links Project4

The Innova tive Links5 project is another example of a nation-wide initiative that is

challenging established conceptions as to what schooling, teacher professionalism and

teacher education is about. It complements and builds upon the experience of NSN. This

is not by chance. Key academics were members of an NSN academic reference group

which asked speci® c questions about the relationship between research and practice in the

work of teachers. Conceptually and organisationally, then, the Innovative Links project

was built upon the procedures, learnings and principles of participation established through

the NSN (and its predecessor, the NSP). As part of the discussion a new and reciprocal

element emerged about the relationship between research and practice in the work of

university academics in the ® eld of teacher education. It has been designed to move

participants beyond their accustomed ways of doing things and their familiar relationships

(Yeatman & Sachs, 1995).

The Innovative Links project represents formal and explicit partnerships between

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Reclaiming the Teacher Professionalism 271

schools and universities which are seen as central to the renewal and development of

teacher professionalism; this is enabled by the formation of local roundtables comprising

® ve to six schools and academic associates from the af® liated university. As Yeatman and

Sachs (1995) observe for the ® rst time the relationship between teacher education faculties

in universities and schools has come onto the school reform/restructuring agenda in

Australia. The project focuses the spotlight on the question of how this relationship should

be designed and developed so as to facilitate the professional development of both school

and university based practitioners. Innovative Links is new and signi® cant for the

following reasons:

· teacher professional development has been designed and developed on a whole school

basis in ways which break traditional classroom isolation and network teachers into

ongoing -school based learning communities and professional conversations;

· it has developed as a formal and explicit relationship the partnership between practicing

teachers and teacher educators in ways which are designed to foster professional

development of both of these partners; and

· this is a formal partnership between participating schools and universities on a scale that

is of system wide impact and signi® cance. (Yeatman & Sachs, 1995, p. 21).

The basic premise upon which Innovative Links and NSN is formulated is the

construction of a learning society. In the context of schooling, teachers can be regarded as

providing the leadership and facilitation of processes, whereby students learn the skills and

knowledge which enable them to take responsibility for their own learning. Within such

a context student learning is only one of the dimensions. Teacher learning must be

incorporated, as must academic learning and systems learning if the idea of a learning

society is to be fully realised.

Both the NSN and the Innovative Links Project have been concerned with revitalising

schools and teacher professionalism through teacher learning. Both projects have empha-

sised processes of inquiry , a collaborative work context and improving student and teacher

work conditions and learning outcomes. The schools associated with both projects have

encouraged teachers to understand and engage in the minds of learners, and to devise

strategies, individually and collectively which will improve students learning outcomes.

Academics are also working with their school based colleagues in more collaborative and

collegial ways. School±university partnerships are moving beyond rhetorical slogans to

being an integral part of the professional work of both groups. To this end, the micro

politica l relationships between academics and their school based colleagues are having to

be addressed in concrete and practical ways.

Teachers working in NSN and Innovative Links schools have developed skills and

competencies to undertake classroom based action research into dilemmas of teaching,

such as investigating problematic aspects of the curriculum, attempting to understand

learners’ conceptions of subject matter content, examining dif® cult student behaviour and

many other demanding and confronting aspects of classroom and school life. The

collaboration between the schools and university academics has led to ® eld based teacher

research and to the development of different kinds of relationships (professional and

social) between two parties concerned with teacher preparation and development. Impor-

tantly, both of these projects have been concerned with developing what Lave & Wenger

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272 J. Sachs

(1991) refer to as `communities of practice’ . They argue that social practice, what

practitioners do and how they talk about what they do, is the primary generative

phenomenon and learning is one of its characteristics. They locate `learning not in the

acquisition of structure, but in the increased access of learners to participating roles in

expert performance’ (Lave & Wenger, 1991, p. 17). A key part of expert performance is

the ability to talk about it, to tell stories about it, not as a second order representation of

what to do but as an integral part of what it is to be an expert performer. Learning is thus

a way of being in a particular social world not merely knowing about it or describing it.

By being part of a community of practice, emphasis is placed upon participation in a

community of practitioners, rather than merely the acquisition of a set of skills, or

practices deemed to satisfy bureaucratic requirements. In the case of the NSN and

Innovative Links schools involvement has been constructed as the development of

opportunities for listening to the stories, documenting the stories, so that participants are

involved in an on going conversation about practice. One outcome of this process is that

teachers and academic colleagues move from peripheral involvement in the research

activity to one of full participation. A conversation is initiated about learning, and how

people can learn from projects and each other. This conversation becomes an on-going

aspect of school life and is fundamental to the continuing development of school-

university partnerships. While there will be interruptions when the exigencies and pres-

sures of school life get in the way, nevertheless the learnings that emerge during and after

the conversations can be returned to, re¯ ected upon and provide the basis for new

conversations and further learning.

Both of the NSN and the Innovative Links projects represent instances of postmodern

professionalism (Goodson & Hargreaves, 1996). They are exemplars of what is possible

when teachers reclaim the professional agenda at both the individual and collective level.

These projects have been guided by a shared vision of the purposes which teacher

professionalism should serve within active social and political communities. Through their

involvement with the NSN and the Innovative Links Project teachers across Australia have

become part of a national social movement in which teachers have been able to take

advantage of opportunities to develop skills, competencies and disposit ions of mind that

will contribute to the enhancement of teaching and the improvement of student learning

outcom es. Through these projects the macro and micro political agenda for teacher

professionalism has been reclaimed by teachers themselves.

These projects by their conception, organisation and membership have provided

teachers, in conjunction with academic and union colleagues, with opportunities to have

an active role in de® ning their professional needs and how these needs might be achieved

locally and nationally. They have recast relationships between a variety of education

workers and have contributed signi® cantly in providing models for how teachers can be

responsible for their own learning and improving that of students. That these projects

transcend state bounda ries and confront the conventional wisdom of experience is in no

small part due to the vision and commitment of a number of teachers, academics and

policy activists working at the state and national level. Their energy and strategic thinking

has played a signi® cant part in the project of reclaiming teacher professionalism. However,

at the end of the day, it is teachers themselves who have the responsibility of sustaining

and reclaiming the professional agenda.

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Reclaiming the Teacher Professionalism 273

CONCLUSION

In this paper I have used the experience from two National teacher professional develop-

ment projects in Australia to illustrate how award restructuring and school reform worked

together to enable teachers to reclaim the political ground of teacher professionalism. It is

clear that teaching and notions of teacher professionalism in the future will require new

and different ways of being debated and negotiated inside and outside of the profession.

To achieve this teachers will need to develop new ways of talking about the work of

teaching and what is means to be a professional. Teacher professionalism, as a term will

no longer be limited by commonsense de® nitions, that in the main have been imposed

from outside. Rather, new forms of teacher professionalism will emerge in response to

changing economic, social and political conditions. Both the Innovative Links Project and

the National Schools Network have provided models for how teachers, with the support of

unions, university academics and education systems can reclaim the professional ground .

These projects have also demonstrated that through strategic partnerships between various

education stakeholders the strategy of reclaiming teacher professionalism is a political

project that must be worked on simultaneously at both the individual and group level.

Furthermore, the projects individually at the school level and collectively at the national

level demonstrate that the development of teacher professionalism is an ongoing struggle.

This is one that goes beyond the struggle for meaning but also the struggle for the

profession to be in control of its own future. It is the members of profession who provide

the moral and intellectual leadership to ensure that student learning is of a high quality and

that the working conditions of teachers are enhanced. The challenge for teachers now is

how to maintain the political gains that have been made through national initiatives such

as the NSN and the Innova tive links Project. Reclaiming teacher professionalism is an

ongoing struggle. It requires energy, commitment and the ability to think strategically. The

two projects described in this paper indicate what is possible when teachers themselves are

given resources to de ® ne what is means to be a teacher for the future .

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The synthesis of the two projects reported here draws upon the intellectual and practical

labour of many educational professionals across Australia. Each project has been coordi-

nated at local, regional, state and federal levels. We acknowledge the work of all of these

people . Vivienne White, the Coordinator of the NSN deserves particular recognition for

her vision and strength.

NOTES

[1] A version of this paper was presented at the 6th National Conference in Educational Research held

in collaboration with the International Network PACT Conference, Professionalism: Rethinking the

Work of Teachers and School Leaders in an Age of Change.

[2] The AEU is the national union representing teachers working in government schools, while the IEU

represents at the national level teachers working in independent and catholic schools.

[3] For more detail about these projects see Sachs (1996, 1997), Groundwater Smith (1996), Sachs &

Groundwater Smith (1996) and Yeatman & Sachs (1995).

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274 J. Sachs

[4] This project also represents the ® rst time that a signi ® cant amount of public money ($3 million) has

been coordinated by university academics in conjunction with school personnel for teacher and

academic professional development.

[5] In terms of its scope the project has provided the opportunity for 14 universities, across 16

campuses, representing all Australian states and one territory to be involved in a project that has as

its core feature the idea of partnerships between practicing teachers on a whole school basis and

university based teacher educators. This is approximately one third of universities in Australia

involved in a coherent teacher professional development project. Added to this are some 100 schools

which include state, independent, catholic representatives and some 80 academic associates.

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