Why and How a Teacher Union Supports Autonomous Teacher Professional Development in an Age of New Managerialism

Abstract

There are five visibly current trends in the literature on teachers’ professionallearning, some dominant and others competing in specificjurisdictions:

• a push for greater alignment of teachers’ professional learning with managerial and system goals

• system support for teachers’ professional learning through governmentfunding but with less managerial control—perhaps epitomizedin Canada by the (now defunct) Alberta Initiative for SchoolImprovement

• the creation of standards of professional learning such as those producedand promoted by Learning Forward the former National StaffDevelopment Council (NSDC)

• dichotomous approaches to professional learning communities—somelargely prescribed and others more organic and self-organizing

• the promotion of collaborative and autonomous professional learningin which teachers as professionals engage in inquiry and otherself-directed approaches, which has built on the legacy of actionresearch