Why do teachers often have to attend professional development in their spare time?
Our 25th interview in the 100 Women Series is with is Dr Carolina Kuepper-Tetzel, a lecturer of Psychology at the University of Dundee.
Listen to Carolina and Teacher Toolkit founder Ross McGill:
- think about Carolina’s typical day at the university and the projects she is involved in
- describe Carolina’s educational background and how that has shaped her career
- explain why she never planned to be a teacher and why she now teaches
- define which career achievements Carolina is most proud of
- understand the one thing Carolina would like to see changed in education
- reflect on the centenary of the women’s vote and how far we still have to go
- discuss the need for increased encouragement from teachers to girls to study STEM subjects.
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You can find out more about Carolina on Twitter and her website Learning and Teaching Lab. You can also discover the resources available free for teachers on The Learning Scientists here.
To learn and teach are natural joys. It’s not a question of why teachers do it in their spare time, for surely learning and teaching are joyful activities that require little energy.
The difficulty lies in what the teachers are having to learn and why. If a teacher’s day is full of joyful teaching, you will not find them exhausted.
However, how much of the fatigue is emotionally based due to high expectations and demands from both the education system and parents alike?
Teaching and learning can be a 24/7 joy if freedom lies at the heart of it. But our education system is far from it at the moment, even though I am hopeful that change is always just around the corner.
Re: the one thing to change – that it is not “okay to do professional development in their free time”.
I would disagree.
I don’t think any other profession would expect CPD to be allocated in the way teachers do. Obviously time is important, with time to reflect on the learning and to implement change. However, most professionals would expect to be reading, listening to podcasts, attending webinars, etc. when at home, on their commute, etc. The bigger challenge would be that teachers (due to marking workloads, parent evenings, etc.) often have less of this time than many other professionals.
Changing this idea that CPD is a chore and time/location bound to ‘inset days’ needs to be pushed in the schools sector. Otherwise ministers and others will continue to put across the wrong message(s): e.g. you should not RECEIVE development – you undertake and engage with it (https://whoseeducationisitanyway.me/2016/02/25/professional-development-teachers-receive-has-a-tremendous-impact-in-the-classroom-nicky-morgan-facepalm-and-my-bett-2016/)