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Don't be left in the dark or led astray:
by Bea Groves
So, what do adult education tutors in the UK need? I mean REALLY need… not just say that they need because someone in authority (with all the funding and job-related power) is closely breathing down their necks?
How often have we sat in meetings and conferences (or such) and heard someone say that they knew what we needed? Inevitably, this amounts to such instrumental issues as better quality CPD opportunities, or ‘better’ qualifications, or more ‘rigorous’ ways of justifying what we do (which usually means more paperwork)? If you’re like me and have started to glaze-over out of boredom and ingrained scepticism every time your hear such talk, then don’t for a moment think you’re alone! How often have we been patronised by people we don’t trust, don’t believe, have no confidence in and generally have their own vested interests at heart? The story of ‘professional improvement’ has so often been told to us, that it’s not too surprising that it is routinely greeted with a groan of frustrated boredom.
Yet there is a value to the professionalism agenda. Ironically, most of the the people who talk about it are inevitably those lacking in professionalism. They haven’t taught in years (if they ever did!), and are so distant from the actual exigencies of working at ‘the chalk face’ (to use a very old term) that their interests and ours are as distant as the stars in the sky. What we DO need is to grasp the issue of professionalism ourselves. Adult educationalists need to form their own agenda, and enthusiastically own it! Sadly we are nowhere near doing this, and (worse still) are divided against ourselves by demoralised illusions of what adult education is supposed to be about, or what it can possibly accomplish.
But let us not be too negative about all this. It’s still possible to make statements about being a professional that make sense, for all the bluster and stone-walling that often follow in their wake from many quarters. I’m going lay my own ghosts here with a few ideas that seem like common-sense to me. Your mileage may differ of course, but then I make no great claims that I speak ‘for’ anyone (least of all ‘for the profession’) by stating them:
How often have we sat in meetings and conferences (or such) and heard someone say that they knew what we needed? Inevitably, this amounts to such instrumental issues as better quality CPD opportunities, or ‘better’ qualifications, or more ‘rigorous’ ways of justifying what we do (which usually means more paperwork)? If you’re like me and have started to glaze-over out of boredom and ingrained scepticism every time your hear such talk, then don’t for a moment think you’re alone! How often have we been patronised by people we don’t trust, don’t believe, have no confidence in and generally have their own vested interests at heart? The story of ‘professional improvement’ has so often been told to us, that it’s not too surprising that it is routinely greeted with a groan of frustrated boredom.
Yet there is a value to the professionalism agenda. Ironically, most of the the people who talk about it are inevitably those lacking in professionalism. They haven’t taught in years (if they ever did!), and are so distant from the actual exigencies of working at ‘the chalk face’ (to use a very old term) that their interests and ours are as distant as the stars in the sky. What we DO need is to grasp the issue of professionalism ourselves. Adult educationalists need to form their own agenda, and enthusiastically own it! Sadly we are nowhere near doing this, and (worse still) are divided against ourselves by demoralised illusions of what adult education is supposed to be about, or what it can possibly accomplish.
But let us not be too negative about all this. It’s still possible to make statements about being a professional that make sense, for all the bluster and stone-walling that often follow in their wake from many quarters. I’m going lay my own ghosts here with a few ideas that seem like common-sense to me. Your mileage may differ of course, but then I make no great claims that I speak ‘for’ anyone (least of all ‘for the profession’) by stating them:
1. AUTONOMY - the heart of the matter! If I’m a professional, then surely I have a right to direct and monitor my own work. I shouldn’t need to be told ‘how to write a lesson plan’ or what the best teaching methods are, or what resources I should be using. Surely a professional will already know these things better than those in their back-office? So why is it I’m constantly being directed how to do such things? Not for me or my students’ general benefit I would suggest. Maybe out of paranoia that tutors or lecturers aren’t toeing the institutional (corporate) line?
2. IF IT CAN BE DONE BY AN ADMINISTRATOR, THEN IT SHOULD BE DONE BY AN ADMINISTRATOR - and by that, I mean I should not be spending my time duplicating umpteen bits of paper which justify issues that should be taken for granted by an educational system that actually believes in the concept of a professional tutor. Paperwork should directly and unequivocally refer to the educational process and should not exist simply to make bureaucracy easier. This should be a no-brainer; paperwork that gets in the way of teaching needs to end.
3. LESS MANAGEMENT, MORE LEADERSHIP - this is the ‘tough one’. We have FAR too many managers, and far too few people within the profession who can lead, both by their example and their words. Management (in general) within the sector is over-weaning, over-present, and far too paranoid for its own good. It fails to consult, guards its power-base far too manically, and fails to empower or facilitate good teaching and learning. It’s corporatism has become a smoke-screen for its own failings, which means that a concept such as ‘management improvement’ has become a laughable topic. In general (and I know there are some exceptions, but they’re relatively rare), management’s interventions usually cause more problems than they solve, and contribute little to efficacy or innovation. What we need instead is less emphasis on organising and managing and more on leadership, vision, a commonality of interest and purpose. Managers should be practising teachers, and subject to evaluative review by their staff (i.e. tutors, lecturers…) as part of their overall appraisal process. And they should have studied and hold qualifications in leadership as a condition of retaining their post. Sound draconian? Then why are these very same constraints applied to us? Surely we’re ‘all in this together’ and our professional opinion of how management works (or doesn’t) needs to be an essential part of this sector’s ‘improvement’ systems?
4. AN END TO ‘NARROWNESS’ - by this, I mean an end to the stereotyping of tutors and lecturers as interchangeable ‘units for work’, an end to the concept of education as only having one end (and that is to get a job), and an end to the view that educational institutions exist in and for themselves. In the latter case, I would argue that institutions are a essentially a means to an end, and that end is the furthering of an inclusive, democratic, free and civilised society — education, in effect, as a means to social participation. Work, can be part of that inclusiveness, and should be as part of the notion of personal fulfilment and prosperity. But it is not the sole and most important issue we deal with. Surely that is transparent from our day-to-day work? Our students do not exist in a social vacuum, and that socio-political context forms an essential part of human growth. We ignore or trivialise it at our peril! Our invented institutions (colleges, community education centres, universities…) are vehicles towards that end. They are not factories producing educational ‘product’. They are not companies selling things to the public. They are the focus points of communities of practice (or communities of exploration, if you prefer), and their responsibilities to foster the profession as a whole, and society at large are profound.
2. IF IT CAN BE DONE BY AN ADMINISTRATOR, THEN IT SHOULD BE DONE BY AN ADMINISTRATOR - and by that, I mean I should not be spending my time duplicating umpteen bits of paper which justify issues that should be taken for granted by an educational system that actually believes in the concept of a professional tutor. Paperwork should directly and unequivocally refer to the educational process and should not exist simply to make bureaucracy easier. This should be a no-brainer; paperwork that gets in the way of teaching needs to end.
3. LESS MANAGEMENT, MORE LEADERSHIP - this is the ‘tough one’. We have FAR too many managers, and far too few people within the profession who can lead, both by their example and their words. Management (in general) within the sector is over-weaning, over-present, and far too paranoid for its own good. It fails to consult, guards its power-base far too manically, and fails to empower or facilitate good teaching and learning. It’s corporatism has become a smoke-screen for its own failings, which means that a concept such as ‘management improvement’ has become a laughable topic. In general (and I know there are some exceptions, but they’re relatively rare), management’s interventions usually cause more problems than they solve, and contribute little to efficacy or innovation. What we need instead is less emphasis on organising and managing and more on leadership, vision, a commonality of interest and purpose. Managers should be practising teachers, and subject to evaluative review by their staff (i.e. tutors, lecturers…) as part of their overall appraisal process. And they should have studied and hold qualifications in leadership as a condition of retaining their post. Sound draconian? Then why are these very same constraints applied to us? Surely we’re ‘all in this together’ and our professional opinion of how management works (or doesn’t) needs to be an essential part of this sector’s ‘improvement’ systems?
4. AN END TO ‘NARROWNESS’ - by this, I mean an end to the stereotyping of tutors and lecturers as interchangeable ‘units for work’, an end to the concept of education as only having one end (and that is to get a job), and an end to the view that educational institutions exist in and for themselves. In the latter case, I would argue that institutions are a essentially a means to an end, and that end is the furthering of an inclusive, democratic, free and civilised society — education, in effect, as a means to social participation. Work, can be part of that inclusiveness, and should be as part of the notion of personal fulfilment and prosperity. But it is not the sole and most important issue we deal with. Surely that is transparent from our day-to-day work? Our students do not exist in a social vacuum, and that socio-political context forms an essential part of human growth. We ignore or trivialise it at our peril! Our invented institutions (colleges, community education centres, universities…) are vehicles towards that end. They are not factories producing educational ‘product’. They are not companies selling things to the public. They are the focus points of communities of practice (or communities of exploration, if you prefer), and their responsibilities to foster the profession as a whole, and society at large are profound.
Bea Groves is General Secretary of the Association of Part-Time Tutors (APTT). She holds QTLS, and has taught in adult education since 1980.
