Dr Michelle Attard Tonna (University of Malta) & Dr Rachel Shanks (University of Aberdeen)
Comparative study of new pathways into teaching in Malta and Scotland
European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction
Paper presented on 15th August, Aachen
Attard Tonna, M. and Shanks, R. (2019) Comparative study of new pathways into teaching in Malta and Scotland, 18th Biennial EARLI Conference for Research on Learning and Instruction, RWTH Aachen University, Germany, 12-16th August 2019.
Long abstract
1. Aim
Preparing high quality teachers is a recurring theme on national and international education agendas. One of a nation’s priorities is to secure a teaching force equipped to achieve high quality learning outcomes for all students. With recruitment and retention problems in many countries there has been growing diversification of teacher preparation routes. New routes operate in contexts with varied problems but share some components, for example being part-time and/or online. Our primary aim is to examine teacher preparation routes in Malta and Scotland to determine which routes have common elements in order to categorise the various pathways into teaching. A second aim is to study the (self-)selection of candidates onto these pathways to understand which pathway characteristics attract which kinds of candidates, for example those which attract more career changers and those which bring more men into primary school teaching.
Malta and Scotland have been chosen as there are shared cultural and historical ties between the two countries. Comparing initial teacher education provision in two different countries is challenging as there is both diversity and complexity of provision across Europe (Buchberger and Buchberger, 2002). Our comparative study is contextualised in the international debates about teacher certification routes on the one hand and the current policy agenda in both countries on the other.
2. Theoretical framework
Our approach is to problematise programmes introduced in response to teacher shortages in order to understand how these solutions have operated in different contexts within and between the two countries. We undertake this research from a critical realist approach meaning we see education as a concrete rather than an abstract science (Clegg, 2005) as education requires practical experience on which practitioners can base their knowledge and future actions (Schön, 1983).
3. Methodology
The study included analysis of the different pathways to teacher qualification, their key features and the numbers enrolled across all teacher education institutions in Malta and Scotland in the 2017-2018 academic year. From Scotland data from two studies, funded by the Scottish Government, is drawn upon: Measuring Quality in Initial Teacher Education (MQuITE) (Rauschenberger, Adams, & Kennedy, 2017) which includes all universities preparing teachers in Scotland; and a study of the Distance Learning in Initial Teacher Education (DLITE) programme at the University of Aberdeen. Data from Malta is based on figures from The Faculty of Education and The Institute for Education, the two main institutions offering teacher preparation routes in Malta, and six semi-structured interviews of teachers qualifying from the part-time and full-time routes.
In the MQuITE study an online survey was distributed to all teacher education students finishing in the summer of 2018. To complement the surveys, interviews were conducted to gather more detailed information on 2018 graduates’ experiences and perspectives of their pathway into teaching. Data from surveys and interviews with participants on the Aberdeen DLITE programme has been analysed for this comparative research.
In the Maltese context, a mixed methods approach was also used. Six semi-structured interviews were held with teacher candidates following different initial teacher education programmes to generate insights into the reasons why different teacher preparation routes are chosen (Have, 2004). These insights were combined with the data from official figures of the number of teachers qualifying through each route. This strategy of inquiry has provided a good understanding of the research problem (Creswell, 2014).
4. Findings
Initial analysis of data from the MQuITE student surveys in 2018 shows that students recognised the effectiveness of university-based experiences contributing to their academic development. However, responses to a question about the contribution that university-based experience makes to holistic development as a beginning teacher reveals a more complex picture. The DLITE programme has attracted more women than men which is consistent with the findings from a study in Switzerland (Keck Frei, Berweger & Bieri Buschor, 2017) in relation to those who opt to switch careers into teaching. The DLITE participants have come from a wide variety of career backgrounds with around half of the participants already involved in the education sector. The data from Malta suggest that those who choose to qualify as teachers through an ‘on-the-job’ route have specific justifications for this, namely to train as primary teachers after failing to be employed as secondary teachers in their subject area of specialisation, or to regularise their position and earn a Permanent Warrant after being employed as supply teachers for a number of years.
5. Theoretical and educational significance
The development of different routes to teaching is a response to teacher shortages but also a change in thinking about teaching as a profession. These alternative routes to teaching open new opportunities to enter teaching and mark a change in the role of schools as an important environment for teachers’ professional learning. The differences between the programmes, both within, and across Malta and Scotland may well reflect the differences in circumstances in which they had to be realised but will enable the categorisation of teacher preparation pathways and the identification of which pathways appeal to which kinds of candidate.
References
Buchberger, F. & Buchberger, I. (2002) Europa ̈ische Lehrerausbildung: Zwischen Finnland und England, in: B. Laudenbach, (Hg), Reform der Lehrerbildung (Bremen, LSI), 378–389.
Clegg, S. (2005) Evidence‐based practice in educational research: a critical realist critique of systematic review, British Journal of Sociology of Education, 26:3, 415-428, DOI: 10.1080/01425690500128932
Creswell, J. W. (2014). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods approaches. (4th ed.). Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
Have, P. T. (2004). Understanding qualitative research and ethnomethodology. London: Sage Publications.
Keck Frei, A., Berweger, S. & Bieri Buschor, C. (2017) Men considering (and choosing) teaching as a career: what accounts for their decision to become a teacher?, European Journal of Teacher Education, 40:4, 535-549, DOI: 10.1080/02619768.2017.1315397
Rauschenberger, E., Adams, P. & Kennedy, A. (2017). Measuring Quality in ITE: A literature review for Scotland’s MQuITE study. Edinburgh: Scottish Council of Deans of Education. Available at http://www.scde.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/MQuITE-Lit-Review-FINAL-Oct-2017.pdf
Schön, D. (1983) The reflective practitioner. New York: Basic Books.