Professionalism And Dual-Professionalism In Education

Drawing on your research on your specialist area, produce a reflective account to compare your concept of professionalism and dual-professionalism with that of your peers in other areas of education and training. Use your findings to explain ways in which your professional values influence your practice in an area of specialism.

Impact of professional values, e.g. meeting organisational policies and procedures, audit of competence, promoting quality in teaching and learning, expectation for high standards, establishing and sharing best practice, updating specialist knowledge and skills, working to current awarding organisation requirements, targets for raising personal standards, engaging in CPD opportunities in improving professional qualifications.

Carry out research to prepare for peer discussion on the impact of national, local and institutional policies on your organisation and practice.

Your researches and discussions should include:

• current educational policies,
• social, political and economic factors
• organisation policies, codes of practice and guidelines

Drawing on examples from your own area of practice produce a case study to identify:

• the role of stakeholders and external bodies in education and training
• how being accountable to stakeholders and external bodies impacts on your organisation in education and training
• why it is important to work in partnership with employers and other stakeholders in education and training

As a part of your study analyse the impact of being accountable to stakeholders and external bodies on curriculum design, delivery and assessment in your area of specialism.

Prepare a presentation for your peers based on the range of documentation used in your specialist area for quality assurance and quality improvement to include:

• completed session evaluation
• completed course/programme evaluation
• completed self-evaluation e.g. SAR (self-assessment review)
• completed internal verification pro forma – of assignments and assessments.

Produce a diagram to show lines of responsibility within your organisation’s quality assurance model and use the diagram to explain how these lines of responsibility contribute to your organisation’s quality cycle

According to me professionalism is important in every organisation and similarly it is important for all education and training institutions to maintain a professional behaviour within their campus. Thus, professionalism is divided into three wide categories such as professional parameters, behaviours and responsibilities. Each of these categories has their own meaning and role to play in the educational institution. Professional parameters are the legal and other ethical problems, which the professional is expected to deal with in as sensible manner (Brody and Doukas  2014). On the other hand, in my opinion professional behaviour describes the behaviour of the teachers with the students, the school authorities, parents and colleagues. Professional responsibility is yet another aspect of professionalism, which focuses on the responsibility towards the institution, student, and community and towards their own family. I have realised that a family is considered to be affected by anyone’s profession due to lack of balance between professionalism and personal life. Professionalism also characterised by various types of quality, which describe their role and skills. Thus, some of the common characteristics of professionalism are appearance, demeanour, reliability, competence, ethics and efficient educational skills. Appearance descries that a professional person should always maintain a neat and professional look while coming to the organisation. On the other hand, demeanour is tea manner one should maintain in the educational institutions such as politeness with the student, humble nature and maintaining the volume of their speech. Similarly, other factors also play a crucial role in structuring the role of professionalism in today’s educational institution (Carrese 2015).

Dual professionalism on the other hand, I think is a much wider concept of professionalism. According to the concept of dual professionalism, a person should have deep knowledge about everything they are teaching others. It also means that they should have high standard in teaching and training activities for others. In my view, it is a little advanced version of professionalism discussed above. Dual professionalism explains that the mentors should be well averse with more than one field of knowledge. This will help the professors to easily move from one area of occupation to other, both within and outside the organisation (Jaakkola 2015). Dual professionalism is becoming much evident in today’s environment, as teachers need to carry out various types of activities in a same place. Thus having trained on dual professionalism will guide the trainers or the teachers to get indulge in various activities without facing many difficulties. Professional standard mentioned by dual professionalism is used by all type of trainers and teachers, whether they are new to the organisation or an experienced one. This is because lack of vast knowledge will also result in the failure of the teachers that have good experienced in that field. England has been active in developing dual professionalism in their institution on a wide range. The teachers that have an expertise in one kind of subject are put into professional activities which can help them develop know about other subjects as well. This is the method adopted in developing dual professionalism in most of the institutions. Educational institutions in England offer a wide range of high education courses to the students. However, recently they have undergone changes in their courses and style of teaching. This has bought a huge amount of changes in the nature of professional activities of the teachers in those institutions. Thus, during such circumstances, dual professionalism plays a vital role.

Task 2

Thus, from the above discussion I am of the opinion that dual professionalism should have the responsibility to not only do their task effectively and to bring about innovation in the tasks. A person with dual professionalism grows at every point of his life. Dual professionalism person should be recognised easily in the institution for the knowledge it holds and should at least have five qualifications. A person with such capabilities also has the ability to judge a circumstance and take up needful decision depending on his/her knowledge. This allows a dual professional person to work autonomously with accuracy. He/she with such capabilities also expect a professional environment for himself/herself where they can work on a collaborative culture of trust and assurance. Such type of professionals also deserve a lot of rewards for carry out such difficult task easily.

Both professionals and dual professionals have some ethical values with which the need to abide in order to be recognised for their work. They have the ethical responsibility of fulfilling their commitments towards the people in the institution by sharing all the knowledge they have.

According to my knowledge, professional values are one of the most important aspects of being professional in any industry. Thus, I have notice that it is also important for teachers and trainers to have some professional values in order to teach correct things to their students and juniors. This is because they are the supervisor and they need to share their views and knowledge with their students. Thus, having professional values is crucial for educational professionals. Professional values are the principles such as the behaviour of the teachers, manner, and ethics that they convey to others such as their students, colleagues and parents. A person with poor professional values will convey bad values to others and will put a negative effect on the institution. According to my experience, there is various impact of lack of professional value that one can face as a teacher in an educational institution. Reputation is one of the most important consideration of a teacher that is indulge in teaching as it is through proper reputation that a teacher can win the trust of others such as the students, their parents and the higher authorities of the institution. A lowering of reputation can occur due to lack of professional values in a person. On the other hand, lack f professional values in a trainer cam also affect the policies of the organisation. This is because teachers are the most important person in the organisation and lack of values from the teachers in the form of unions and arguments cam cause a change in the policies of the educational institution (Hooley, Johnson and Neary 2016).

Task 3

It has been noticed by me that poor professional values also put an impact on the teaching quality of the institution. For example if a teacher of my institution is not professional in his/her timing and come late everyday or fails to deliver the task effectively, it will put a negative impact on the quality of educational service delivered to us. This in turn lowers down our expectation to get high standard services from the institution. Moreover, the effort of updating new techniques and skills in the institution or among the teachers will also be reduced because a person lacking in professional values ill never take an effort to learn and get indulge in new things. This will put a negative impact on the career of a person as he/she will fail to fulfil the needs and requirements of the educational organisation he/she is working with. The target of raising their professional as well as personal standard will go in vain with all such negative impact on the behaviour of a trainer. This shows that lack of professional values would not only hamper the growth and prosperity of the institution they are indulging in, however, it will also affect the personal growth and expectation of the trainer (Dickson 2015).

Educational institutions are also affected by the policies operating in the country as well as in the local institutions. Pertaining to some of the problems the education ministers and other educational bodies has formulated various for the educational system of UK. Educational system of UK has undergone a lot of difficulties and challenges such as improving the performance of the students and elimination of all the difficulties between the students of different backgrounds. Moreover, attracting good mentors for the student is also a challenging task for the institution. These challenges have put the institution to formulate policies for the growth f the institution. Some of the policies put forward by the educational department of UK are:

In 2011, England came forward with Pupil Premium programme. This programme aimed at reducing the inequalities between students from low social backgrounds. The policy supported these students by offering free school meals and other supportive activities (Englishuk 2017).

Another programme was initiated in 2011 named as Every School a Good School, which aims at improving the quality of school and learning process.

There are other various policies put forward by the educational board and the government of the country. It aimed at improving the quality of information about the educational institutions and the courses. Such improvement was done to offer effective information channels for eh parents as well as the students. The policy was carried out by way of media through League-tables. This table helped the parents to compare the one institution with other institutions in the country. The reform that was introduced by the government is called the market mechanisms.

Task 4

Other educational policies put forward by the government in 2016 are the free childcare entitlement programme, teacher recruitment and fairer funding. These programmes were undertaken to improve the structure of the educational institutions (HuffPost 2017).

The condition of the social, political and economic factors of UK puts a huge impact on the educational policies set by the education board and the government. Socially UK is full of people coming from various cultures. There is a huge amount of immigrant in the country and the country is strict against discrimination based on sex, culture and others. Such social condition of the UK will put a positive impact on the educational policies put forward by the government such as the Pupil Premium Programme. This programme focused to reduce the discrimination done in educational institution. Moreover, the people of UK believe in earning their own needs without sitting at home. The education level is much high in the country which is also beneficial for educational policies to be successful in the economy.

UK also has a very tight policy against any kind of discrimination done, which will also help the educational programme initiated to reduce discrimination to be successful. It is also a well-developed economy with a good quality media and communication sector, which will help the policy to be easily spread among people. Thus creating awareness among people is easy in such an economy.

Thus, an advanced economy will always have a positive influence on the educational policies introduced by the government compared to a backward economy. This is because people of such economy will act supportively for the programme in order to improve their educational system.

The policies formulated by the government of the economy have various types of impacts on the educational practice carried out in the economy by various institutions. The government has always come up with some or the other policies for the improvement of the education system in UK. The Pupil Premium programme that was introduced in 2011 has helped in removing the discrimination in the educational system. It has also helped the students coming from both high and low level backgrounds to get equal opportunities related to the course they want. Every School a Good School programme helped in raising the standard of the education given in such institutions, which is beneficial for the student in long run. The high-level education taken by student now will help them cope up with a difficult course in university level. Lastly, the policies taken in 2016 such as the childcare programme and the teacher recruitment programme also helped the institutions to grow the quality of education delivery offered by the teachers in such institution (Oecd 2017).

Impact of Professional Values in Area of Specialization

Thus from the above discussion in task 2, I have learned that polices are very crucial for the education and training system. It is through these policies the system recognises its flaws and plan for its improvement. The policies formulated by the economy from time to time have laws been helpful for the institution in eliminating the factors that would result in their downfall. I have also recognised that the non-discriminating policy put forward by the government in 2011 has put a fruitful impact on the education system by removing all types of discrimination and being supportive to students coming from backward regions. I have also experienced that the information policy initiated by the government on equation helped me to get proper and detailed information about the university and curse I wanted to pursue for my higher education and also the skills I am going to use in future after completing my education and training course. Thus, the overall impact of policy formulation has always been positive.

The professors of the University of Edinburgh shape the curriculum of the University and they are the important stakeholders of the University. Mr Jenny is the associate professor of Economics in the University and he has designed the course content in an organised manner keeping in mind the practical implementation of the course content. The professors of the department of Economics in the University are very co-operative and they always help the students. The head of the department of the Department of Economics organizes seminars for the students on the recent topics. There are other assistant professors, associate professors of the University who work in co-ordination with them. The other professors of the university work in co-ordination with the department of economics. The students of the other universities also participate in the seminars which are organized by the University. The professors of the university has designed the curriculum in such a way that helped them to stay updated on the current national and international economic events which are going on around the world. The professor also modifies designs and enriches the syllabus of the university. They design the syllabus in such a way that it matches with the syllabus of the other universities. The students get an exposure to participate in the national and international seminars. Mr. Jenny encourages the students and he takes initiative in organizing the seminars. He also supports the students and gives them various ideas on dealing with these seminars. Mr. Jenny along with the other professors of the universities also engages the students in vocational programmes during their holidays. This helps the students in their higher education. The management authority of the University of Edinburgh organizes career counseling fairs for the students. The top institutes of different professional courses visits the university and the students of the University gets an opportunity to discuss with them and thus go ahead with the particular course. The professors of the University organize special coaching classes for the students so that they can go ahead with the particular course. There is a union body of the professors in the university. The professors have to work in co-ordination according to the norms of the union body.  The professors of the university play an important role because the university is entirely dependent on them. If they do not actively engage themselves in the teaching learning process, it will affect the life of the students. The Government of UK also recognizes the talents of the professors and gives them rewards on an annual basis. The professors also get many benefits from the Government if they impart proper service to the University.

The parents are the external stakeholders of the university. The parents of the students have to bear huge amount of cost on their wards. The University of Edinburgh also organises parents meeting on a quarterly basis which helps the parents to know about the performance of their wards. The University gives special concessions to the siblings of the top students of an academic year. The parents can also give suggestions to improve the curriculum of the University and they are also allowed to visit the University and participate in the various refresher courses free of cost which are provided by the University.  

The principal of the University, Mr. John and the dean of the university, Mr. Lawrence are also the major stakeholders of the university. Mr. John also co-ordinates with the professors of the university and arranges meetings with the teachers and the students on a monthly basis. He takes individual care of the students who are pursuing professional courses from other countries. There is a special reservation for the students of other international universities. Mr John has suddenly raised the tuition fees of the students without holding any meetings with the student or the teacher’s body. The students became very agitated and they denied paying such a high fees for pursuing these courses. Mr. John does not give any importance to the problems of the students and thus the student’s union body has decided to go for indefinite strike. They have also appealed the dean of the University to select another principal and remove him from his post.

The dean of the University, Mr. Lawrence discusses various issues with the principal and then decides to take necessary actions. The Dean also arranges special meetings with the teachers and the student’s body in case of emergency in order to solve out the problem. Mr. Lawrence pays sudden visit to different departments of the universities and enquires about the performance of the students and the teachers. The students are also eager to meet the dean because he is very friendly with them and they can discuss various issues with him. When the principal of the University raised the fees of the students without any prior information to the student’s union body, the dean arranged special meetings with the students and solved their queries. The student body arranges special meetings with the dean if they have any issue.  The teachers also approach the Dean if they have any issue regarding the curriculum of the University. Mr. Lawrence also takes care that the curriculum of the university matches up the standards of the other universities in UK. This will help the students to get enrolled in professional courses in other universities of UK.

The Government of UK and the trustee body also provides financial assistance to the students. The Government provides scholarship to the meritorious students and this has motivated and helped the students who cannot pursue various professional courses due to financial condition. The Government of the country prepares the education policy and thus the students and the teachers have to work in accordance with the policy. The Government provides clarification about the various responsibilities that are to be provided by the trustee body of the University regarding the issues. The trustee body also consults with the University regarding the plan of the entire academic year. The trustee body has elected a chairman who holds different meetings with the dean of the university and the student body. This has helped them to know about the various problems of the students and the teachers. Moreover, the chairman of the trustee body also plays an important and critical role when the University establishes its gaols, missions and values. The trustee body also organizes various camps for the parents of the universities. The board of trustees tries to emphasize teamwork among the students and the teachers so that it will help in the betterment and development of the University.

From the above case study, I can say that professors, students and the principal are the important stakeholders of the University. The teachers design the curriculum of the university in such a way that it will help the students to compete with the students of the other University. The teachers also help the students when they face any challenges in dealing with difficult courses. The teacher’s union body also participates in the important decision making process of the University. The teachers also receive various kinds of rewards from the government and this helps in the recognition of their talents. This also motivates them to go for further higher education. Moreover, it is useless to have a good curriculum without proper professors. So, the teachers should be recruited according to the requirement of the University. This will also help the students and thus they can choose their courses accordingly. If the university does not have expertise on a particular subject, it becomes very difficult for the students to cope up and get the current updates on that particular subject. So, teachers play a vital role as the stakeholders of the University (Krainer 2014).

I have also learned that the principal and the dean of the university must also be responsible to the students as well as the teachers. They must understand the problems of the students and thus not impose unnecessary burden on them by raising the tuition fees. I can say that if the principal or the other authority members are friendly and easily approachable by the students and the teachers, it will help in the development of the University. If there is any agitation or misunderstanding within the student or the teachers body, the management must try to solve it our rather than unnecessary issues (Omer Attali and Yemini 2017). The fund which is provided by the government and the trustee body must be properly utilized. The University management must take proper care that the eligible students receive the aided fund. I have also learned that the participation of parents plays an important role in university. The parents must co-operate with the university members and the union body. They must try to utilize the various opportunities which are provided by the university. The trustee body provides financial assistance to the University and this has helped the University. The trustee body takes care of the teachers, students and the parents and they work for the betterment of the University (Leal Filho and Brandli 2016).

Figure 1: Quality Assurance Model

Source: (Author’s creation)

Quality assurance department is one of the most important departments of any educational institution. With the increasing number of educational institution offering same types of course, it has been more important and crucial for the institution to take up quality assurance programme. Thus, the organisation should train deserving personnel for looking after quality assurance. For the purpose, a third party assessment can also be den or institution can also take up internal quality assessment (Laguador, Villas and Delgado 2014).

The quality assurance framework of my university is divided into two broad categories such as internal quality assessment and external quality assessment. The internal assessment team is further divided into one more category such as the quality improvement cell. On the other hand, external assessment team is divided into two sub categories such as accreditation council and institutional performance evaluation team. These sub division in the quality assurance management has helped the institution to manage the quality of service delivered.

The accreditation council is formed in my institution to look after all the quality related issues and concerns. The council is employed with people who has specialised knowledge of taking care about the quality of the institution. All the issues are bought under their knowledge for solution. The next quality team is the institutional performance evaluation team, which looks after the yearly performance if the institution and work on the grounds that lack good quality service. The units lacking in service quality is analysed by this department and then informed to the accreditation council. The council is the supreme head who then spreads the task to other departments for solving the issue. The internal department that is the quality improvement cell is informed about the quality problem faced in the institution and they are the one that take steps to improve the quality. They do all the quality improvement task of various departments of the institution and help the institution to fight tough competition coming from other educational organisation.

From the above drawing, it is clear that the institution carries a well formulated quality assurance model and each department mentioned in the model contribute a lot in the quality cycle of the organisation. A break in any of the department will not allow the organisation to carry out quality assessment evaluation effectively. Thus, the organisation needs to maintain a link between each of its department in order to maintain their service quality.

Along with this the organisation also needs to improve on certain grounds where it is lacking to maintain eh quality more effectively. The can sub divide its quality evaluation task to some more departments and team that can analyse the quality of small areas efficiently. Moreover, it can also include the students of the university to the quality task, as they are the best source to know about the quality of service delivered. There can be a portal where the students can drop their grievances and depending on these messages from the students, the institution can plan out their quality improvement programmes. The quality improvement programme should also abide by the educational policy designed by the government. Such an importance is given to service quality improvement only to fight out the competition in the educational sector.  

References 

Brody, H. and Doukas, D., 2014. Professionalism: a framework to guide medical education. Medical education, 48(10), pp.980-987.

Carrese, J.A., Malek, J., Watson, K., Lehmann, L.S., Green, M.J., McCullough, L.B., Geller, G., Braddock III, C.H. and Doukas, D.J., 2015. The essential role of medical ethics education in achieving professionalism: the Romanell Report. Academic Medicine, 90(6), pp.744-752.

Dickson, C., 2015. Congruence of Professional Values: An Exploration of the Reciprocity between Art Teaching and Art Therapy. Art Therapy Online, 6(1).

Englishuk.com 2017. How to sell a UK education. [online] Available at: https://www.englishuk.com/en/agents/english-in-the-uk/how-to-sell-a-uk-education [Accessed 23 Aug. 2017].

Hooley, T., Johnson, C. and Neary, S., 2016. Professionalism in careers.

HuffPost UK 2017. Three Things To Look Out For In Education Policy In 2017. [online] Available at: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/duncan-sim/three-things-to-look-out-_1_b_13744330.html [Accessed 23 Aug. 2017].

Jaakkola, M., 2015. The contested autonomy of arts and journalism: Change and continuity in the dual professionalism of cultural journalism. Tampere University Press.

Laguador, J.M., Villas, C.D. and Delgado, R.M., 2014. The Journey of Lyceum of The Philippines University-Batangas Towards Quality Assurance And Internationalization Of Education. Asian Journal of Educational Research, 2(2).

Oecd.org. 2017. Education Policy Outlook Highlights: United Kingdom - OECD. [online] Available at: https://www.oecd.org/edu/highlightsuk.htm [Accessed 23 Aug. 2017].

Leal Filho, W. and Brandli, L. eds., 2016. Engaging Stakeholders in Education for Sustainable Development at University Level. Springer.

Omer Attali, M. and Yemini, M., 2017. Initiating consensus: stakeholders define entrepreneurship in education. Educational Review, 69(2), pp.140-157.

Krainer, K., 2014. Teachers as stakeholders in mathematics education research. The Mathematics Enthusiast, 11(1), p.49.