World Bank (Department of Education) Teacher Policies: Supply, Training, Professional Development, Incentives Juan Manuel Moreno The World Bank Regional Responses to Global Challenges EDUCATION POLICY REFORM WBI-ECA Kiev, March, 2008

World Bank (Department of Education) Looking for the – right - Teacher The Stage The Characters The Plot Finale

World Bank (Department of Education) The Stage (I) Constant reforms in the curriculum of general secondary education (As a principle, any change in the curriculum, no matter how small, affects the identity of teachers and their professional interests). Implementation of reforms – curriculum, governance, management, assessment – is basically a problem of in-service training and professional development.

World Bank (Department of Education) The Stage (II) Universal secondary education, growing diversity and deep changes in the profile of students. Critical and widening gap between pre-service training and social expectations on the teaching profession.

World Bank (Department of Education) The Characters (i) Searching for a new professional role Qualified secondary teachers are becoming a precious and sometimes very scarce commodity in many countries. They tend to be the hardest segment of the teaching profession to attract, the most expensive to educate and the most difficult to retain in schools

World Bank (Department of Education) The Characters (ii) Searching for a new professional role Professional identity of secondary school teachers is not built on teaching itself but rather on their disciplinary specialization. Professional identity crisis in Secondary: Traditional identity fades away and emerging alternatives are not attractive and do not mobilize teachers.

World Bank (Department of Education) The Characters (iii) Searching for a new professional role How do we move to a reconstruction of the professional identity of teachers? People find meaning not so much in what they do but in what they are or believe they are (Castells, Giddens)

World Bank (Department of Education) Principals are concerned In half the OECD countries the majority of 15 year-olds are enrolled in schools where principals report learning is hindered by a teacher shortage/inadequacy % of 15-year-old students enrolled in schools where principals report learning is hindered ‘to some extent’ or ‘a lot’ by a shortage/inadequacy of teachers: Source: OECD PISA Database, 2001.

World Bank (Department of Education) Concerns about hiring teachers There are major difficulties in hiring qualified teachers in key subjects Cross-country mean % of upper secondary students attending schools where the principal reported that hiring fully qualified teachers is difficult, 2001 Source: OECD International Survey of Upper Secondary Schools (ISUSS) database, 2003.

World Bank (Department of Education) Specific issues in developing and transition countries Inadequate incentives – or lack thereof - to enter the teaching profession Insufficient number of graduate teachers to address the demand of teachers in remote and rural areas Over-representation of unqualified teachers in the poorest districts and areas In-service teacher training programs are “one- off” and “ad-hoc”, based on isolated initiatives financed by international donors.

World Bank (Department of Education) The Plot (i): Issue # 1. The Supply of Qualified Teachers (especially in IT, Science and Mathematics)  Trend to accelerate pre-service training  New routes to access the teaching profession  Alternative mechanisms to contract teachers

World Bank (Department of Education) Improving teacher supply - Responses  Improving the image and status of teachers  Making incentives more differentiated and flexible  Improving non-salary conditions in teaching  Improving geographical mobility  Making teacher education programmes more flexible  Developing targeted policies rather than “one size fits all” policies The Plot (i): Improving the Supply of Teachers (especially in IT, Science and Mathematics)

World Bank (Department of Education) Improving teacher supply – Responses  Greater school involvement in teacher recruitment and selection  Broadening the criteria for teacher selection  More flexible responses to short-term staffing needs  Expanding the supply pool of teachers / Creating alternative pathways into teaching The Plot (i): Improving the Supply of Teachers (especially in IT, Science and Mathematics)

World Bank (Department of Education) The Plot (ii) Issue # 2. Is it worth investing in pre-service teacher training? Tension between the drive to raise the status of the profession and the need to take it back to the school and the classroom.  School based training and mentored teaching of novice teachers seems to be more effective and, indeed, less costly than traditional pre- service teacher training.

World Bank (Department of Education) The Plot (iii) Issue # 3: Matching Teaching Skills with Required Key Competencies of Secondary School Graduates  Students can hardly acquire the desired competencies and skills if their teachers simply do not have those competencies themselves. Which are the teaching competencies and skills that should be incorporated into the curriculum of teacher training colleges, and which are those that should become the preferred focus of teachers’ professional development activities and policies?  Which are the teaching competencies and skills that should be incorporated into the curriculum of teacher training colleges, and which are those that should become the preferred focus of teachers’ professional development activities and policies?

World Bank (Department of Education) The Plot (iii) Issue # 3. Matching Teaching Skills with Required Key Competencies of Secondary School Graduates  Which are the reform choices and alternatives in national teacher training systems which would allow to achieve a better match between teaching knowledge and skills and desired key competencies in student learning?  How can professional knowledge and skills be efficiently transferred and shared within and among educational institutions and individual teachers?

World Bank (Department of Education) The Plot (iv) Issue # 4. The much debated focus of teacher training and professional development Content Knowledge versus Pedagogical Knowledge

World Bank (Department of Education) Issue # 4: (continued) Finally, One answer… PCK: Pedagogical Content Knowledge

World Bank (Department of Education) Pedagogical Content Knowledge  Pedagogical content knowledge is a teacher’s understanding of how to help students understand a specific subject matter  Includes knowledge of how particular subject matter topics can be organized, represented and adapted to the diverse interests and abilities of learners, and then presented for instruction

World Bank (Department of Education) Finale: Perennial Challenges Ahead There is no consensus on what the right long-term policy should be for teacher training and professional development. Not easy to find consistency and alignment between in- service training systems and changes in incentive policies for teachers The battlefield in the curriculum for training teachers: – Change Factors: (Competencies of the 21 st Century). – Stability Factors (The traditional logic of academic disciplines in Universities)

World Bank (Department of Education) Thank You Thank You