1. FE Professionalism – do we need an epistemic culture? Norman Crowther National Official Post 16 Education

2. 2 Aims ▪to experiment with ideas about professionalism ▪to suggest that FE professionalism lacks explicit ‘expertise’ recognisable to a ‘knowledge-society’ ▪that we can transform FE professionalism if we do and support NEW practices ▪that university researchers can (and do) play the leading part in this 2

3. 3 Professionalism as a strategic interest ▪ What is a ‘professional’? – specific expertise provided as a service to public with jurisdiction of judgement (Abbot); or abstraction (Friedson) ▪ What does it mean to be a professional? – commitment to high performance, a ‘calling’; modern interpellation ▪ What does professionalism mean? – means by which an occupational group can profile and enhance its expertise and service ▪ Which of these questions is more important and why? 2

4. Failed interventions in FE by ‘internal governance units’ around professionalism – ‘Internal governance units’ or agencies attempted to establish a space for professional activity and development in the sector or ‘field’. – All were disestablished: LLUK; IfL: QIA; CEL; QCDA; LSIS; SVUK; or, are in question Ofsted… –Today ET Foundation and Society for Education and Training (S.E.T.) attempt to develop that space via new Professional Standards and emerging ‘professional exchange’.

5. 5 The Logic of Incorporation ▪Incorporation in 1993 attempted to deliver more viable colleges, widen participation, improve quality via a ‘pseudo market’. ▪That pseudo market had an underpinning dynamic: the ‘logic of incorporation’ which began to shape all spaces in the FE sector around ‘viability’, ‘funding’, ‘auditing and monitoring’. ▪ Leaving unorganised spaces: teaching and learning, professionalism, student research and research in general.

6. 6 Problems with a vision? ▪‘Without a coordinating vision of their future, it is difficult for teachers to know whether their profession as a whole resembles the part they can see.’ ▪ DIY Professionalism: Futures for teaching John Craig, Catherine Fieschi (2007), Demos page 4 6

7. 7 4 Aspects of ‘professionalism’ ▪ How would you answer these questions: – What is the specific expertise of post 16 teaching and learning and how is it acknowledged? – What does autonomy mean and is it an individualist illusion? – How is an ethics of the profession evidenced? –Socialisation of members: how do you become (if you can) a professional practitioner in FE? 7

8. Individualised vision of practice…. fkd d Individual Practice Performance management shared practice

9. Collective Professional practice. fkd d Expertise or expertise Professional Standards Professional Practice Trainee Teacher

10. 10 Another way to ‘professionalism’? ▪‘if we are confronted with the growth of knowledge-centred and knowledge- based activities in many areas of social life - epistemic practices may come to dominate other kinds of practice.’ (Knorr Cetina TPT p176 ebook) 10

11. 11 Knowledge Society Approach ▪‘Knowledge society arguments consider knowledge as a productive force that - in a postindustrial society - increasingly plays the role that capital and labour played in industrial society.’ Knorr Cetina TPT 177 ebook) ▪So, ‘fundamentally changing the nature of production systems, the nature of work, and the demands on the work force and on work related items...’ (Knorr Cetina EC 134 Loc ebook) 11

12. 12 A new focus? ▪‘A knowledge society is not simply a society of more experts [or new identities ‘apprenticeships’], more technological gadgets [or white boards and ipads and online MOOCS], more specialist interpretations [embodied learning]. It is a society permeated with knowledge cultures, the whole set of structures and mechanisms that serve knowledge and unfold with its articulation.’ (Knorr Cetina EC Loc 150 ebook) 12

13. 13 Culture ▪‘Culture, as I use the term, refers to the aggregate patterns and dynamics that are on display in expert practice and that vary in different settings of expertise.’ (Knorr Cetina EC loc 160 ebook) ▪‘...scientists and other experts as enfolded in construction machineries....Epistemic subjects (the procurers of knowledge) are derivatives of these machineries.’ (ibid loc 191)

14. 14 From the Laboratory to Practice ▪‘Laboratory sciences subject natural conditions to a “social overhaul” and derive epistemic effects from the new situation.’ (Knorr Cetina EC loc 414 ebook). ▪ The implication being that: ▪Any control over objects constituted as ‘real’ or via symbols (ontology); ▪Combined with procedures of ‘truth’ (epistemology) ▪Form epistemic subjects (researchers); ▪And determine a ‘field’ of expertise. 14

15. 15 Back to practice via research!? ▪Research work seems to be particular in that the definition of things, the consciousness of problems, etc., is deliberately looped through objects and the reaction granted by them...creates a dissociation between self and work object and inserts moments of interruption and reflection....How can we conceive of practice in a way that accommodates this dissociation?’ (Knorr Cetina TPT p175/241 ebook) 15

16. 16 What would a college look like through this lens or speaking ‘truth’ to practice...? ▪Ontology: the ‘truth’ of learning for researchers ▪Epistemology: how practitioners access that ‘truth’? ▪Ethics: how practitioners behave around that ‘truth’ and how it serves the learner ▪The learner: placed within the bounds of expertise as a transformed ‘object/subject’ 16

17. Epistemic culture?. fkd d Ontological ‘truth’ Epistemological practice Learner Expert field of activity

18. Epistemic subjects?. fkd d Community of Practitioners Teacher Trainers Discipline Teaching Researchers

19. 19 How is your practice? ▪What relations do you have to FE practitioners? ▪What relations do you have to FE teacher trainees would you say? ▪What ‘knowledge’ is warranted by you for FE practice or whom do you see doing that in FE? ▪How do you see the college organisation - supportive, limited, obstructive? ▪How do you see the university organisation in relation to the college? 19

20. 20 The End ▪Thank you for listening and taking part. ▪I hope you enjoyed the experiment! 20