Conference Agenda

This study looks at the interplay of teacher agency and bottom-up professional development conferences in Armenia by exploring the types of teacher agency in relation to the features of the bottom-up PD approach. The key elements of the conference are peer learning (sharing and exchanging knowledge and experience), self-directed learning (selecting topics, engaging in professional discussions), autonomous decision-making, promoting engagement, knowledge creation/building and positive communities among teachers (Carpenter, 2016, Bernstein, 2019).

While PD is a key strategy available to schools and school systems for improving teaching quality (Darling-Hammond 2021), frequently changing educational landscapes don’t leave enough time for teachers’ learning and the opportunity to embed those learnings into practice (Pachler, 2007). The available literature fails to explain how teachers learn from PD thus it seems to have little meaning for teachers and consequently for students’ learning (Opfer and Pedder, 2011). Therefore, within this context, there is a need for illumination of the agentic role of teachers in professional development, as agentic action is related to important topics like concepts of teacher professionalism and autonomy (Priestley et al., 2015). Whilst teacher agency might seem an obviously important phenomenon to consider it is an under-researched area, particularly in the context of teacher professional development. Nevertheless, the relevant studies suggest that there are two main approaches to the conceptualization of teacher agency: a traditional approach where the agency is viewed as a possession, a capability (Giddens, 1984) and the emerging ecological approach where agency is concerned with the way in which actors ‘critically shape their responses to problematic situations’ (Biesta and Tedder, 2007, p. 11). Within this conceptualization of agency, it is understood as an emergent phenomenon of the actor-situation transaction (Emirbayer and Mische, 1998 p.963).

Hence, this article argues for a model for teacher-led professional development in which teachers themselves are increasingly becoming ‘agents’ in their own and their peers’ professional development, a PD approach that utilizes a wider range of expertise and input through a bottom-up structure. In contrast to a traditional, top-down model in which ‘teachers are mostly reduced to executors of top-down prescribed ideals’ (Vangrieken, Meredith, Packer and Kyndt 2017, p. 5.2.1), a bottom-up structure implies that classroom teachers are making decisions, selecting topics, and designing workshops outside of the pressures of employers’ goals. Moreover, this type of conference serves the needs teachers feel are most relevant and can promote engagement and positive communities among teachers. It allows participants to engage in a neutral space and therefore tackle issues in an authentic manner with a diverse group of colleagues (Macias, 2017).

The current system of TPD in Armenia is top-down mandating teachers to go through training and attestation[1] every 5 years. The process of training does not allow any differentiation, teachers do not have a choice. Some essential elements of professional learning such as collaborative interaction (Hargreaves and ElHawary, 2018), self-guided learning based on individual needs and interests are missing from teachers’ experiences.

The research questions which arose from my professional experience and the literature, and which are the basis for exploring teacher agency in the context of bottom-up PD are:

What is the interplay of teacher agency and bottom-up professional development conferences?

What types of teacher agency are identified in the context of ‘bottom-up’ TPD?

What potential does the bottom-up PD conference have for practice?

This study generates new understandings of teacher agency in a new bottom-up PD context by providing new insights and implications for educators, policy makers and further research.

[1] In total 110 hours of training to get 9-11 credits. Training incudes some critical topics such as inclusive education, digital literacy, etc.

All over the world, teachers have gone through challenging times that threaten their self-fulfilment and their collective valorisation. Educational systems all around are being affected, with the numbers of people applying to teacher education courses decreasing in several countries (Thomas Dotta & Lopes, 2021). This challenge is linked to others, such as the general shortage of teachers, the ageing of the teacher population and retention rates in the profession as a whole (European Commission/EACEA/Eurydice, 2018).

In Portugal, for instance, the education system is currently mostly composed of veteran and "superveteran" teachers (Thomas Dotta & Lopes, 2021; Robinson, 2020) that are expected to retire in the next ten years, which may generate a crisis in the system at various levels. In fact, teachers that were on the onset of their careers during 1970s are now retiring. They will take with them 50 years of social and personal history, but also knowledge about pedagogical processes and practices, school relations, teacher education, educational change and the progressive valorisation of teaching and of the teaching profession (Lopes & Thomas Dotta, 2015).

Quality teacher education involves the social valorisation of the profession (Darling-Hammond, 2017). In Portugal, as well as in other countries, the teaching profession has become less attractive, putting the renewal and general quality of the teaching staff at risk (Thomas Dotta & Lopes, 2021). The social image of the profession is a fundamental part of the symbolic dimensions that generate attraction (Darling-Hammond, 2017). In addition, “the work of teachers worldwide has undergone deep change resulting from various parallel reforms, diversified student populations, technology developments and globalization” (Goodson & Ümarik, 2019, p. 589).

Within this context, a genuine reprofessionalization of teaching (Torrance & Forde, 2017) is in order. This reprofessionalization needs to promote "teacher leadership and practitioner enquiry", as "sets of practices based on the exercise of influence and agency on the part of the teacher" (Torrance & Forde 2017, p. 123). In this sense, the need for teachers' reprofessionalization that reinforces teachers' individual and collective agency becomes vital. Although teachers’ work has become increasingly standardised under neo-liberal reforms, the educational policy is increasingly acknowledging the importance of teachers´ agency for the overall quality of education (Goodson & Ümarik, 2019; Biesta, Priestley & Robinson, 2015).

In the professional practice of teachers, teachers’ agency emerges as a differentiating element that is based on a critical and reflective attitude, an investigative stance, an ethos of engagement and collaborative work (Cong-Lem 2021; Fu & Clarke 2017) and whose development can be influenced by different factors, such as personal, social/relational and contextual factors (Cong-Lem 2021). According to Cong-Lem (2021), personal factors include personal beliefs, values, background, identities and emotions, teachers’ knowledge, skills, and prior experiences; social/relational factors include the relationships with colleagues and learners, if teachers enact agency individually or collectively, and local social discourses; and contextual factors include institutional policies, power relations, sociolinguistic backgrounds and cultural values.

In the context of the project "Fifty years of teaching: factors of change and intergenerational dialogue - FYT-ID” (PTDC/CED-EDG/1039/2021)[1], teachers and the Portuguese educational system during the last 50 years are considered an important case study, with international relevance for the elucidation of endogenous and exogenous factors of educational innovation and the recovery of intergenerational dialogue. In this sense, this paper objective is to study the evolution of the educational system in Portugal, from experienced teachers' perspectives, and to identify traits of agency and their facilitators.

[1] Funded by FCT - the Portuguese funding agency that supports science, technology and innovation, in all scientific domains, under responsibility of the Ministry for Science, Technology and Higher Education.

In this study, we focus on the leadership of curriculum leaders, whose responsibility comprises ensuring nine years of compulsory education for children and periodically revising the curriculum jointly developed by each secondary school district. They manage the jointly developed curriculum in each junior high school district, organise professional teacher learning, and serve as liaisons between schools. They are clear about the challenges in effectively coordinating educational activities between elementary and secondary schools. However, building initiatives that relate ‘assessment for learning’ to ‘assessment for learning’ is not easy. The practices that connect these two types of assessment are also expected to involve tools such as data-driven assessments, evidence-informed practices, and research-informed practices (Barends, Rousseau, & Briner 2014, Jones 2018, Kvernbekk 2016, Wyse, Hayward, & Pandya 2016, Brown, MacGregor, Flood, & Malin 2022 ).

We address the following two research questions in this study:(1) How do curriculum leaders use educational data and assess educational practices for improvements in each school? (2) What are the differences between successful and unsuccessful schools?

We aim to identify the curriculum leadership that builds on teachers’ professional learning to respond to uncharted situations, the work of leaders in creating an environment and culture that promotes teacher and student agency in the school, and the organisation and management of a coordinated curriculum between primary and secondary schools (Harris, & Muijs 2004, York-Barr, & Duke 2004, Zeiser, Scholz, & Cirks 2018, Leijen, Pedaste, & Lepp 2020).

City A has 15 secondary school districts and has been engaging in primary and secondary school cooperation for more than 10 years. It has been deploying integrated education for primary and secondary schools throughout the city since 2018. However, in the fifth year, differences were found in the results of their efforts and teachers’ awareness in the 15 secondary school districts in the city.

For example, in secondary school district B, the student council and the teacher team worked together to implement events for cross-grade exchanges that were originally planned to be held face-to-face and used the WWW conferencing system in 2020–2021 to publish the secondary school district news and ICT for communication and learning among students and between teachers and students. In secondary school district C, teachers from both elementary and secondary schools planned and conducted a workshop to learn how to carefully observe students who attend under such circumstances. They then discussed the image and goals of the students they intended to nurture through integrated elementary and secondary school education. They had an opportunity to discuss the contents of the classes and teaching methods, including the effective use of ICT, and proceeded with the training.

Thus, the efforts of the B and C school districts focused on the agency of teachers and children, providing them with the opportunity and information to bring them out. Interestingly, these two secondary school districts used ICT for educational data utilisation and improved their efforts based on the results of the behavioural change records and awareness surveys of the students involved in the initiatives. The utilisation of educational data in curriculum management was a distinctive feature. The workshop training in the secondary school district was likely a reason for such assessment and management.

We used questionnaires and interviews to understand the attitudes and behaviours of teachers and children and their interactions with the initiative to visualise what type of curriculum leadership was in place, how educational data were being used, and what type of workshop and teacher learning was being provided in the secondary school districts where the transformative initiative was implemented.