Teacher Status and the Role of Teacher Unions in the Context of New Professionalism

Abstract

The status of teachers and the teaching profession is currently under pressure from the reform agendas of governments and international organisations. This article examines the perceptions of teacher unions about changes in teacher status under the influence of new public management and its dominant discourse of new professionalism. The analysis is underpinned by a conceptual framework that seeks to reveal the main challenges facing teachers and their unions in the context of new professionalism. The framework is applied deductively to data drawn from two surveys conducted by Education International in 2015 and in 2018. The findings revealed some worrisome trends that appeared consistently over time and influenced teacher status, including an increased accountability for teachers through external control, a lack of government efforts to improve teacher professionalism, the expansion of privatisation policies, and a lack of teacher union engagement. This restructuring of the teaching profession implies the need for teacher union renewal in mission and action.