In this opinion article ACER Principal Research Fellow, Dr Lawrence Ingvarson, explores the role of the newly created Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership and argues it has the potential to have a major impact on the quality of school teaching in Australia.

Julia Gillard, the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Education, recently announced the establishment of the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL).  The new body will be responsible for delivering reforms that promote the quality of teacher education and the attractiveness of the teaching profession. 

AITSL has emerged as a key component of the COAG National Partnership on Improving Teacher Quality.  The Partnership recognises the need for much better coordination of policies to strengthen the teaching profession at state and national levels.  

Australia is weak in this area.  Countries that do better than Australia on international tests of student achievement invest more in assuring the quality and status of the teaching profession.  They ensure that teaching can compete with other professions for the ablest graduates from secondary schools and universities.  They offer career paths and salaries that provide substantial rewards to teachers who reach high standards of practice.

Current salary schedules for teachers in Australia need to provide stronger incentives for teachers to show evidence of increasing professional knowledge and skill.  They need to give higher status to expert practitioners, the people most central to successful schools.  They also need to ensure these experts are distributed equitably across schools and school systems.

This is where AITSL comes in.  It has the potential to have a major impact on the quality of school teaching in Australia.   One of its first tasks will be to gain agreement on a National Professional Standards Framework for Teachers.  A draft Standards Framework has been put out for public consultation until the 7^th of May.  

The standards describe what teachers should know and be able to do at four stages in a professional career: Graduate, Proficient, Highly Accomplished and Lead Teacher.   They include three main areas: Professional Knowledge (what teachers should know about their students and the content they teach), Professional Practice (planning, teaching and assessing student learning as well as establishing supportive learning environments) and Professional Engagement (professional development and contributing to the professional community).

At this stage, the standards are very broad and generic.  The consultation process will show general agreement with this Framework, and only a few minor quibbles.  We’ve been through this stage many times before.  

It is what the profession is not being consulted about as yet that will reveal less agreement.  How should teacher performance against the standards be assessed and who should do it? 

The Minister has indicated that the standards will provide the basis for an “agreed system of national certification of teachers” at the Highly Accomplished and Lead Teacher levels.    This means that a valid, reliable and fair system for assessing teacher performance against the standards will be essential.   This will only be possible when the meaning of the standards is fleshed out in more detail (e.g. what opportunities to learn mathematics or history should a highly accomplished primary teacher be able to provide, and so on?) 

Setting up such a system is as complex as setting up a national system for assessing student achievement, perhaps more so.  There is no system currently in place in any state that is based on sound research and development to ensure its validity.  The public is only going to support significantly higher salaries for Highly Accomplished teachers if it is convinced that the certification system is rigorous.

Can this be done?  International research clearly demonstrates that trained expert teachers can assess teacher performance in ways that are reliable and valid, but one question needs to be resolved quickly before work starts on developing an certification system.  

Should AITSL operate one profession-wide certification system, as in other professions? Or, should employing authorities and unions in each state and territory develop their own assessment methods using AITSL’s standards only as a framework?   Should there be one certification system for teachers in independent schools, one for teachers in Catholic schools and yet another for teachers in government schools?

This would seem very odd if applied to other professions (imagine different Royal Colleges of Surgeons for doctors in State, Catholic and Independent hospitals), yet this is the direction in which some employing authorities appear to be moving already.   Most professions have a single national body for providing advanced certification.  Why should teaching be different?

A fragmented system would be inefficient and would almost certainly undermine comparability and its ability to provide teachers with a respected portable professional certification, a key objective of the National Partnership on teacher quality.  

Also, developing and operating a rigorous professional certification system requires considerable expertise.  It would be wasteful to duplicate this work in each jurisdiction. Any doubts about comparability in the assessment process would spell death to the reform.  Failure to demonstrate the psychometric quality of the assessment system is one of the most common reasons why so many attempts to recognise accomplished teachers have failed.

It is not appropriate for employing authorities or state teacher registration bodies to control a system for the certification of highly accomplished or lead teachers.  That is the proper responsibility of a national body like AITSL, based on standards and assessment methods developed by experts in the teaching profession.  However, it is perfectly appropriate for employing authorities to demand that such a system demonstrates its rigour before they are expected to provide salary rewards and career recognition for nationally certificated teachers.

AITSL’s certification system must gain the respect of teachers.  At present, only two of the 17 members of the AITSL Board of Directors is a school principal or a practising teacher.  AITSL’s certification system will be more likely to gain respect and achieve its reform objectives if teachers and their associations are deeply involved in its development and operation.   Minister: let the profession be a full and genuine partner in your National Partnership on Improving Teacher Quality.

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