http://www.science-teaching-as-a-profession.com/

According to the website:

What are the elements of a profession? What makes someone a “professional” as opposed to an employee? Or a manager? Or an artist?

Knowledge based expertise that derives from academic training. Professionals are tested for entry and frequently retested for continued competence.
Code of ethical behavior (on and off the job)
A moral commitment embodied in a public service (beyond the desire for profit)
Higher than average standard of living
Relative independence or autonomy
That autonomy limited — if at all — by licensure and the standards set by professional organization
High status in the minds of ordinary citizens

What are the privileges of professional life?
Self-regulation/self policing
Advancement on the job
Independence of a particular employer (portable benefits)
Right to choose their clients, their hours and set fees
Time set aside for research, professional development, self-improvement, and collaboration

The push on these threads so far is to first recognize that feeling called to the profession, or caring a lot about kids, or loving your job is not enough … in fact, is irrelevant to the problem you define. Certainly, calling, passion, and concern are great motivators, like the engine for a train. What’s missing is a solid set of tracks.

the “calling” angle only helps teachers continue to slip that accountability.

OK, as many commenters have pointed out, being a teacher who feels a calling to teach does not mean that you’re a woo-woo touchy-feely teacher with no interest in student achievement. I don’t think teachers are using the idea of a calling to deliberately avoid accountability.

But I do think that rhetorically the teaching profession has made something of a misstep. Otherwise how on earth would a profession devoted to excellence be perceived as a profession for passionate flakes who avoid accountabliity?

What I see reported in the media is a debate with two unequal sides:
1. The government and business community who support standardized testing as the primary and best means of assessing student performance and, by extension, teacher performance.
2. Teachers, who just really think that’s bad.

The problem is that teachers are not proposing an alternative. A loud, public, well-defined, usable alternative. We are arguing against instead of arguing for, and it puts us in a weakened position.

I think its perfectly within our rights as professionals to say learning is more than what can be tested on a single standardized tests. That teaching quality is more than that. But we have to start saying what it is and how to measure it.

As an example, the use of the zero in grading on a 100 point scale for late or missing assignments is a practice which I don’t believe can be justified by any fair review. However, I have experienced teachers raising objections — couched in “professionalism” — of a decision to restrict individual teacher autonomy around such an issue.

Certainly I have great respect and value about teaching; however, I’ve found lots of emotion and a wide array of meanings around the “professional” term — so much so that it seems to lose meaning.

I was reviewing “John Adams’ Promise: How to have Good Schools for All Our Children, Not Just Some” by Jon Saphier, which I think has some good answers about what matters–what it means to succeed as a teacher or school. I don’t know if this is still available as a pdf download, but it’s a great read.

>>I think that “professional” is a low, and attainable bar for the teaching profession. In fact, I think it is one that has been met.

I think that what we need to strive for is not professionalism, but success in teaching.good doctor.

Much like good doctors are a subset of all doctors, I think that good teachers are a subset of all teachers. The term “professional” is not used as a subset of the population of doctors, lawyers, accountants, dentists, etc., so why should there be a double standard for teachers.

And speaking of double standard, I completely agree (so much that I used italics for emphasis) about the lack of rigor of the Praxis and professional development. I’d love to see some educational researchers with policy-pull get to work on those. If only …

So yes, I also agree with you that we need a set definition of professional that is cross-curricular and can be applied to anyone who wishes to claim the title. I tried to define it based on the medical, dental, legal, and accounting professions (tried to see what they had in common), because even a working definition is a start. I tried to use the dictionary, but it uses the word “profession” in the definition which seemed too circular to me to be a list of requirements. By all means, let’s hammer out a good definition/criteria list.

I hope that makes it somewhat more clear? I never was very good at the educational jargon.

(By the way, the American Heritage Dictionary uses as an example for their word “profession”, the teaching profession. :) )

I have to take issue with your characterization/definition of a professional.

(1) Professional qualifying test. Yep. In my state we call it the Praxis and I scored within the top 10% in the nation.

The Praxis is in no way on par with the qualifying exams of most other professions.

(2) Continuing education in my field. Yep. We call it “in-service” and make jokes about passing from this world during it.

In the same way, most “in-service” sessions don’t begin to meet the qualifications for “continuing ed” in other professions (as your “passing from this world” quip makes clear).

(3) Low number of law suits and complaints to our accrediting board. To date, no law suits OR complaints to my license issuing board.

Umm … so not getting sued is a defining characteristic of a professional? Sheesh.

@ Joel:

Passing an academic test, sitting in an in-service, and avoiding lawsuits might make a professional, but it doesn’t make for a successful teacher.

Obviously, I wouldn’t agree that those three things make someone a professional, and I don’t think other professionals would agree, either. More troubling, though: are you (or TheInfamousJ) proposing that successful teachers are not necessarily professionals? Because people that don’t want to give teachers respect or increased pay would love to agree with you (as would the teachers who want to avoid any professional accountability).

The problem with these terms, and particularly with “successful teacher,” is that we have no common understanding of what they constitute. If you want to make some differentiations, I could agree with making “professional” a subset of “successful teacher,” but that only starts us down the road to the main issue of this thread: success as defined by external standards and not by “effort” or “passion” or “concern.” The teaching “profession” has too little professional accountability, and the “calling” angle only helps teachers continue to slip that accountability.

The “calling” angle also enables the public to think of teachers as something “other than” professionals and provides teachers with too many “outs” in terms of accountability (one example: the right to boast about “winging it,” as if that’s proof of the calling).

@ Dina: Perhaps you’re just being playful (if so, apologies up front), but I suspect Dan isn’t intentionally “equivocating” but is instead looking for a way to get a handle on this issue, which I find pretty unwieldy myself.