Standards for Standards: The Development of Australian Professional Standards for Teaching

Professional standards for teaching have been developed in many countries during the 1990s. In Australia, the first wave of standards development has been dominated by the large state government school systems, and influenced by competency-based conceptions of standards. This paper provides a review of the first wave standards, concluding that these standards are characterised by long lists of duties, opaque language, generic skills, decontextualised performances, an expanded range of duties and weak assessments. As a second wave of standards development begins, led by teachers professional associations and deeply influenced by the methods of the American National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, the paper proposes a set of standards for development of professional standards in Australia. Standards, it is argued, should be brief, transparent, specialised, contextualised, focused on teaching and learning, and matched by strong assessments.