In considering how to better support teacher and school leader careers, the ET2020 Working Group on Schools has redressed the balance by understanding better the lived experience of individual teachers and school leaders. The starting point was to focus on what teachers may want from their careers as they enter the school education profession, and how these ambitions may change as their career is sustained.
Importantly for policy makers, the Group has considered how support mechanisms can benefit these individuals and, at the same time, benefit schools and the wider system in a coherent manner.
It is hoped that education systems, by virtue of their policy makers, can engage and support stakeholders to take a new approach to teacher and school leader careers: one that genuinely nurtures individual motivation and abilities (competence), whilst providing a range of opportunities in which all teachers and school leaders can grow and progress.
There are two core ideas explored in this Guide: the need to recognise and support diverse career paths; and the need to take a coherent approach to that support.