Address: University of Bristol, Graduate School of Education, 35 Berkeley Square, BS8 1JA

Symposium

Name: Dr Maria N. Gravani

Post: Research Fellow

Address: University of Bristol, Graduate School of Education, 35 Berkeley Square, BS8 1JA, UK E-mail:

Title: Universities as providers of in-service training for teachers: the case of Greece

Paper presented at the European Conference on Educational Research, University College Dublin, 7-10 September 2005

Abstract:

This paper focuses on the role of the university as in-service training provider for teachers in Greece. The first part gives a brief account of education in the country, the purpose being to locate the university-provided in-service within a certain framework. Particularly, information is given about the main principles, organisational structure, characteristics, recent developments and reforms, pre-service and in-service teachers’ education in Greece in the lights of a United Europe. The second illuminates the in-service training scheme for teachers in universities as this was implemented in two stages, November 1999-February 2000, and December 2000-June 2001, under the Second and Third Community Support Framework. The paper then concentrates on two programmes organised for philologists in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and reports the findings of a research study aimed at evaluating the above programmes in terms of their strong and weak points, and learning outcomes. The findings highlight the stimulating and failing aspects of the programmes, such as: the theory-practice gap, the lack of proper organisation and climate fruitful to learning, the higher-secondary education nexus, the breaking from the routine of the school. The paper concludes with a number of suggestions regarding the reorganisation of professional development programmes in universities in Greece.

*Note:

Version of the above paper appears at: Journal of In-service Education, Volume 31, Number 1, 2005

Introduction

At a time, when the need becomes quite rigorous for education in Greece to be modernized and adapted to the current demands of the new international socio-economic environment (Bouzakis & Koustourakis, 2002, p. 167) and European Community’s Support Framework’s funds aim to support the innovations in the system (Papanaoum, 2000), there is heightened awareness regarding the ability of the professional development programmes for teachers to facilitate changes. Research on this illustrates that, despite the rhetoric of change with the introduction of ‘new’ schemes, professional development is failing (Mavrogiorgos, 1996; Papananoum, 2000; Karophillaki et al., 2001). Programmes are still designed by means of the ‘centre-to periphery’ model; they are poorly organized; operate spasmodically; teachers’ needs and expectations are not taken into account; their experience is given no value (Tsafos & Katsarou, 2000; Karofillaki et al., 2001).

Given the above and the fact that little time has been spent on investigating these ‘new’ professional development programmes (mainly funded by the Ministry of Education and the European Union) and working out ways by which they might be improved, a research attempting to do so would be quite valuable. In particular, this is vital at a time when the debate for teachers’ professional development in Greece has risen to the top of the educational agenda with the establishment by the Law 2986/2002 of a unique over-centralized mechanism of in-service training (Chronopoulou & Giannopoulos, 2001). The research reported in this paper aspires to illuminate some of the above issues by focusing on one of the ‘new’ Schemes implemented, the in-service programme for secondary teachers in universities. In doing so, it gives voice to the experiences and perceptions of both secondary and university teachers, as they embark up on it. The study uses a conceptual framework that views certain steps in the evaluation process of a programme from the perspective of the participants.

Policy Context

The Greek educational system has a hierarchical structure as well as a centralized and rigidly controlled, bureaucratic character, despite the alleged strategies for democratization and decentralization adopted (Kazamias, 1990). Teachers’ professional development is not independent of the broader educational context in which it functions. It is therefore, defined at national level by the Ministry of Education (Papastamatis, 1995). At the time of carrying out this study, professional development is under reform. A new Organization for the Professional Development of Teachers, known as O.EP.EK, was established (Law 2986/2002), under the authority of the Ministry of Education, the purpose being to monitor every single in-service training action. Its responsibilities are: to co-ordinate, organize, allocate, assign and certify professional development of teachers. By doing so, it prevents initiatives taken by various units while the Regional Centres for Professional Training (PEKs) (these constituted the central providing agency for the in-service training (Law 2009/1992)) along with other agencies perform under its authority (Chronopoulou & Giannopoulos, 2001).

The professional development programme in which this study focuses was implemented prior to O.EP.EK’s establishment. It is one of the projects included in the framework of the Action: ‘In-service Teachers’ Training’ of the Ministry of Education. It addresses to a small number of secondary teachers of different specialisations, aimed at updating their subject knowledge and professional skills and informing them about developments and reforms in education. It also aims to bring secondary schools, universities and the labour market together in order to produce successful professional leaders (Ypepth, 1997; 2000a). The programme was first implemented in November 1999, under the Second Community Support Framework, on a six months basis within the context of eighteen university departments. The initial plan was to start in March 1998. In its second stage, the programme started in December 2000, under the Third Community Support Framework, on an annual basis, within twenty-one university departments. This was initially planned to start in March 2000 on a six–month basis. A basic characteristic of its implementation, during both stages, is the central control that flows from the Ministry of Education to nearly every aspect of the programme, despite universities being fully self-governing legal entities of public law (Eurydice, 1999).

The following table gives a comprehensive idea of the programmes implemented in university departments during both stages.

TABLE I

Two in-service programmes organised for philologists (secondary teachers in Ancient and Modern Greek, Latin, History and Philosophy) based at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, are the basic units of analysis. These programmes are entitled: ‘In-service Training for Philologists’ organised by the Department of Philology-Section of Classics, and ‘Professional In-service Training for Philologists’ organised by the Department of Philosophy & Education in co-operation with the History & Archaeology Department. The investigation reported in this paper is located in the above contexts during the second stage of the programme’s implementation between December 2000 and June 2001.

During this stage, in the Philology department 420 hours of in-service on Ancient Greek Philosophy, Tragedy, Rhetoric, Latin Literature, Latin Language, Modern Greek, Teaching Methodology of Ancient and Modern Greek, Information Technology are offered to thirty experienced philologists coming from different parts of the country. Ten university teachers are involved in teaching the above subjects. The programme addresses mainly to those teaching in upper secondary schools aimed at renewing their subject knowledge in both Classical Languages. Philologists participating in the programme, after being assessed through a written essay in one of the ten courses attended and taking exams in Information Technology, are awarded a Certificate of In-service Training (Ypepth, 2000c).

In the Department of Philosophy and Education the 420 hours of in-service is distributed among the following subjects: General History and History of the Civilisation, Ancient and Modern Greek, Linguistics, Educational Theory and Research, Teaching Methodology of History, Greek Language, Ancient and Modern Greek Literature, Developments in the Socio-Cultural and Economic Context, Information Technology. Overall, forty-seven university teachers are involved in teaching twenty-nine philologists who attend the programme (Ypepth, 2000d). The in-service aims at updating their subject knowledge, informing them on educational theory, research, teaching methodologies, making them aware of developments and reforms in education. With the end of the programme, participants are assessed through a written essay and awarded a Certificate of In-service Training (Ypepth, 2000d).

Literature Review and Conceptual Framework

The key concepts guiding this study are a set of ideas associated with in-service training and university-provided in-service training. Bolam (1982) perceives the former as referring to those education and training activities engaged in by teachers following their initial certification. This includes training in the induction year, short courses, school-based training and university award bearing courses. The term is also used loosely and interchangeably with professional development–the continuing learning process extending from initial training until retirement, by which teachers acquire the knowledge, skills and values to improve the service they provide to clients (Fullan, 1991, Hoyle & John, 1995). It is also connected with the term continuing professional education, which means briefly a complex system of support and instruction by which people with particular experience in a filed of teaching or learning convey it to those professionals with less experience, in order to update their practice (Houle, 1983). The third term by which it is linked is staff development –is seen as a way by which an individual is developed as a member of staff in a particular school, or the development in some way of the whole staff of a school (O’ Sullivan et al., 1998). In this study the four terms are used interchangeably to refer to the Greek context.

Several sources of in-service training have been identified in the literature. Since the units of analysis in this study are two in-service programmes organized in one university, the focus is on the university provided in-service training model. This is frequently criticized on the following grounds: first, since professional development is not universities’ primary function, reliable funding is not generally available (Sneed, 1972) and as a result universities have no independent policy in professional education (Stern, 1983). Second, academics view continuing education as ancillary to other work and responsibilities. Knox (1982) found a lack of incentives for faculty participation in one university’s continuing education effort. Moreover, some raise the spectre of ‘the end of knowledge in higher education’ (Barnett & Griffin, 1997; Delanty, 1998) or of the ‘the university in ruins’ (Readings, 1996). The ‘end of knowledge’ thesis takes three forms. Substantively, it is felt that the knowledge sustained by the university has no particular status. Ideologically, it is felt that it lacks legitimacy. It is a set of language games of academics that reflects their interests and marginal standing to the rest of the society. Procedurally, it becomes performative in character and loses its power to enlighten (Barnett, 2000, p. 411).

However, even if much of the above is correct, in the literature it is emphasized that universities have a number of strengths as professional development providers as well as new knowledge functions. In particular, Houle (1983) and (Suleiman, 1983) argue that universities, unlike other providers that deliver relatively discrete forms of instruction over a period of time, they are more capable of offering lengthy types of learning experiences that lead to continuing education credits. They also argue that they have a large resident staff whose full-time responsibility is instruction. Cervero (1988) emphasize the fact that universities are the primary source of knowledge for most professions therefore, they can teach these to practitioners through in-service training programmes. Furthermore, as Barnett (2000, p. 411) points out university’s new functions in such an age of supercomplexity are: to offer completely new frames of understanding; to help us comprehend and make sense of the resulting knowledge mayhem; and to enable us to live purposefully amid supecomplexity. In this context a new epistemology for the university awaits, one that is open, bold, engaging, accessible. It is an epistemology for living amid uncertainty. The above points raise some thorny issues, explored in the context of the two in-service programmes examined.

As a foundation for the study Kirkpatrick’s (1975) conceptualization of the evaluation process was used. This was considered to be the most congruent with the development programme outlined above. He conceives of evaluation as four steps, all of which are required for an effective assessment of a programme. These are: reaction evaluation - getting data about what the participants like most and least, what positive and negative feelings they have; learning evaluation - getting data about the principles, facts and techniques acquired by the participants; behaviour evaluation - requiring data about actual changes in what the learner does after the training as compared with what he did before and; results evaluation – data such as costs and efficiency usually contained in the routine records of an organization. A fifth dimension added to the above is the rediagnosis of learning needs – repetition of the diagnostic phase (Knowles, 1990). In the study Kirkpatrick’s model is used as a heuristic only to guide the research questions and the collection and analysis of data.

Methodology

The nature of the study is exploratory the purpose being to investigate experiences and perceptions of both secondary and university teachers on the in-service courses. Since the study focuses on how individuals understand, experience and interpret a phenomenon and seeks for a deeper interpretation and conceptualization of that (van Manen, 1984), a phenomenological approach to the collection and analysis of data was adopted. van Manen (1984, pp. 37-39) attributes the following remarks to the phenomenological research: is the study of lived experience – the world as we immediately experience it rather than as we conceptualize, categorize, or theorize about it; is the study of essences – asks for the very nature of a phenomenon, is the attentive practice of thoughtfulness – a heedful wondering about the project of life, of what it means to live a life; is a search for what it means to be human – as we research our lived experiences, we come to a fuller grasp of what it means to be in the world, and; is a poetizing activity – it tries an evocative speaking, wherein we aim to involve the voice into an original singing of the world.

Participants

Twenty -two secondary teachers (philologists) - eleven from each of the two departments examined - and twelve university teachers - six from each of the two departments, participated in the study. The secondary teachers (sixteen women and six men) ranged in their teaching experience in both the Lower (Gymnaseo) and the Upper (Lykeo) secondary education from ten to seventeen years. They had extensive experience of teaching virtually all the subjects that a philologist would teach in a typical Greek school: Ancient & Modern Greek Language and Literature, Latin, History, Philosophy, Psychology, despite their areas of specialization. Their prior experience of attending in-service courses also varies from zero to three months. The university teachers (three women and nine men) ranged in academic rank from professor to research assistant and had different experience in university teaching. They also varied in their experience as classroom teachers and teachers in professional development courses, ranging typically from no experience at all to thirty - eight years. Their areas of specialization included: Classical Studies, Pedagogy, History, Modern Greek, Linguistics and Information Technology in Education. To sum up, with regards to the choice of participants, the sample was opportunistic rather than stratified. According to this approach every individual has an equal chance of being selected (Miles, Huberman, 1994, p. 28).