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Editorial: Teacher Education

In October I attended the launch of the Global Teachers Status Index at the Institute of Directors in London. The event was launched by President Bill Clinton for the Varkey GEMS Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation established to improve the standards of education for unprivileged children. Lord Adonis spoke first on how it was unprofessional for teachers to strike and how important performance-related pay was for the status of the teaching profession. President Clinton was more inspirational in tone and focused on the transformative impact that teachers can have on students. This launch comes at a time when the role of English universities in the education of teachers is under serious threat. This is why we have commissioned a special edition for 2014 on the debates surrounding teacher education and will welcome papers in this area to be submitted no later than the end of April 2014. The report launched by President Clinton underlines how important it is to understand how teachers are respected relative to other professionals, the social standing of teachers, how much teachers are trusted to deliver a good education to their students, and so on, because teachers and their roles impact on how the education system is viewed, and thus, in part, on the success of the education system. Twenty-one countries were surveyed to explore the levels of respect for teachers, and samples within these countries were collected through use of quota sampling, in order to represent relevant proportions in populations. The following lists the significant findings. On average, teachers were ranked seventh out of 14 professions, indicating a mid-way respect ranking for teaching as a profession. Teachers were most respected in China, South Korea, Turkey, Egypt and Greece, and they were least respected in Israel and Brazil. Head teachers were more highly respected than secondary teachers in 86% of countries, and secondary teachers were more respected than primary teachers in 81% of countries. Primary teachers were regarded more highly than secondary teachers in France, China, Turkeyand the United States. Significant differences existed between countries as to whether they would encourage younger generations to become teachers. Parents would most probably encourage children to become teachers in China, South Korea, Turkey and Egypt, and were likely to do so in Israel, Portugal, Brazil and Japan. On average, only 27% of respondents thought students respect teachers. However, 75% of respondents in China believed they did. Across Europe, it was found that higher British Journal of Educational Studies Vol. 61, No. 4, December 2013, pp. 383–384