The teacher and his professional identity. Facilitators or obstacles to educational change?

Abstract

The trend towards focusing on educative competences, the creation of performance standards and the implementation of sophisticated systems of evaluation, has raised concern amongst authorities to commit the professors towards improvement of the quality of education. However, the profile of the underlying professor towards the previously mentioned changes does not necessarily coincide with the definition that professors have already constructed. This may produce consequences concerning ones' professional recognition and thus constitute an obstacle towards ones' desired improvement as a professor. Through an approximate methodological approach that combines the application of a questionnaire to high school professors and the documentary analysis of the official discourse from these professors, this article identifies the understandings and misunderstandings that take place between the developing identity and the constructed identity. In addition, the conditions that would favor the effectiveness of such innovations are discussed.