Inquiry-oriented and collaborative professional learning are widely recognised as central to strengthening teacher professionalism and agency. Yet less attention has been paid to how teacher learning is framed within national policy discourse in resource-constrained contexts such as Sri Lanka, and what this reveals about the institutional positioning of teachers as professionals and the conditions that constrain or enable agency and professionalism. This study conducts a discourse analysis of national Teacher Professional Development (TPD) policy documents as its primary focus. Documents were selected for their role in defining national expectations for teacher learning and professional growth. TPD is adopted as the overarching frame because it encompasses both pre-service and in-service teacher learning and reflects established usage within the Sri Lankan context. Informed by Hargreaves and Fullan’s notion of professional capital and ecological theory of teacher agency by Biesta, Priestly and Robinson, the study explores how teacher learning is described and positioned within policy texts. In doing so, it sheds light on how teacher professionalism is conceptualised and highlights the conditions that may enable or constrain the development of a more agentic professional learning ecosystem. Preliminary findings suggest that, within the context of ongoing education reform, policy expresses aspirations towards professional recognition and development, yet without clearly articulating the distinctive forms of professional capital that underpin teaching as a profession, including inquiry-oriented and collaborative approaches to professional learning. The paper contributes to debates on how policy discourse shapes the conditions for building professional capital and supporting teacher agency in resource-constrained contexts.

Authors:
Tharindu Samarathunga, University College London, United Kingdom

About the Presenter(s)
Tharindu Samarathunga is a doctoral researcher at the UCL Institute of Education in the UK. His research examines teacher understandings on perspective-taking and humane values education in Sri Lanka.

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https://www.linkedin.com/in/tharindu-samarathunga-education1992/

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