Should school teaching be classified as a profession? A twenty first century look at this classic question

The question of whether school teaching should be regarded as a profession is a long standing, sensitive and important one. Throughout the twentieth century many people have debated and discussed this concept, resulting in arbitrary and nebulous models being devised in which to compare against teaching. This has resulted in teaching often failing to meet these traditional definitions. This paper suggests that these traditional views of a profession are inappropriate and proposes a new way to think about this question in the twenty first century.