What is a Professional?

There’s a long history and a large body of material about “professionals” and “professionalism.” In Medieval times, there were only three professions, called “the learned professions”:

• Medical Doctors
• Lawyers
• Priests

As professionals they were licensed to carry out socially useful tasks on behalf of the state or Church:

• Medical Doctors: To intervene in our bodies
• Lawyers: To regulate the conflicts of rights and obligation among individuals and groups
• Priests: To intercede for us in our prospects of future salvation

The reason these jobs were “professional” is they had to do with power:

• The power to intervene
• The power to intercede
• The power to regulate

Power – in all societies – has to be legitimated. Kings did not need to be “professional” to govern. They had royal blood. But others did.

Over time, there’s been an evolution and expansion of the professions for us to draw on as we ponder the state of science teaching as a profession.

What are the elements of a profession? What makes someone a “professional” as opposed to an employee? Or a manager? Or an artist?

• Knowledge based expertise that derives from academic training. Professionals are tested for entry and frequently retested for continued competence.
• Code of ethical behavior (on and off the job)
• A moral commitment embodied in a public service (beyond the desire for profit)
• Higher than average standard of living
• Relative independence or autonomy
• That autonomy limited – if at all – by licensure and the standards set by professional organization
• High status in the minds of ordinary citizens

What are the privileges of professional life?

• Self-regulation/self policing
• Advancement on the job
• Independence of a particular employer (portable benefits)
• Right to choose their clients, their hours and set fees
• Time set aside for research, professional development, self-improvement, and collaboration

Professional athletes benefits from many of the privileges of professional life. But are they true “professionals?” No. They’re just not amateurs. They’re plying their sport for payment!

So, for purposes of making those distinctions in our quest to improve the status of science teaching, think of science teaching as an “Elite Profession.”