Towards a Framework for Analysing Notions of Education Quality in Different Teacher Education Orientations

While the need improve the quality of teacher education is widely acknowledged, there has been limited critical engagement with notions of education quality in different teacher education orientations and their implications for teacher education policy and practice. This article proposes an analytical framework to help unearth core education quality issues and questions in different teacher education orientations. The article also describes the application of the proposed framework to two selected teacher education orientations, namely the human capital and the capabilities approaches. Results showed that the economic ‘lens’ of the human capital orientation narrows the range of education quality issues and questions that can be raised within this orientation. On the other hand, due to its comprehensive and multidisciplinary nature, the capabilities approach is able to bring to the fore education quality issues and questions that cover a wider scope of not only educational processes and outcomes but also of dimensions of human well-being and flourishing, and was thus able to provide a more nuanced understanding of quality in teacher education than the human capital perspective. Implications of the results of the analysis for teacher education reform are also briefly discussed. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n7p38