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Seeing the Forest and the Trees
Fifty years ago, the Association established its first specialist councils at the direction of the 1960 Annual General Meeting. Delegates, or councillors, as they were called then, voted unanimously in favour of resolution C47/60, which approved the formation of specialist councils “for the purpose of improving practice in the various specialties.” The Business Education, English, Guidance, Home Economics, Industrial Arts, Mathematics, Modern and Classical Language, Physical Education, Science, and Social Studies councils, together with the Council on School Administration, were officially launched at their inaugural conferences the following year.
Delegates’ decision to establish specialist councils was—and continues to be—entirely in keeping with the Teaching Profession Act, which, in 1960, defined as one of the objects of the Association improvement of the teaching profession “by initiating and promoting research in methods . . . of teaching the various subjects of the curriculum.” Their decision was also prompted by a desire to maintain the unity of the teaching profession and to avoid the disunity that could result from the establishment of discrete organizations for each specialty. As then-executive secretary S.C.T. Clarke and Ernie Ingram, the Association’s first executive staff officer in Professional Development, wrote in 1959,
The organization of independent associations for professional educators would seriously weaken the unity we now have in the teaching profession and would hamper efforts to bring all educators into one comprehensive organization. A multiplicity of organizations, all working on similar problems, without a central coordinating body could lead to nothing but confusion and weakness throughout the entire teaching profession.
Special interest organizations have many advantages, but must be organized logically within the structure of one comprehensive association if the interests of education are to be properly safeguarded.
The specialist council to which I belong, the Mathematics Council, has a long and distinguished history. Its logo—appropriately, a striped Venn diagram with the council represented by the intersection of students, teachers and the mathematics curriculum—has remained unaltered since the council’s inception. In addition to publishing the journal delta-K and the Mathematics Council Newsletter and organizing an annual conference, the Mathematics Council has also published many monographs in its 50-year history, some of them, including Problem Solving in the Mathematics Classroom, to international acclaim. It has developed math kits, established a corps of Metric Missionaries, coordinated film circuits, hosted summer seminars and organized miniconferences throughout the province. Affiliated with the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, the Mathematics Council provides input on and informs its members about curricular changes, sponsors awards and grants, and embraces social media.
In short, like the Association’s 20 other specialist councils, the Mathematics Council has remained true to the objects of the Model Constitution for Provincial Specialist Councils—to improve teaching practice in the specialty by increasing members’ knowledge and understanding of the specialty; to foster the professional development of members through membership activities and services; to provide advice and expertise to the Association on learning and working conditions, curriculum and teacher preparation as related to the specialty; and to act through the Association as an advocate for the advancement and promotion of the specialty.
Much has been written about professions and their defining characteristics, and part of what makes teaching a profession and the Association a professional association is undoubtedly our specialist councils themselves. While some teachers, particularly elementary teachers, tend to view themselves as generalists, not specialists, I believe strongly that generalists should join specialist councils. As a Grade 3 teacher at Big Rock School in Okotoks, I am by necessity a generalist but I belong to the Mathematics Council, and thereby have the advantage of being able to see both the forest and the trees.
In that, we are not unlike other professions. Just as the Association has specialist councils, so the Alberta Medical Association has sections, the College and Association of Registered Nurses of Alberta has specialty practice groups and the Alberta College of Social Workers has member interest groups. While we are teachers first, the status of our profession is contingent, at least in part, on the strength of our specialist councils.
So let us celebrate the golden anniversaries of these vibrant subgroups and look forward to their continued efforts to improve our profession.
