Research Paper

TEACHING as a PROFESSION… as a VOCATION
One of the most important things that teachers should always keep in mind is the fact that teaching is not only a profession but also considered as a vocation. None of them could become effective and efficient teachers if they will only work for the sake of the degree that they have earned in college or just for the sake of the salary they get from their employers.
So that we can see why teaching is considered as a vocation, first, let’s take a look at the difference between profession and vocation. According to the Oxford dictionary, “profession” is a paid occupation that involves prolonged training and a formal qualification while “vocation” is a strong feeling of suitability for a particular career or occupation, especially regarded as worthy and requiring dedication. If we are going to see the difference between this two, profession is more of the work needed to be done for a salary. In contrast, vocation is more of the work that needs to be done not for salary but for service. And if we will be evaluating those two words deeper, both of them involve work but only one emphasizes dedication – which is vocation. Yes, anyone can become a sales lady but not everyone can become a priest. Anyone can work over time but not everyone can go to mountains and serve those needy people. Therefore, a vocation is only for some who are really dedicated not just to work but also to serve other people.
Teaching is technically a profession where it normally involves occupation and the salary that is being awarded to a teacher after hard days of work. However, unlike any other profession, it requires dedication and service in order for an individual to be considered as a real teacher. That’s the reason why teaching should not just be treated as a simple profession but also a serious vocation where other people and service is over self and salary.
TEACHING : a moral VOCATION
If teaching is a moral profession and if we are only disseminating information, or just communicating knowledge, we are falling short of our calling. What makes education, education? The Latin meaning of that word is to draw out, not to put in, information, but to draw out the heart of the student, to draw out his own understanding so the information and understanding can become his own.
PROFESSION OR VOCATION?
Vocation is a theological word. It has been defined as a career with a spiritual calling from deep within. It is important that other people recognize and confirm your vocation but ultimately it is something very personal concerned with your core values. The Cambridge International Dictionary of English however defines vocation as a type of work that you feel you are suited to doing and to which you should give all your time and energy or the feeling of suitability itself.
On the other hand, a profession is generally defined as an occupation characterized by skilled intellectual techniques, voluntary association and code of conduct, and teaching is certainly that, it is characterized by public standards to which all members are accountable. The truth is that the professional teacher is someone who handles his commitment in a responsible and open manner with colleagues and pupils or students. However, Teaching is a relatively new profession when compared with medicine and law. there are many people for whom teaching is obviously a wrong profession or occupation, because they have entered teaching out of frustration rather than the joy to see others learn and develop. But, for a dedicated teacher, the profession is also a hobby and a vocation.
The possibility is that you may find many teachers regretting that they had decided to become teachers. But the reason is not the profession nor is it the working environment. It is the low earnings of the teacher which needs to be addressed adequately as a nation.
Besides, the myth and unique respect associated with other professions like law, medicine, engineering and so on can not be said to be same with the teaching profession. Schooling is now democratized and teachers are generally considered as ordinary workers with mediocre skills. Teachers at the Basic school level, for example, are considered generalists and therefore cannot claim to be experts in their field as other professionals like legal and medical officers.Teaching is closer to an art than it is to a craft or technique, and, though it certainly involves mysterious transactions, it is nevertheless a public activity that is improvable through practice and criticism.
Have a Vocation, Not a Job
For many people, their work is a means to an end. They work for a paycheck in order to live their lives. But those called to teach have a true vocation. To those with whom you interact most during your day of teaching - the students - you are not an employee but a friend, a mentor and a guide to the world. A teacher makes a difference in the world by enabling each of his or her students to fully maximize their talents, imagination, skills and character.
Is teaching a vocation, a job or a profession?
Believe it or not, the answer to this question can drastically alter the way in which we approach teachers and teacher development. So here are the three views and their implications. They might also be called the three contradictory 'truths', all present at the same time. Perhaps there is a fourth view here which is sorely missing – and will be provided by you!

The vocation votaries
The commonest cliché of course is the oft-heard lament: "Teachers are no more what they used to be… In my days, teachers really took their work seriously. And of course from the ancient times till recently, gurus were both respected as well as worth respecting. But look at it all now – from a noble vocation it has degenerated into just a job. Those who can't get any other job, use this as a last resort. And once they get in, once it's a permanent job, you can guess what happens – they simply stop working and turn to other avenues such as private tuition or local politics. Ah, the good old days when teaching used to be a vocation, as it actually should be…"

Obviously, thus speak the votaries of 'teaching as a vocation'; they see it as a sort of 'higher calling' whose role is to 'impart' knowledge and character, moulding children into 'something' (i.e., from nothing to something).

The main difficulty is that such teachers are seen as 'born rather than made' and teacher development programmes don't have much scope for success – after all a vocation is something you naturally grow into rather than being made to develop along prescribed lines.

The vocation votaries also condemn themselves to perpetual disappointment. Since the number of teachers already in place exceeds 5.7 million, with another million or so still to be added in the next few years, it is highly unlikely that some many millions will be born teachers with an in-built sense of their vocation as 'preceptors to malleable and eager young minds' – so the vocation votaries can look forward to a lifetime opportunity to lament.

The 'job' party
So then who thinks of teaching as a 'job'? Well, the teachers themselves and all their near and dear ones. In a country where education does not guarantee a job (because it does not guarantee even learning), getting a job (despite one's poor education) is indeed a big thing. The bigger thing of course would have been to get a job where you could earn something 'extra', but failing that it is really great to have freedom from worry, a regular and fixed income, with benefits such as medical expenses and pension thrown in. Even better, like so many other (government) jobs it doesn’t matter if you don't succeed or don’t even work. So long as you can keep a limited few happy (or at least not make them unhappy), you yourself can be happy, never mind what happens to children.

The 'job' party sees the main role of teachers as that of 'dealing' with children, maintaining 'discipline' – that is, keeping children in order. Being sincere here means 'covering' the textbook, taking regular attendance, doing the 'non-academic' duties. And if you're extra sincere, you can add: getting children to do well in examinations.

The difficulty with this approach is that no matter what, i.e. no matter what kind of training or other 'incentives' or 'disincentives', teachers will continue to do what they have been doing. After all, it's just a job and no point breaking your back at it. And then hard work does hurt one – the moment a teacher really starts working hard, many others tell him to stop it right way, or they themselves will be expected to work hard too.

All this renders futile our pre-service and in-service trainings, on-site support and supervision, and academic resource centres at cluster and block levels – after all, if you are only in a job where performance doesn't matter or invites censure, why bother to improve?

Profession, anyone?
So does the notion of teaching as a profession have any scope at all? And who really believes that? Well, it's actually those who are working seriously and methodically to help teachers improve in real terms. They hold that much as a medicine or engineering, teaching too has its own requirements, standards, rigour, ethics and, of course, contribution to make. They believe that teaching is not something that 'anyone and everyone' can do. Instead it requires a well-informed understanding of children and learning, grounding in several philosophical disciplines, numerous skills and adherence to a code of conduct that has to be in operation ever minute that that the teacher is in action. If all this does not count as being a profession, what else can?

So this group sees teacher development as a systematically implemeted process that enables the acquisition and generation of the required knowledge, attitudes and skills, as well as commitment to put them into practice such that each child they are responsible for attains an optimal degree of learning. Far from being 'preceptors' or 'child-minders', they see teachers as knowledge partners who enable children to develop and refine their understanding through a wide range well-executed learning experiences.