In Jamaica, there are many sources of data that can provide an evaluation of teachers, students, and schools at the primary level. The NAP assessments of students at grades 3, 4, and 6 focus on academic outcomes in literacy, numeracy and primary level subjects such as science and social studies. The panel inspections conducted by the Ministry of Education and Culture allow for officials of the Ministry of Education to assess some aspects of the management and supervision of a school, as well as the performance of teachers in that school.

Education should change the way that we live. The planetary crisis--of cli­mate change, depleted energy resources, air and water pollution, species ex­tinction, violence, poverty, HIV/ AIDS etc-requires a radical shift from education that is narrowly confined to the classroom to one that places stu­dents in community. Education that is solely an indoor activity, using Orr's term (2006) produces graduates who often know much about their world but do not act to change their world.

As global concerns increase about the effectiveness of schools in edu Tlcating and developing the human resource potential critical to economic and social advancement, countries worldwide have embarked on a wide range of school improvement initiatives. Central to these is the belief that good teachers are the most critical component of what schools need to do a good job, and good teachers need to benefit from good education programmes (Villegas-Reimers and Reimers 2000).

"Medicine, law, business, engineering - these are noble pursuits, and necessary to sus tain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love - these are what we stay alive for." 

Based on findings from a study of beginning teachers’ concepts of professionalism in Jamaica, this paper argues for the development of pedagogy in teacher education to address sustainability. The findings indicate that at the core of beginning teachers’ concept of the teacher as a professional is that of the teacher as a change agent. What these teachers mean when they speak of change agents and change agency is the subject of this paper.

The Caribbean Journal of Education (CJE) celebrates its 35th anniversary this year. To commemorate this achievement we have produced this special CJE anniversary issue devoted to reflecting on and reviewing the major themes that have recurred over the 35 years of the Journal’s existence. We look back in order to deter mine the future development of the Journal.

The problem of violence in our schools is a problem of identity and the difficulty faced by our young people to interpret the world in a way that makes sense. Living on the “street corner,” in other words, on the margins, economically, socially, and physically, many of our young people are challenged to construct an identity or a “world” that is coherent, to respect the self that they have created, and to acknowledge the “self” of others.

Jamaican policy makers have prioritized literacy improvement as a matter of urgency within the educational milieu. This has become even more intense during the past decade with initiatives being mandated and implemented to promote this cause. One such initiative is the establishment of literacy research and development centres in two teacher-training colleges with a prime mandate to prepare a special group of teachers to extend literacy improvement efforts in Jamaican schools.

Knowledge about how Jamaican teachers understand the concept of teacher professionalism is limited. In this qualitative study, 52 final-year student teachers participated in semi-structured interviews and concept mapping exercises designed to explore how they understand teacher professionalism. The analysis revealed that they view professional teachers as those who embody outstanding personal and professional attributes; recognize the complexity and contextual challenges of teaching; and respond to these by connecting the realities of their classrooms with what they have learnt in college.