MODULE V:

THE CODE OF PROFESSIONAL

CONDUCT FOR TEACHERS IN
TANZANIA- A SEARCH FOR THE
IDEAL
 The multi – dimension of the
teacher (as parent – figure,
community leader, worker –
employee).
 The multi – dimension of the
teacher’s responsibility:
responsibility to the learner (the
school child, the pupil).

 The multi – dimension of the
teacher’s responsibility:
responsibility to the profession
(his/her duty of calling).

 The multi – dimension of the

teacher’s responsibility:
responsibility to the employer.
THE CODE OF PROFESSIONAL CONDUCT
FOR TEACHERS
The role of Code of Ethics(CEs) in the
teaching :
• Teaching profession is defined with a written
code of conducts.

• Without code of ethics, teaching will cease

to be a moral enterprise.
Cont…
 Code of Ethics: is the guiding
principles which sets out an
institution’s (profession) ethical
guidelines and best practices to
follow for honesty, integrity, and
professionalism.

*** …is the set of recognised ethical

standards to which all members of
the profession must adhere to.
Cont…
• Codes defines and clarifies
teachers’ responsibilities and
obligations to different
stakeholders in the teaching
enterprise.
.
 FUNCTIONS OF CODE OF
ETHICS (CES) IN TEACHING
 It provides guideline for decision
making based on Moral Judgment
(MJ).
“MJ” tells us what we ought to do and
what we ought not to do (Carr, 2000).

 It acts as a tool of building and

sustaining public and client trust
towards teaching profession.
Cont….
It builds and promotes the status
of the teaching profession.

It develops teachers confidence

and identity towards the
teaching professional.

Ref: Arguments against the

profession.
 Cont…
It acts as a guide for sanctioning
teachers in case of abuse.

It explains the ethical nature of

the teaching profession.

It emphasises social

responsibilities of the profession
towards the community.
Cont…
NB: Codes have a positive and
significant impact in improving
teacher commitment and
professional behaviour and
performance of teachers
(Nuland & Khandelwal, 2006).
 According to Tanzanian
Teachers’ Service commission

• Every teacher shall recognise that he/she has

certain responsibilities to the:
child under his/her care;
community in which he/she lives;
profession;
the employer; and
the state.
 Responsibility to the Profession
Profession:
 An enduring job or occupation that
requires a relatively higher level of
education and training.

..as well as a level of occupational

specialisation for efficient and
effective discharge of the required
skills.
 Cont.

Profession: is a kind of
occupation which:
o demands a highly specialised
knowledge and skills.

o draws more or less on a

theoretical body and not by or
through practice only.
Cont…
o tested by some forms of
examination.

o conveys to the persons who

possess them considerable
authority in relation to clients
and others.
 Cont.
Such authority is carefully maintained
and deliberately intensified by guild-
kind of the practitioners How?
through:

 Laying down rules of entry, training and

conduct in relation to the public…

..by…Ensuring and upholding the

standards of knowledge, skills, and
performance of the practitioners.
 Cont.
 Defend the level of their
professional remunerations.

 To prevent competing groups from

intruding upon boundaries of their
professional activities.

 Preserve professional status.

How?
Cont…
Through:
• Encouraging high quality
teacher education.

• Continuous professional
development opportunities.

• Attracting potential individuals

in the teaching profession.
Cont…
• Promoting and ensure work
autonomy and engagement in
decision-making.

• Advocating for a strong public

education system and a
positive representation of
teachers in the society.
 Responsibilities with
respect to the profession:
• A teacher recognises that
teaching is a vocation and more
than mere gainful employment.

He/she therefore, undertakes to

conduct himself/herself
according to the following rules:
Cont…
 To follow at all times the highest
standard of professional conduct.

 To work accurately and with

diligence and regularity.

 To set a good example in his/her

conduct and to the children under
his/her care.
 Cont…

 To abuse no right or privilege contained

in his/her conditions of service.

 To exert every effort to provide a

professional service, to raise
professional standards.

 To refrain from activities that are

detrimental to the image of the
profession (teaching). ……////…….*
 Same cases that violate Code of Conduct in teaching
Profession:

Failure to exert oneself in one’s

work or to work diligently and to
show good examples to others.
Cont..

Failure to advance oneself through

self-study.

Lack of self-respect as might be

indicated, through:

(drunkenness, acts of loitering,

prostitution, etc.).
…..///////…….
 Teaching as a normative enterprises

Ask your self

What is normative enterprises?

Why teaching is a normative

enterprises?
 Areas teacher failing in teaching profession

.
Dimensions in which teacher has
failed in relation to teaching
profession as normative
enterprises.

According to David Carr (2000,

Cont…
Incompetence;
…..in the form of knowledge and
ability to understand a subject
matter in terms of failure in
pedagogical and content
competence, lack of authority in
classes, etc.
Cont…
Failure to promote pupil’s
independence of mind.
Cont…
Possess danger and insecurity to
pupils. Teachers fails when
engaging in non – qualified
issues like:

sexual abuse to pupil; joining

students in gambling issues; etc.
Cont…
Violation of professional norms;
for example setting wrong
expressions and life styles like
dressing code.
 The Imperative for the
Teacher
a. Keeping abreast of developments
in one’s teaching subject through
reading, self-study and enquiry.

b. Respecting oneself in whatever

the teacher says and does before
pupils, members of the public.
Cont…

c. Pay attention to one’s work and

one’s profession in relation to
public expectations.
 Responsibility to the Employer
‘Employer’ as a concept it
cannot be discussed in isolation
from a companion concept-and-
factor of ‘employee’

• There is no one without the other

 Cont.
• It is a life of symbiosis in human
relations.

• For each of the two, there are-rights

and obligations, other known as
rights and duties.

Employer: a person/organisation or
an institution that engages
individuals or groups for wages or
 Cont…
• The employment relationship
confers authority on the employer
to:

Control and direct the work to be

performed;

Engage or discharge and furnish the

working location and supplies.
…….///////……*
 Assumptions
Assumptions:
Something that you accept as
true/factual without question or
proof.
 Assumptions About an Employer

 The employer has a set of tasks

to be done, which he/she cannot
do [or has no ability or skill to do]
and for which he/she must look for
those individuals best prepared to
do the tasks.
Cont…
• On the other hand, the employee
has certain skills or disposition for
which he/she was commended to an
employer, who should thus offer fair
compensation to enable use of them.

It is this element that bring the two

together into a kind of relationship.
Cont…
• The ‘force’ that brings the two
parties together is a relationship
cemented by mutual
understanding on their rights
and obligations.

..So it is were know contract

comes in.
 Commitment to the Employer
• To observe contractual commitments.

• To render/provide professional service

to the best ability.

• Actively promote the improvement of

school/educational institutions.

• To uphold principles of employment

rather than personal interests. ******
 Realities
• Realities:
The state of things as they
actually exist or actual experience.
The Teacher as an Employee
Two realities surrounding this
argument

Positive realities:
As a moral exemplar:
supportive of change/innovations
if they are morally convinced for
the need of changes.
Cont..

Teacher as a role model, you will

be supporting or accepting roles
and responsibilities to report to
your employer.
Cont…
Negative realities:
Elements/aspects.
 Teacher autonomy: based on
his/her intellectual authority and
wide latitude of knowledge and
skills. Thus you can use them to
resist changes.

(to create breakdown)

 Cont.
Teacher traditionalism and
conservatism: particularly on issues
where the teacher feels insecure or
unsafe.

..Hence they tend to glorify the past for

quality of the future.

..Teachers do not like to accept changes

because they fear to lose our
positions.
 Cont.

Communication breakdown:
especially in situations of
delicate mutual bargaining
between employer and teacher,
teacher may act as a block.
 Cont..
Costs and expenses; when a
teacher is in a waste materials and
poor financial position.

E.g… A teacher may teach

superficially to attract tuition.
 Some cases for violating code
of conducts
 Reporting or rendering/providing a wrong
report designed to cheat the employers

 Failure or refusal to be accounted for the

resource given to you by employer.

• Absconding (leaving) from work without

permission from your employer.
 How to avoid contravention
between teacher and employer
• Provides accurate and correct
report, when demanded by
employer- Be honest.

• Be prudent and all the time try as

much as you can to avoid
unbecoming behaviors such as;
embezzlement.
*********
 Responsibilities to the learner

• All the time you have

responsibility to guide each child
in his or her development.

Physical- body
Mental- Cognitive
moral - Spiritual
Philosophical
Assumptions about the
learner:
A child is a scared human creature
of Almighty Creator (God)… is
born good & perfect.
• It possess unlimited power
• Logical and rational thinker
• Uncertain
• Ambitious, Optimistic, etc.
 Cont…
 Because the child is born good,
thus, teachers are responsible to
guide them to follow the laws of
nature.
Cont…

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) …

children are born good and guiltless,
and through life experiences they
learn badness and guilt.

NB: [People are destroyed by different.

forms of self-interest].
 The realities about the pupil

i. A pupil can be good, supporting

and noble because was born good,

Although sometimes a child may

be:
• Moody- not predictable &
emotional.

• Resistant to teachers.
 Cont…
ii. Pupil needs a model to imitate.
• Inspire
• Empower
• Help, etc.

Mentor-teacher role is one that is

important to the student.
Cont…
Aristotle(384-322BC)----
Alexander the Great (356 -
323 BC).

Note: pupils spends more time in

school
Cont… Responsibilities
Teacher should strives to help
students realize their potentials as
worthy and effective member of
society.

Thus, he/she must works to

stimulate the spirit of inquiry, the
acquisition of knowledge and
setting goals.
 Cont…
Promote quality teaching.
Improve learning environment.

Protect students from conditions

harmful to their learning or health
and safety.

Encourage students to respect other

members of the profession.
Cont…

To Giving fair learning

opportunity to all students.

Protect information about

students, unless the disclosure
serves a professional purpose or
is required by law.
 Same cases of violating of code
of conducts in relation to learner

• Seducing or involving in love

affairs with child elsewhere.
• Refusing to assist pupil to perform
a school work unless you are paid.

• Involvement with school pupils in

immorally or inappropriate public
actions. e.g. drinking.. ******
 Obligation towards Learners

• Sincerity in Teaching: It is
obligatory for the teacher to
teach effectively and to the fullest
in the best possible way.

• Motivating the Students:

Teacher should motivate the
student not only to study subject
but also for life.
 Cont…
• Providing Emotional Stability:
Students are highly emotional by
nature and very often situation
comes where a normal student may
also get emotionally unstable.

• Help the Students in making and

taking decisions: Teachers educate
and inspire students for better life,
development and progress. ****
Community

Responsibility to the
community

Note: All education processes

wherever they take place are
in the society.
 Providing good citizens

In school children are taught

various subjects and different
ways of life. Thus,
A teacher have to install
all the desired qualities
make student good
citizen.
Making students responsible towards rights and
duties.

All interactions should be based on

ethical norms which are guided by
the legal rights and duties.
To follow social norms

Teacher should guide student

making the existing norms very
clear in all the ways.

Social norms make student

become socially adjusted
individual to the given society.
 Setting up of Ethical Standards

Teacher can install ethical qualities

in the students by means of:
• moral lecture;
• personal demonstration and
other related activities.

******
 Responsibility to the
State

What is the State?

Responsibility to the
State
• A teacher is supposed to perform
each and everything for the
interest of the country.

• All the time teacher as a citizen

should respect, protect and
uphold laws and regulations in
place.
 Cont…
NB: Be sure that you will be treated
according to laws of the state.

For example, if you flout any law,

you will be held account regardless
of your professional status.

Walk away from trouble if you can, let it not be.

….End.