ABSTRACT
Debates about who should provide INSET are not news. During the 1980s providers and provision were being discussed in the context of growing dissatisfaction that traditional forms of cafeteria-style INSET were failing to have an impact on school-based practice (Jones and Reid, 1988). Such concerns became subsumed within wider attempts to manage the education system in order to effect ‘quality’ of teaching and learning. With the introduction of specific forms of funding, the planning, implementation and evaluation of INSET, within wider frameworks of a national curriculum, were increasingly systematized and training grant schemes became important government tools for addressing educational change by targeting teachers. By 1988, central government had passed on two messages: education was far too important to be left to practitioners, but at the same time a ‘practitioner train thyself’ philosophy of school-orientated provision had been advocated, whereby teachers were considered suitable trainers of teachers under whole school mantles, monitored and evaluated by LEAs and external observers.
