ABSTRACT
The teacher’s role was taken to be vulnerable and exposed to conflict in two senses. First, because the role, lacking the defences of mystique, jargon or narrowly defined technical expertise, could frequently be exposed to incompatible expectations from various external agencies, all of whom felt confident of their ability and right to define the teacher’s role. Second, vulnerability and hence conflict was seen to arise from the uncertain status of the teacher as a professional. The final area of role conflict focused upon incompatibility between the values which teachers were expected to uphold to the pupils and those which were generally current in society. The standard of housing is generally good and there are few areas in the town which could be described as industrial slums. Some of the Victorian terraces in the central railway area of the town are occupied by West Indian and Indian families which together represent about 5 per cent of the total population.
