Partnership in initial teacher training: After the shotgun wedding

This paper focusses on the institution of a partnership between one higher education institution (HEI) and several schools. The qualitative data reported here were collected from semi-structured interviews with students, mentors and tutors. This study provides insights into how the partnership worked out in practice by highlighting contradictions and conflicts in these newly defined roles. Using the respondents' accounts, the reconfiguration of relationships emerging in the partnership are explored. The academic division of labour and the traditions of initial teacher training in which authority and responsibility resided with the tutors in HEIs have circumscribed the formation of partnerships. In broader terms, the technical powers given to the mentors have been limited by the ways in which the partnership has been introduced. Despite the collaboration implied by the partnership, it appears in this initial year that it has reinforced the hierarchical relations and constituted a clearer demarcation of practice in schools from educational theory.