What I’d like a College of Teachers to do:

Respect!  Acknowledge that not only do teachers hold a degree and a post-graduate teaching qualification, but that they have chalk-face experience which they bring to the table too:  The College of Teachers absolutely must not be top-down.

Advise & support. The College of Teachers shouldn’t be the Orwellian Big Brother regulator that the GTC soon became, but a Professional Carer able to offer sage advice.

Broadcast sound pedagogy. Enough of the looking anywhere but the country which has a very long and fine tradition of educating! The College needs to shout best pedagogy to government.

Offer useful INSET courses. Teachers have 5 inset days a year, few of which in my experience are used for CPD.  There could be 5-day intensive regional conferences around the country, where teachers opt into the lectures/courses they’re interested in pursuing, or smaller courses on relevant things, which could be web-cast.  The College should have a role in connecting teaching teachers with learning teachers too.

Offer graduate and postgraduate courses, run in sympathy with work commitments.

In a digital age, the college must have online fora to discuss and share ideas with colleagues:

• An in-house version of Twitter’s #UKEdChat
• An online messageboard to share best practice. Maybe by subject discipline as well as general topics.
• A Dropbox-esque place (or obvious links to) to share materials under a Creative Commons license.
• A blog, with entries from house and guest education luminaries, and the chance to discuss the topic.
• An organised programme of teach-meets.
• TED talks

That these things have already come about in disparate places is testament to the need for them.  Bringing them together under a College of Teachers’ charter would go a long way to replace the Advisers lost a generation ago.