Professional Development Files

As part of the BPTC I have to complete a “Professional Development File”.  Roughly speaking, this entails:

  1. Copying out your timetable into an unwieldy format and saying one thing you learnt each week;
  2. Printing out your main pieces of opinion writing and drafting and putting them in a folder with your feedback sheets;
  3. Putting all your advocacy feedback sheets into a folder
  4. Putting in copies of your absence forms, supporting evidence and the work that you did for those sessions you missed;
  5. A “law in practice” report.

This is an extremely large amount of paper and ink.  I have already had to refill my printer once today and it’s only going to get worse.  Moreover, as the feedback sheets are quite useful to keep, they have to be photocopied.

This works out as follows:

  1. Timetable - 8-10 pages
  2. Written work + Feedback - 30 pages
  3. Advocacy Feedback - 30 pages
  4. Absence forms & evidence - 8 pages (I was absent twice)
  5. Absence work - 24 pages (I make a lot of notes)
  6. Law in Practice Report - 2 pages

That totals around 104 pages.  I can’t see the point in printing and photocopying that much without a very good reason.  If you want to test the fact that I attended an SGS, this should be more than adequately covered by how I perform in the exams on the topics it covered.  If you want to test the fact that I handed in some written work, log it.  If you want to check my attendance, take a look at the register you took at the beginning of every SGS.  If you want to see if I learned anything in them, look at my exam results.

But I can’t see how it serves any useful purpose to make me reprint and photocopy over a hundred pages for a hoop-jumping compliance exercise.