In this tour de force account of his early career during the first onset of populism, Andy Hargreaves describes how political attacks on teachers and academics, on the one hand, and naive professional understandings of child-centred learning and teaching, on the other, each failed to grasp the nature of teachers’ work, the complexity of student learning, and the importance of intellectual balance. Written with incisive clarity and sparkling with self-deprecating humour, The Making of an Educator is a delight from the first page to the last, with direct relevance for all of us today who are dedicated to improving teaching and learning, wherever we may be.

This is the story, both personal and professional, of a teacher and academic studying and reflecting throughout his educational career on key facets of professionalism and core purpose. Important truths emerge about the vital influence of culture, the importance of embracing the ‘big picture’ of education, and the need to move beyond survival and coping strategies. Essentially this is about the essence of professionalism and the essential need to combine both practical classroom wisdom with theory. Powerful, endearing, and transformational – a compelling read.

Brilliantly reflective and often disarmingly funny, Hargreaves invites us into the inner life of an educator navigating a world in flux. Insightful and inspiring.

Andy Hargreaves is a prolific international author of great renown. But what informed his thinking and how did the ideas in his many books first take hold? In this very readable and accessible book, we discover some of the background to the events and experiences that shaped Andy’s career and the evolution of his thinking on education. But this book does much more than this. It relates what happened in the 1980s and 1990s to the education issues and challenges of today and gives us a new and wiser perspective. It also unveils the personality behind the ideas in a very authentic way. Everything from being interviewed as a potential suspect in the Yorkshire Ripper manhunt to bouts of depression and struggling to make ends meet with a young family is revealed in a truly fascinating narrative. As someone who knew Andy at the time and who has observed his thinking over 40 years, I loved it.

In a deeply personal narrative that blends the self as a teacher and then the self as researcher, Andy’s book helps us understand how the personal and professional are deeply intertwined, mutually informing one another. Importantly, it generates critical insights into the rise of neo-liberalism in educational policy and practice and captures key insights for educational improvement in our current moment that speak to both the pursuit of educational quality and equity.

In this intriguing memoir, noted educator Andrew Hargreaves reflects on the experiences that led him to become a teacher, a scholar in education, and a leader of thoughtful educational innovation.

Andy Hargreaves has written a slew of books in the past three years. My advice is to put them all aside and go straight to The Making of an Educator. Or should we say the ‘making, remaking’, and ‘further making of an educator’. And it is not linear. It is forward, sideways, rediscovering, doubling back, leaping forward. Always human and grounded in the roots of life and humanity, Hargreaves takes us through his non-linear but ultimately converging body of early work. From the time that Andy found himself in charge of the household when his father died and his mother was bedridden, Andy was responsible for the whole family, including his younger siblings. We then witness Andy’s first 15 years in formation as a British academic, in his 20s and 30s, before he came to Canada. In his 20s and 30s, he would have been seen as an upstart in the stuffy halls of British academia (and he still has that upstart demeanour in his 70s). In 1987, Andy, his wife Pauline, and their two children, Stuart and Lucy, took the leap into the unknown as they came to join us in Toronto. From that period on, Andy always found himself in leadership roles. Again, you can’t understand Andy’s sources of inspiration if you don’t see him in different roles, with different aspects of life and his scholarship and its application. In The Making an Educator you see Andy in flesh, blood, and as he was up to the age of 37. You understand what makes him tick and be ticked off. You can’t understand and get the full brunt of Andy’s magnificent contribution to practice and theory without absorbing the making of the early man. Read this book first before you pick up any of his 30+ other titles.

In The Making of an Educator, Andy Hargreaves goes back to the 1970s as his starting point. I started my own teaching career in the same decade, and for everyone in the same position there will both a familiarity and a freshness as the book successfully makes sense of four decades of change.

Andy Hargreaves is amongst a small group of academic researchers whose name is familiar to and referenced by practising teachers. He has been a leading figure in the revolution that is beginning to make teaching an evidence-based profession, and this book gives an insight into how Andy has succeeded in bridging the gap between policy and practice. He has a language that speaks to professionals from all parts of the education community in a way that they feel both understood and appreciated. It is a rare skill, and it runs like a thread throughout this book.

Andy is keen to say that this is not a memoir and, in the sense that it isn’t merely an account of the past, he is right. However, it is an invaluable ‘bringing together’ of the journey that school policy has taken over almost half a century and offers wise and rooted advice for the next generation of education professionals. As such, it provides us with a shared foundation for navigating the future.

It might not be a memoir (he says), but it absolutely falls somewhere between a highly illuminative portrait of our greatest educational interactionist and a deeply engaging origin story of a truly unique and wonderful human being. As an avid reader of Andy’s books for the better part of two decades, I think this is the keystone upon which everything else should be placed. The early career teacher and academic will find incredible wisdom and advice. We somewhat later-stage activists, teachers, wonks, and researchers will find ourselves in the pages, amazed by the lucidity and insight Andy so consistently maintains as we come into contact with the main social theorists and thinkers of our formative years and look upon them with new eyes. It is truly a monumental piece of work and generous contribution to further feed our ‘passion for understanding education’. Chapeau, Andy.

As an educator who has relied on Dr Hargreaves’ scholarship for almost 50 years, The Making of an Educator has given me a renewed sense of pride, optimism, and resolve to take our work to new heights. It is chock-full of reflective insights, coping strategies, and actions to implement. Authenticity comes to mind because Andy has done the work himself as an educator, writer, and world-renowned researcher.

Those who know Andy’s global influence wonder about the experiences that have shaped this educational icon, hoping to replicate those qualities in teacher training and capacity building. We wonder if a replica of research excellence, political acumen, and productivity is possible.

This book has provided many innovative ideas and actionable steps to augment our work as practitioners. The three ways forward and deeply reflective analysis of insights gained over a lifetime of innovations have great didactic value. His exhortation to strengthen our core, take out our moral compass, ensure that we stay true to our North Star or Southern Cross, and remember why we chose teaching in the first place is timely as we navigate and learn from major shifts and disruptions.

Dr Hargreaves has emboldened us with boundless courage and insights on how to become solution finders who pursue the dreams deferred. He has equipped us to revitalise our equilibrium and pursue our primary mission with courage and determination.