Picking up on Locke’s (2001, 2004) somewhat bleak view of the erosion of teachers’ professionalism, this article begins by inquiring into a range of current professional environments across the Western World. Many of these environments are driven by managerialist policy and discourses, which are contributing to a steady impoverishment of the professionalism of teachers and teaching. I identify some trends in recent teachers’ professional development policy and practices in secondary schools and use a reading of a literary short story to critique these trends. I then proceed to take as a framework for closer analysis Freire’s conception of knowledge and learning as banking, and consider the critical implications of such a conception for managerialist policy and practice. My argument is that much managerialist policy and practice assumes teacher knowledge and teacher identity to be fundamentally individualistic. Finally, this critique of managerialist policy and practice with respect to professional learning frames a reflexive analysis and discussion of one site of inquiry-based professional learning. My analysis and discussion suggest a paradigm of professional learning that may give cause for more optimism with respect to the future professionalism of teachers and teaching.