This article examines the impact of discourses upon teachers who strive to be professionals amidst the US No Child Left Behind era. The author used qualitative research methodology and ethnographic techniques to conduct a case study within the context of a teacher learning community comprised of two female secondary teachers and the researcher. This article illuminates how a teacher learning community becomes a space for agency for the ‘teacher as professional’ and how teacher development can be sustained within a contemporary context of compliance and accountability.