Tag Archives: schools

Some light on entry to the teaching profession

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The NCTL issued an interesting set of reports yesterday. At present they aren’t on their main web site, or at least I couldn’t find them, but they are available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications?keywords=&publication_filter_option=all&topics%5B%5D=all&departments%5B%5D=national-college-for-teaching-and-leadership&official_document_status=all&world_locations%5B%5D=all&from_date=&to_date=

Regular readers of this blog may find some of the Report linking ITT and workforce data somewhat familiar, but none the worse for that.

Here are the key findings that the authors believe stand up even though they have issues with the quality of the data.

  • Three regions of England – North East, North West and South West – appear to have large numbers of new qualified teachers who do not join a state-sector school immediately after achieving QTS.
  • Those studying on undergraduate with QTS courses have low initial retention rates in the profession, though we cannot know whether this results from subsequent choices made by the individual or recruitment decisions made by schools.
  • Teach First has very high two year retention rates, but thereafter their retention is poorer than other graduate routes.
  • Ethnic minority teacher trainees have very low retention rates.
  • Individuals who train part-time or who are older have much poorer retention rates, which may simply reflect other family commitments that interfere with continuous employment records.

The first point is no surprise given the official policy of allocating places by quality of provider rather than by labour market need. As the Report uses School Workforce data it largely predates the big shift into School Direct.

I am not sure whether the authors qualify the second point in relation to the first; too many primary trainees in the big four providers might have made a difference especially as the difference between HEI-led FT (I assume the graduate routes) and Undergraduate with QTS that is largely primary courses is only around three percentage points by Year 3 and in for the 2010 entry undergraduate routes were higher in terms of retention after three years than HEI-led. (Table 1).

EBITT did very well on retention and the early years of School Direct were above university courses rates, but below the former EBIT retention rates that they largely replaced. Teach First had the worst retention rates after three years. This isn’t surprising since its original raison d’etre was as a short-service type programme with the hope some would become career teachers: disappointingly less than half, even of those that entered during the years of recession, chose to do so. The exit of this group pushes up demand for replacements especially as Teach First expands.

The news about ethnic minority teachers isn’t surprising and reflect the study I did for NCTL a couple of years ago. While the last bullet point may be true, it could also reflect their location and job opportunities and the decisions schools make about the cost of teachers and the age profiles of their staff. Without more geographical information linked to TeachVac data on where the jobs are we can only speculate.

Finally, it would have been interesting to have had some contextual information such as the state of the economy and of the teacher labour market and whether the TSM numbers were over or under-recruited to for each cohort. Too many trainees against predicted demand can lead to wastage at the point of entry.

Counting the cost of Creativity

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There has been discussion this week around the possible consequences for creative subjects in schools as a result of the Tory Government’s push for more pupils to study the EBacc subjects. As there is no creative subject in the EBacc list, any push to widen the scope of that group of subjects could have a disastrous effect on those curriculum areas left out of the EBacc grouping.

Does it matter? Of course it does. While the idea of Progress 8 that was championed by the Liberal Democrat part of the former coalition recognised the worth of creative subjects, the present government clearly prefers geography to art and history to music and anything it seems to design and technology.

However, these creative art subjects and the associated performing arts subjects are an important part of both what makes England what it is and of our wealth generating industries. The latter is a fact it seems completely overlooked at the DfE, at least at ministerial levels. But, think of the earnings from our rich music culture that spans the gamut from popular to experimental. For a number of years I was invited to the Schools Prom every November and witnessed both a transformation in the range of music on offer and also in the diversity of schools encouraging a love of music in their pupils. Perhaps my most abiding memory was of a Norfolk Middle Schools marching round the stage of the Royal Albert Hall and containing pupils of all abilities. Do we really want to lose this heritage? Do we really want to ignore the possibility of enthusing those that could go on to create activities that support our national wealth in the future? Surely not.

The same arguments can be made for other subjects and especially, as I have pointed out before on this blog, for design and technology. Whether it been food preparation, sowing and textile design, electronics, carpentry or even the evolving use of 3D printing technology in new and creative ways, these are all important to generate enthusiasm in young people; have you read the piece on the BBC web site about using a 3D printer technology to create new food arrangements?  Even more importantly, these are areas of significant wealth generation and we impoverish future generations by not understanding this.

In the year we recognise the mid-point of the centenary of World War One, I don’t denigrate the importance of history, but merely observe that culture and creativity can be as important in the education of future generations.

As regular readers of this blog might expect, I am not just relying upon sentiment or even the economic arguments to make the case that these subjects are under threat, but have had a look at the TeachVac data. In the first six months of 2016, TeachVac has recorded a 24% fall in advertised posts for main scale teachers of art and design; a 17% fall in advertised posts for design and technology and an almost unchanged level in demand for teachers of music. Since TeachVac figures include both State Funded and independent schools it maybe that the decline in advertised posts is even greater in the State sector; we haven’t yet had time to drill down through the data.

To remove the creative subjects from our state secondary schools would be nothing short of a national disaster.

 

Can we afford 2,000 MATs?

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Earlier today the Regional School Commissioner (RSC) for the area that covers Oxfordshire appeared in front of the county’s Education Scrutiny Committee. This was his second annual visit since taking up the post of RSC. He brought along his new deputy to listen to the exchanges.  The discussion was robust at times. The RSC revealed that he now has a staff of around 50 people in his office and has established three sub-regional boards because the area he covers is so large. However, he didn’t know what his total budget for the office of RSC was, but promised to write to the Committee with the figure.

Two other interesting facts that came out during the discussion were, first, that the chairs a committee that includes civil servants from other bodies such as the EFA and Ofsted so that he can co-ordinate ‘soft intelligence’ about schools. Chairing such a committee places an RSC in a very important position with regard to all the academies in his area. He also revealed that he thought multi-academy trusts should probably normally range from 1-15 schools depending upon location. He also wasn’t seemingly in favour of clusters of secondary schools in the same MAT, as in the ARK and Harris models. This is despite his view that the reinvention of advisory teachers for those that want to stay in their subject and not more into general leadership seem an attractive idea to him. Without some degree of local groupings of secondary schools the travel involved, apart from being wasteful of resources, might also dissuade some good candidates from applying for such a post.

Taking the point about wasting of resources in a time of austerity and tax cuts for business further, an average size of a MAT of ten schools might require around 2,000 extra schools leaders if replaced across the county, once the post of CEO of a MAT replaced the former Executive Head role. With on-costs this might cost around £200 million a year, as this blog has pointed out before. Even an average size of 20 schools in a MAT might cost upwards of £100 million. That figure would cost the equivalent of more than 3,000 classroom teachers across the sector. That seems a high price to pay for ditching local democracy and imposing an NHS style direct rule system on the school sector.

The RSC agreed that local authorities have the duty to provide education for pupils in academies where the plug is pulled for either financial reasons or persistent poor performance, if a transfer to another MAT cannot be organised. Why would a MAT want to take on a school with a financial deficit even if the MAT was prepared to try to overcome a long-standing period of under-performance against expectations?

In answer to a question the RSC seemed to accept announcing a school closure for September any time after Easter would place a burden on a local authority with regard to finding alternative school places. With reduced resources in local government, such a burden could probably only be met by taking staff off of other work. The Committee didn’t ask about the effects of closing a school in a rural area if it meant increased transport cost to local council Tax payers.

All in all the RSC must have felt the session was good preparation in case he is ever asked to appear in front of a parliamentary Select Committee, but it left this member of the Committee wondering whether the benefits of the system really outweigh the costs?

Schools and their pupils in 2016

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Now that purdah is over the DfE can once again start its full range of duties. Earlier today the DfE published the results of the latest school and pupil numbers based upon the January 2016 census. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/532121/SFR20_2016_Main_Text.pdf

Overall, there were 121,000 more pupils in the system than in January 2015; no surprise to anyone there. However, even in the secondary sector there were 8,700 more pupils, reversing the long decline and marking the start of an increase likely to stretch well into the next decade.

There are some interesting statistics buried in the Statistical Bulletin, some of which may point to why the nation voted as it did last Thursday. The proportion of pupils with minority ethnic origins increased in the primary sector from little over 20% in 2006 to more than 31% in 2016; an increase of around a half in just a decade. For the third year in a row, the largest ethnic minority group were White Non-British at 7.1% of primary and 5.4% of the secondary school population and 6.3% of the total school population.

There are a lot more interesting nuggets buried in the tables. For instance, four shire counties each had more independent schools in them than in the whole of the North East region. The four: Surrey, Kent, Hampshire and Oxfordshire together accounted for 309 independent schools. Taken together two regions, London with 551 and the South East with 529, accounted for almost half of the independent schools in England.

Similarly, the three regions of London, The South East and East of England together account for 98 out of the 211 free schools, UTCs and Studio Schools in existence this January. Despite their potential for vocational education there were only six schools classified as free schools, UTCs or studio schools in the whole of the North East region: a truly divided country on these measures.

There is also a sharp divide in terms of free school meals, with regions in the north of England having above average percentages of pupils eligible and claiming and most of London, the Home Counties, East Midlands and South West having below average percentages. Inner London boroughs don’t share in this pattern, with some having amongst the highest levels of free school meals claimed in the country as a percentage of the school population. Tower Hamlets even exceeds the level seen in North East authorities such as Middlesbrough on one of the measures.

There was a slight fall in the number of infant classes with more than 30 pupils in January 2016 compared with last year, but the DfE admit the percentage of such classes still remains above the 2013 level, no doubt reflecting the pressure on school budgets.

Redbridge and Harrow had the largest average key Stage 1 class sizes at 29.5 each, closely followed by Slough, Richmond upon Thames, Birmingham and Sandwell. Rural areas in the north of England had some of the smallest average class sizes at Key Stage 1. As many of these have some of the smallest average class sizes at key Stage 2 as well it may pose interesting questions for the National Funding Formula, should the consultation still go ahead.

 

 

 

 

Ministers and the Rule of law

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The judgement of the High Court in the recent case concerning term-time holidays is now available for all to read at http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2016/1283.html The issue itself is on the way to the Supreme Court, where it seems likely that they DfE may be joined as an ‘interested party’ to the case. That makes the remarks by the Minister of State, Mr Gibb, quoted by the Guardian on the 9th June that “schools should continue applying the current regulations that allow parents to be fined” all the more interesting.

The recent case turned on whether the pupil had ‘regular attendance’ as that is what primary legislation requires from parents that entrust their offspring to the state school system for their education. Parents, it must be noted, are not required to send children to school to be educated, but if they do so it must be ‘regularly’. There seems to be no similar legal penalty that appears to be enforced for those that decide to home school or educate their children in some other way than sending them to school and that issue may need to be looked at if the government loses in the Supreme Court and reconsiders the current legal position.

Under the ‘rule of law’ governments are bound by the actions of the courts. In England, our common law system is founded on the judgements of the courts, and especially the superior courts, and these decisions change legislation enacted by parliament, usually by clarifying them. This is often because the way parliament legislates can mean Acts of Parliament are badly drafted and not enough time is spent at the Committee Stage picking over the Bill during the discussions. Interestingly, the House of Lords generally does a much better job of scrutinising legislation that starts there than does the other chamber.

So, should a Minister tell schools to ignore the decision of the High Court? He certainly won’t be able to tell them to ignore the judgement of the Supreme Court even if he doesn’t like it and even if he intends to try and change the law in a new Act of Parliament. I wonder if it was ill-judged on his part to so strongly support the government’s current position on term-time holidays, especially as it is only backed by secondary legislation, when LORD JUSTICE LLOYD JONES at the High Court had said in the judgement on the recent case at paragraph 19 that, “the regulation does not have the effect of amending the statute. In my view, the nature and scope of the offence created by section 444(1) remain unchanged. In particular I would reject the suggestion that Regulation 2 has the effect that any absence without statutory excuse necessarily constitutes an offence under section 444(1).”[of the relevant Education Act]. On that basis, perhaps most parents who have felt hard done by where a fine has been issued will now take their case to the Magistrates’ Court and plead ‘not guilty’, at least until the Supreme Court has ruled in the matter.

Realistically, it seems to me that ‘regular attendance’ has to be looked at in the round. The common sense view would seem to be that where a pupil has a good attendance record and the time off for holidays doesn’t impinge on important learning activities it could be treated no differently to the similar outcome if a pupil suffered a common childhood illness or a severe bout of flu. Where a child has a poor attendance record, then the holiday might just tip the balance between regular attendance and a failure to maintain regular attendance. In this case because it seems from the judgement that the child’s parents were no longer together and the other parent had already taken the child out of school that year, one can understand why the Council acted as it did, even where the child had an otherwise apparently very good and regular attendance record.

It is important that any revision of the primary legislation must define what is meant by ‘regular’. That will be a challenge. However, with home to school transport there has been a clear distance definition for very many years, so, about attendance, it should be possible to say something like, unless the pupil is unwell or attending a medical or dental appointment the parent of a child where the parent has asked the State to educate the child will need to ensure the attendance at school of the child by the required time every day that the school is open for the provision of schooling.

Finally, I support the view that where an offence is one of strict liability, as attendance at school is deemed to be, then it needs to be clear exactly what is required; it isn’t at present. I also dislike fixed penalty notices as a punishment because they take no account of parental circumstances and bear down more heavily on those that are less well off.

Surely, the real solution is for parents to accept the need for pupils to attend all the time and for travel companies to seek out vacations that cost no more in school holidays than during term-time. But, that is easier said than done.

 

 

More to attend school of their choice

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Purdah is turning out to be a curious state of affairs during the referendum campaign. Normally, during a general election, virtually everything in government stops. However, the DfE seem to be carrying on as normal in some ways but not in others during the current period of purdah. Yesterday, the statistical release on the admissions round for September 2016 was published. https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/secondary-and-primary-school-applications-and-offers-2016

There was the usual headlines about London parents being less successful than those elsewhere. However, to fully understand the London data, compared with the rest of England, you need both a sense of history and a knowledge of geography. The tightening of rules regarding free home to school transport by many shire counties over the past two years, as austerity has taken hold in local government, inevitably means more parents have no choice of school unless they are willing to pay for travel. Thus, many rural areas have more than 90% of parents receiving their first choice of school even at the secondary school level.

In London, where travel anywhere across the capital is free for travel to school regardless of parental income, parents can make a choice knowing that if unsuccessful they will still be offered a place in a school somewhere. Providing the figures by borough is even more unhelpful in London where the construction of secondary schools, was largely governed by the former LCC and it successor the ILEA often many decades ago. For various reasons, the outcome for the location of schools was not evenly spread around the then boroughs. Add in factors such as single-sex schools and faith schools and even single-sex faith schools and the distribution only makes sense at a greater level than that of the individual borough.

Nevertheless, some of the London problems may be the result the growth of 2.8% in the number of applications received this year to 548,006, compared to 533,310 in 2015. DfE officials said the increase was due to a “rise in births which began in the previous decade”: no surprise there, and London is likely to have seen a growth of more than 2.8% in applications.

The gap between the national average and outcomes for school places in London is much less at the primary school levels that at the secondary, level with Barking & Dagenham even doing better than the national average. This is despite I seem to recall dire warning some years ago of a shortage of school places in the borough.

Indeed, 84.1% of 11-year-olds across the country landed their first preference, compared with 84.2% in 2015 and 88.4% of children seeking primary school places were offered their first choice, up from 87.8% last year. This improvement suggests that the funds David Laws pledged for school building programmes, when he was the Minister, may be starting to have an effect even despite the growing school population. It may also reflect the work done by many local authorities to manage pupil place planning. This is a service that government doesn’t always seem to fully appreciate, especially when dumping a free school or UTC in an area where it is not helpful to effective place planning for all pupils.

Hopefully, the DfE now realises that overall planning at a national level just wouldn’t work and that effective local decision-making, especially for primary education must be retained and even encouraged.

 

Teacher Supply, a longer-term issue

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According to a Local Government Information Unit bulletin issued on Saturday, and citing a report in the Birmingham Post that was apparently based upon Office of National Statistics data, the number of people aged 0-14 in England will increase by 951,200 between 2014 and 2039. This will take the number from 9.7 million to 10.6 million. If anywhere near accurate, these figures will mean that there is likely to be no let-up in the demand for more teachers for most of the next quarter century.

The ONS will release some more data at the end of June but, whatever happens, the demand for more teachers is not likely to be spread evenly across the country. At present, ONS projects the following increases for the different regions of England.

Percentage increase in population 2024 on 2014

Region 0 to 15 years old
England 8.7
London 14.9
South East 8.8
East Midlands 7.7
East 10.9
South West 9.2
North East 4.0
Yorkshire and The Humber 4.9
West Midlands 6.9
North West 5.3

This table is very much in line with the findings of our TeachVac www.teachvac.com vacancy tracking. Both in 2015 and so far in 2016, London has had the largest percentage of vacancies per school for classroom teachers of any region, followed by the South East and East of England regions. There have been far fewer vacancies registered in the regions of the north of England.

If the population of London and the Home Counties is going to continue to increase, then governments, whatever their political complexion, will need to solve the staffing crisis in these regions as well as finding sufficient space for the extra pupils. Finding locations for new schools will be a real challenge and it might in extremis require building on existing playgrounds, with new outdoor space being located on the roof. There are precedents for such schools in inner city locations, although they probably aren’t ideal. I recall visiting one such inner city high school in New York located in a former office building that had no windows on several of the upper floors where the classrooms were located.

But, the longer-term strategy for teaching such large numbers of pupils also needs to be addressed by government. The issue is not, will they be taught, because somehow they will be. But, will it be to a standard we require to maintain our position in an evolving world economy? Schools in London have made great strides in achievements this century, it would disappointing to see that progress stall and even worse to see it go into reverse with falling standards just because there were insufficient appropriately trained and qualified teachers.

Whether the solution is a longer working life, more late entrants into teaching as career changers living in London already won’t face a problem of where to live or the more advanced use of technology and private study for older students is all open for discussion.

What is not a matter for debate is the need to take action for the longer-term in a strategic fashion. The first step might be identify a regional commissioner group for London and the surrounding areas.

 

 

New free job portal from Teachvac

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Two years ago I helped start TeachVac. Today, TeachVac, the free web site when schools can log vacancies for teachers and teachers and trainees can indicate their job preferences, all for free, takes another step forward.

I am delighted that TeachVac has today launched a free job portal for those schools that don’t have a vacancy page on their own web site. This will be of most interest to primary schools, since most secondary schools do have a page for vacancies. You can find it by visiting www.teachvac.com and clicking on the details of the portal in the middle box.

The free TeachVac job portal essentially creates a special page with the school name and details of vacancies entered by the school. After a set period of time, usually 14 or 21 days, the job is removed automatically. If the position hasn’t been filled the school will need to re-enter the vacancy. Teachers matched with the vacancy are directed to an email supplied by the school where they can request full details and any necessary application form.

At present the portal is only for teaching posts but, if demands by schools requires, it can be extended to cope with all types of non-teaching vacancies including teaching assistants, administrative staff and others types of post. We can even configure it to offer details of School Direct training posts if there is the demand from schools.

When a school with a portal decides to add a vacancy page to its own web site it is a simple exercise either to close down the portal or a school can just let any jobs listed expire and be deleted by the system leaving the portal remaining as inactive.

Teachvac has a free helpline. The two most common questions are: we are trying to register and what is a school’s URN and is it really that simple? The answer to the first is that it is not the same as a school’s DfE number and if a school doesn’t know their URN the team at TeachVac will help them locate it quickly and easily. The answer to the second is, yes it really is that simple to either register a job as a school or register a requirement for a vacancy as a teacher or trainee. And for everyone, it is a free service. All that we ask is that users spread the word to others. Word of mouth reduces the marketing costs and so far it seems to be working as 2016 vacancies and numbers looking for jobs is showing impressive returns over 2015.

TeachVac covers all schools in England, both state funded and private, but doesn’t yet go beyond the borders. That’s something we are looking at for the future to see whether there might be a market for a TeachVac service for international schools. Teachvac is also looking at the further education sector as another area for expansion.

 

Recruitment round enters final stage

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The end of May marks the traditional climax of the recruitment round for September appointments in schools. From this point onwards most existing teachers cannot change jobs for September. As a result schools must rely on the remaining trainees, returners and overseas teachers to fill any vacancies still remaining.

At TeachVac, the free recruitment site that is used by an increasing number of schools, teachers and trainees, we have been busy computing the results of the recruitment round so far in 2016 compared with last year.

Secondary schools that post vacancies receive the latest information about the market in that subject every time they post a main scale vacancy. They also receive monthly updates of the overall position in the newsletter posted on the TeachVac website. There is a similar newsletter for teachers.

The more detailed summer review is now being written and will appear by the end of June. It will summarise both our view of the recruitment round to date; prospects for the autumn term and the latest analysis of recruitment into training that will allow early predictions to be made about the recruitment round for September 2018 and January 2018.

TeachVac has always recognised that many primary schools don’t recruit often enough to make it worthwhile having a vacancy page on their website. For that reason TeachVac are launching a vacancy portal that will allow primary schools to use a school specific page within the TeachVac site on which to place their vacancies when they do arise. Simple to use, it will like the other key TeachVac services be free to schools and will provide interested teachers with a link to the school for more information.

At TeachVac we don’t see why anyone should pay for recruitment unless it is absolutely necessary. The basic service should be free. The DfE accepted this view in the recent White Paper, but we still have to see whether they will accept what is already provided in the market or spend public money creating a new system of their own?

Despite the stories of budget cuts and redundancies, TeachVac has recorded more adverts for main scale teachers so far in 2016 than in the first five months of 2015. Some of the vacancies reported early in the year may have been as a result of schools being unable to fill vacancies for January with appropriately qualified teachers. However, it is noticeable that vacancies advertised during May were little changed to the numbers advertised last year, especially the case in subjects where schools might struggle to find a teacher.

Location undoubtedly matters. There are large differences between parts of the north of England and London and the Home Counties in the average number of vacancies advertised per school. These regional differences really do mean that not taking location into account when allocating teacher preparation places can affect some schools’ chances of recruiting appropriately qualified staff with high quality subject knowledge.

 

 

 

Purdah causes more issues for education sector

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The Report of the STRB doesn’t seem like the only activity at the DfE caught by the start of the purdah period for the Euro Referendum. I had been expecting the second stage of the consultation over the proposed new National Funding Formula to appear last week: it didn’t. ASCL’s interim general secretary commented in a press notice that ‘The timetable for the new funding formula was already very tight and this delay is the straw that breaks the camel’s back.’

The delay will affect everyone, since a three month consultation launched at the end of June will run to the end of September. Even allowing for a month for the DfE to respond to any consultation, even to say, having read the responses we aren’t taking any notice, it would be late October before action could be taken. That doesn’t leave much time for School Forum to respond and set any limits left to them to administer before the 2017 financial year starts in April. Of course an eight week consultation over the summer holidays and every decision controlled by the DfE might still allow a 2017 start, but it only needs some intervention either through the Administrative Court by way of judicial review from a school that loses out under the proposals or in the House of Commons for the timetable to be derailed.

There are also tenders, such as that for the next stage of the National Teaching Service that seem to have fallen foul of purdah. The delay shouldn’t affect the timetable for a 2017 start, but will reduce the planning time available for the successful bidder.

However, the DfE were able to publish the Wood Report and their observations on it before purdah started. The report suggests significant changes to the manner in which local authorities, the police and NHS, plus the departments at Westminster than oversee these bodies and fund them, will handle serious case reviews. This is another area where the lack of any logical framework for local government is causing problems. On the one hand the government want to re-introduce large urban counties under the guise of the Northern Powerhouse while seemingly sanctioning the continuation of small unitary authorities, such as those that govern the former Berkshire.

In respect of children’s services, there doesn’t yet seem to be a coherent framework that binds together local and regional requirements. Nationally, the arrangements between the Home Office (police) DfE (Children’s Services) Department of Health (NHS) and DCLG (funding of local authorities) seems even more tenuous that the local frameworks in the emerging MASH arrangements  – Multi Agency Safeguarding Hubs – being put together in the more forward thinking areas. The lack of common boundaries between services in many localities probably doesn’t help. In education, the overall role of local authorities is sometimes hampered by the presence of large numbers of academies, especially in the secondary sector, where the handling of issues, such as missing episodes by pupils, may reflect the strength of the relationship between individual academies, their MATs whose headquarters may deal with lots of different local authorities and police bodies, and the MASH, if there is one.

Safeguarding children is rightly top of the agenda but whether managing from the DfE remains the correct approach is not considered within the Wood Report. There might be a case, either for a Ministry for Children, and not just a Minister or shifting responsibility to the Ministry of Justice to sit alongside the Tribunal Service.