A very small but important minority

Posted on August 15, 2022 by John Howson

The DfE have recently updated their study on ‘Education, children’s social care and offending, descriptive statistics’ with some 10 case studies of different local authorities. One of the case studies is of Haringey, the north London borough. Education, children’s social care and offending – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Regular readers of this blog will know why I have focused on this report. For new readers, I started my teaching career in a school in Tottenham that is part of the Borough of Haringey. For personal reasons this study also brings back memories of a particular incident in January 1977 that found me on the front page of The Daily Mirror.

Much of what is in the analysis will not surprise readers, and the authors go out of their way to remind everyone reading the report that a causal relationship cannot be inferred from any characteristic.

I do have a slight issue with the choice of offences listed. There are no driving offences, such as ‘death by dangerous or careless driving’ in the list, although in my view they involve violence. Perhaps, there weren’t any recorded offences in these categories. Maybe, the same reason will apply to ‘aggravated burglary’ that can include violence.

I would recommend this report or one of the others in the selection of the ten authorities to any new teacher. Indeed, much more focus should probably be placed on the teaching of challenging pupils during teacher preparation courses. Interestingly, the report doesn’t allocate points to characteristics and score the profile of a young person ‘at risk’. He is likely to be male; few females even these days commit offences in the categories included. He is likely to do better at maths than English: an interesting observation. For the rest, you can read the report and look at the graphs, although some data are so small as to be suppressed, as they might allow individuals to be identified.

For policymakers, and I include our next Prime Minister in that group, there has to be a consideration as to whether the focus on the subjects in the English Baccalaureate and a lack of resources for practical and vocational might have had cost implications for society. Those that successfully complete their education may well be less likely to commit acts of violence.

This blog has been championing a Jacob’s Law and has also supported the need for inter-agency working. I am not clear whether this report also considered children not yet in school because they had just moved into Haringey, and their offending behaviour.

What seems certain is that spending on those at the late stage of primary education and early secondary schooling may well be worthwhile. Indeed, ensuring every child, regardless of SEND needs, can read and write is something we ought to strive to achieve, so that no child starts secondary school regarded by the school as a failure.

The depressing fact is that such a statement could have been made at any time in the history of education. We know the problem, but have not been willing to create the solution.

Success in ITT, but at what price?

Posted on August 3, 2022 by John Howson

In my previous post about the July postgraduate ITT numbers, I concentrated just on the headlines, and the potentially dire implications for the 2023 teacher recruitment round if the collapse of the economy doesn’t both stem departures from teaching and encourage more returners back into the profession.

In this post, I want to look in more detail at the data in the July numbers, now published by the DfE. Monthly statistics on initial teacher training (ITT) recruitment – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) The total number of candidates applying has reached 35,633, but this compares badly with the 44,970 of July 2021. More alarming is the fact that the ‘recruited’ total is down from 8,620 in July 2021 to 3,911 this July. That’s the number in the bag, so to say, and most likely to turn up when courses commence. Even more worrying that the number with ‘conditions pending’ is down from 23,030 to 18,699. The number of withdrawn candidates has increased from 1,281 last July to 2,010 this July. These are not good numbers for the health of the profession.

Comparing the ‘other’ column against ‘all applications’ in the July 2021 data and the ‘unsuccessful’ against ‘all applications’ in the July 2022 data shows that across all subjects more applications have been successful.

Subject	2021 Successful	2022 Successful	Difference
Languages	na	29%	na
Computer Studies	21%	28%	7%
D&T	27%	34%	7%
Physics	23%	30%	7%
Music	28%	34%	6%
Art	26%	32%	6%
Business Studies	20%	26%	6%
Biology	23%	29%	6%
Mathematics	23%	28%	5%
PE	22%	27%	5%
RE	27%	32%	5%
English	25%	30%	5%
Drama	29%	33%	4%
Chemistry	27%	31%	4%
Geography	27%	31%	4%
History	26%	30%	4%
Classics	23%	25%	2%

Source UCAS and DfE data

Whether the increase in the level of success is due to similar numbers of acceptable candidates against a smaller overall pool or providers accepting candidates that they might not have accepted before cannot be determined from the data. Perhaps it is a bit of both strategies that is taking place.

Applications are lower across all age groups this round, with the key new graduate ‘21 and under’ group down from 5,650 to 4,591 candidates this July. Those who gender is recorded as male candidate has fallen from 13,350 to 10,591. This is despite the number not recorded as either men or women falling from 1,240 to 351 this July.

Applications have fallen for both primary and secondary phase courses. Down from 51,310 to 43,242 for the former and from 65,990 to 53,532 for the latter.

While numbers applying for postgraduate teaching apprenticeships increased from 3,610 to 4,427 applications; a modest increase, but, nevertheless an increase: all other routes had witnessed a decline in applications.

Hopefully, at least in the context of teacher preparation courses, this will be as bad as it will be, and next year the changes in the broader economy will once again swing the pendulum back towards the desirability of teaching as a career, perhaps aided by a recognition of the necessary rewards required to attract and retain teachers. If not, then the government will have set a record in terms of the length of the period of under-recruitment into teacher preparation courses.

Muck up or conspiracy?

Posted on August 2, 2022 by John Howson

In August 2013, when this blog was in its infancy, I incurred the wrath of the DfE by suggesting that there was going to be a teacher supply crisis.

As reported by this blog on 14^th August 2013 “A DfE spokesperson, helpfully anonymous, is quoted by the Daily Mail today as saying of my delving into the current teacher training position that there was no teacher shortage, adding: ‘This is scaremongering and based on incomplete evidence.’”

Regular readers know whose view of the situation was correct.

Why am I reprising this quote for nine years ago? Well, normally around the middle of the month the DfE, following the time-honoured tradition set by first the GTTR and then UCAS, publishes the monthly update on applications and offer to postgraduate ITT.

The DfE duly created the data on the 25^th of July this year, but at least as far as my browser is concerned, the data didn’t appear on their web site. June’s data remained the latest in the public domain as I write this blog. Monthly statistics on initial teacher training (ITT) recruitment – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) hopefully, by the time you read this the July data will be fully in the public domain. (The DfE updated their website with the July data sometime the same day that this post was published – thank you DfE.)

Now comes the key question: is this lack of transparency due to a processing fault within the DfE or is it due to not wanting the data widely known? Truly, the data on ‘offers’ so far this year is shocking.

Looking back at the period between the 2012/13 round of application for postgraduate ITT courses, and the 2021/22 round, it is clear that the total of ‘Recruited’ plus ‘Conditions Pending’ plus ‘Deferrals’ plus ‘Received and Offer’ are disastrously low in many secondary subjects this year. Leaving aside, Modern Foreign Languages, where the methodology is different this year, we see

Art, history, geography, chemistry and business studies no longer recording new records or offers and, in most cases, recording insufficient numbers to meet the expected Teacher Supply Model number. Only in history and art will there be sufficient numbers, and even in history the over-recruitment is likely to be less than in the past couple of years.

However, it is in

Religious Education

Physics

Music

English

Computing

Biology

Where the numbers of ‘offers’ look most worrying.

Jack Worth of NfER predicted earlier this year that fewer than 20% of the physics places might be filled this year in a presentation to the APPG on the Teaching Profession. His prediction now looks like it might well come about. All of the subjects in this list are hitting new lows for ‘offers’ since that 2012/13 recruitment round. The implications for recruitment of teachers, assuming the schools have the funds to recruit in 2023, look bleak.

Design and technology remain one of the few relatively better performing subjects, with more offers than last year. But, sadly, not enough to meet the required target.

With less than two months to go before courses start, and some providers closed down for the summer, there is unlikely to be a significant upturn in these numbers.

The DfE might well want to ask about conversion levels between application and offers and whether more risk might be taken with some marginal applications. The DfE will also need to ensure that they don’t de-accredit successful providers, as there is no guarantee potential applicants would choose another provider.

I do wonder whether the two contenders for Prime Minister will have anything to say about this issue, and whether anyone will even ask them?

Fewer than 400 physics teachers join state schools in 2021

Posted on July 29, 2022 by John Howson

If you train too many teachers in some subjects, then then a higher percentage won’t find jobs. That’s the message for government from the latest ITT completer profiles. Initial teacher training performance profiles, Academic Year 2020/21 – Explore education statistics – GOV.UK (explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk)

Final year postgraduate trainee outcomes by subject for the 2020/21 academic year

Subject	Total trainees	Percentage awarded QTS	Percentage yet to complete	Percentage not awarded QTS	Percentage of those awarded QTS teaching in a state-funded school
Design & Technology	666	91%	6%	3%	82%
Biology	2,122	86%	8%	6%	78%
Music	478	92%	3%	5%	78%
English	3,229	90%	6%	4%	77%
Mathematics	2,812	87%	7%	5%	77%
Geography	1,203	92%	4%	3%	76%
Business Studies	381	87%	7%	6%	75%
Religious Education	651	88%	7%	6%	75%
Chemistry	899	86%	8%	6%	74%
Secondary	20,365	89%	6%	5%	74%
Physics	543	83%	9%	9%	73%
Total	35,371	87%	8%	5%	73%
Modern Foreign Languages	1,650	91%	5%	4%	72%
Other	398	91%	5%	4%	71%
Primary	15,006	85%	11%	4%	71%
History	1,676	90%	6%	4%	70%
Art & Design	919	90%	7%	3%	69%
Computing	624	82%	11%	7%	68%
Drama	455	92%	4%	4%	67%
Physical Education	1,590	95%	3%	2%	64%
Classics	69	90%	9%	1%	52%

Source DfE

Of those awarded QTS, and not shown teaching in a state-funded school, this does not always mean that they have abandoned teaching as a profession, as they may still be in teaching either in a Sixth Form or FE college or in the private sector, either in England or elsewhere in the world.

However, it seems highly unlikely that 576 PE teachers are doing so, while just 108 design and technology teachers took the same route. However, it does seem possible and indeed likely that almost half the 69 Classics teachers trained at the public expense are teaching outside the state-funded sector. Apart from computing and classics, all the subjects in from Primary to the foot of the table are subjects where recruitment into training might have been close to or exceeded the DfE training number presumption from the Teacher Supply Model.

Training teachers for the private sector may be a cheap price to pay if it relieves the State of the need to fund the education of pupils whose parents are prepared to pay for their education. Although there are other arguments against private education.

However, if the trainees that moved into the private school sector are either used to teach pupils from overseas or even more, now teaching is a global profession, they move to a school overseas to teach that is a net loss to the Exchequer. This is a point Mr Sunak might like to ponder following his reference to selective schools in the debate with Conservative Party members last evening.

Private schools may also account for the reason why physics had only 73% of the 500 or so potential completers working in state-funded schools. That’s less than 400 new teachers of physics for the state-school sector in 2020/21.

Disturbing profile data on new teachers

Posted on July 29, 2022 by John Howson

Yesterday, the DfE published its annual survey of ITT providers, through an analysis of their outcomes

Initial teacher training performance profiles: 2020 to 2021 – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

One of the most revealing tables in the report is reproduced below.

Summary of final year postgraduate trainee outcomes for the 2020/21 academic year

		Percentage awarded QTS	Percentage of those awarded QTS teaching in a state school
Age	Under 25	90	72
	25 and Over	86	73
Disability	Declared	81	68
	None declared	88	73
Ethnic group	Asian	81	64
	Black	78	65
	Mixed ethnicity	86	72
	Other	82	66
	White	89	74
Gender	Male	84	71
	Female	89	73

Source DfE

For every one of the groupings in the table, the minority group or groups seem to have fared less well than the majority group in terms of their percentage awarded QTS. Whether it is older trainees, trainees with a declared disability, males or those from a declared non-white background, the percentages gaining QTS are lower than for the comparator group. Interestingly, in most case the percentage of each group teaching in a state school is also lower, although older qualifiers marginally outperformed younger new teachers in terms of the percentage teaching in a state school at 73% compared with 72%

The disturbingly low percentage of ‘Black’ teachers gaining QTS continues. Only 78% of ‘Black’ trainees were awarded QTS, the lowest percentage in the table, and 11% points below the White trainee outcome for that much larger group of trainees. The government really should investigate why this discrepancy in outcome continues each year, especially as only 65% of ‘Black’ trainees awarded QTS were teaching in a state school at the time of the data collection.

Elsewhere, the demise of the undergraduate route is such that only 4,737 final year trainees were recorded, compared with 35,371 postgraduate trainees of whom nearly 19,00 were on school-led courses, with just over 16,500 on higher education led courses. What this balance will look like after the end of the current re-accreditation process is completed is an interesting question. With falling pupil numbers in the primary sector, it seems likely that the 40,000 trainees with QTS in these profiles will mark something of a high point.

The covid pandemic affected these data in two ways. Firstly, the pandemic created a one-year increase in registrations to train as a teacher, boosting the 2020-21 cohort of postgraduate trainees, and secondly, more trainees than usual may have extended their course and will have qualified later than normal due to the effects of the pandemic. Those late qualifications will have redcued some of the outcome percentages.

Although Teach First still uses that name for its band of training, the DfE has re-named its trainees as the ‘High Potential ITT trainees’. It would be interesting to understand the thinking behind this insult to other trainees and their providers. whether universities or schools?

Finally, there is some evidence to support the thesis that the distribution of training places may not be ideal. Only 62% of those awarded QTS in both the North East and North West were employed in state schools, compared with 76% that trained in London; 78% in the South East and 82% of those trained in the East of England. Since these three regions also contain a high percentage of the national total of private schools, this is an interesting outcome, and raises a key question about the use of resources across England.

End of pupil boom in sight

Posted on July 18, 2022 by John Howson

The recent pupil projections issued by the DfE National pupil projections: July 2022 – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) show that the secondary school population is likely to peak at around school years 2024 or 2025 for England as whole. For some part of the country, notably the South East the date might be later, depending upon internal migration.

The DfE suggest that primary pupil number, including nursery pupils, will fall between 2022 and 2023, and by 2030 there will be 680,000 fewer pupils in the sector than in 2022; a reduction of approaching 15%. Even in the secondary sector, there is projected to be a small decline overall during the period 2022 to 2030.

Looking at these numbers, it is possible to see why there needs to be some consideration of the number of ITT places in the remainder of the decade. The secondary pupil numbers will decline through much of the second half of the 2020s and even though the primary sector fall is reducing by 2030, and the teaching workforce will likely be older than at present, demand for teachers under normal circumstance should be less than at present. Of course, what is normal and how any change in ITT provision should be managed are policy questions open to debate and alternative views.

But, with, it would seem in the present economic circumstances and the demands of the NHS, government funding unlikely to support any overall improvement in pupil teacher ratios and reductions in class sizes, the outcome is a need for fewer teachers unless some other aspect of the model changes. Factor in a low tax, high wage economy and the demand for teachers looks even less likely to continue at present levels.

The two unknowns are, firstly, whether an economic slowdown drives more teachers to stay put and returner numbers to increase and secondly, whether demand for graduates and for teachers from schools around the world will reduce the teacher workforce in England faster than expected just from the decline in the pupil population.

The DfE notes that the projection model published in 2021 estimated a school population of 7,269,000 in 2032, so the updated model shows a decrease of 354,000 on the total at the end of its projection period. The difference is primarily due to notably lower birth projections in the mid-2020 ONS national population projections, used for the first time in this set of pupil projections, which are the main drivers of the pupil population.

Next year the data from the 2021 Census will be fed into the ONS models, and, as a result, there might be some more significant changes to the outcome totals from 2028 onwards when the data are next published in July 2023. However, it seems unlikely that the changes resulting from the 2021 census will result in the demand for teachers increasing later in the decade. I suspect that there will once again be some regional analysis of school population trends that is missing this year.

End ITT deserts

Posted on July 1, 2022 by John Howson

Whatever else the re-accreditation process being undertaken by the DfE across the ITT sector achieves, it must end the ITT deserts so that schools across England can rely upon a flow of new entrants into teaching across the whole gamut of secondary curriculum subjects and the differential needs of the primary sector. Attention should also be paid to the needs of the special school sector and pupils with SEND in mainstream schools. The lack of a genuine plan for the training of teachers for pupils with special needs is a scandal than needs highlighting.

However, the needs of the secondary school sector are just as pressing. TeachVac, as well as the DfE and even the tes have built up extensive databases of teacher vacancies that should inform the discussions about where provision needs to be located.

Ever since the cull of providers in the late 1970s and early 1980s there has been a policy of rewarding quality of provision regardless of where that provision was located. The thinking presumably was that ‘trainees will move to the jobs’, so location of the preparation is less important than quality of the preparation. There may also have been a thought that providers of training could partner with schools in localities where there was no training provider.

With the coming of school-based training and employment-based routes, there might also have been an assumption that schools finding recruitment challenging could enter the market and train their own teachers. This produced a confused approach that tried to marry up a top-down model of place allocations based on quality with a ‘bottom-up’ approach on need for teachers that led to a disorganised picture.

In 2013, Chris Waterman joined me in producing a book of maps showing the locations of the various providers, and the routes into teaching that they offered. I have always been surprised that the DfE website on teaching as a career doesn’t offer such a map alongside its rudimentary search facility that only indicates whether a provider has places for a specific course in a manner unhelpful to applicants. The DfE did better in 2013 with its original School Direct application process.

The re-accreditation process provides an opportunity to look in detail at the national picture based upon actual needs for teachers that has been lost since the decision in the 1960s to take teacher preparation away from the employing local authorities and faith communities and transfer preparation into higher education. Wise though that move was in many respects, once the DfE started to let a thousand flowers bloom in the teacher preparation market this ended any national coherence around the provision in relation to the needs of schools.

The situation has become worse in areas where state schools are competing with private schools for the same pool of teachers and trainees. Turning a blind eye to that fact doesn’t help state schools, especially when there is a shortage of new entrants into the profession.

Whatever else the re-accreditation process achieves, if it doesn’t take into account the needs of schools across the whole of England for a reliable flow of new entrants across all subjects and phases it will have failed in what should be one if its major purposes.

More bad news on ITT

Posted on June 28, 2022 by John Howson

Yesterday, The DfE published the ITT applications and acceptances data for the period up to the 20^th June thus year. In this post I look at the acceptances for June 2020 compared with those in June 2019, the last year before the pandemic struck. By 2019, there was already concern about the decline in interest in teaching as a career. The pandemic to some extent reversed that trend and provided teaching with a recruitment boost. But, was it a false dawn?

The following table compares the June 2019 UCAS data on ‘offer’ with that from the DfE data issued yesterday.

Subjects	2018/19	2021/22	Difference in offers
Biology	1430	524	-906
Science	2430	1531	-899
English	2290	1418	-872
Geography	1010	519	-491
History	1180	1000	-180
Computing	410	290	-120
Religious Education	400	304	-96
Design and technology	450	355	-95
Mathematics	1590	1511	-79
Music	240	228	-12
Chemistry	600	597	-3
Physics	400	400	0
Business studies	150	197	47
Art and design	410	468	58
Physical education	1290	1469	179
Drama	na	334	na
Classics	na	64	na
Other	na	429	na

Sources: UCAS and DfE

On this basis, as I warned in my previous post, 2023 will be another challenging labour market for schools. Only in the same three subjects where there is least concern in 2022: history, art and physical education, is there likely to be anywhere near sufficient supply of new entrants unless there is a sudden rush over the next two months that frankly looks unlikely at this point in time.

The science number is based on an aggregation of totals from the three sciences and doesn’t represent whole new category of potential trainees. The most significant declines in the number of offers since 2019 are English, geography and computing. However, at these levels most subjects won’t reach their Teacher Supply Model number unless there is a significant input from other sources such as Teach First. I am not sure how likely that will be as they don’t publish their data in the same way to the general public whatever they share with the DfE. There are currently more ‘offers’ in mathematics than there are in English and at this level, English departments may struggle with recruitment in 2023.

Overall, there have been 32,609 applicants by 20^th June. This compares with 37,790 applicants domiciled in England that had applied through UCAS by June 21^st 2021. There are 2,229 ‘recruited’ applicants in 2022, when there were ,5830 ‘placed’ according to the UCAS data in June 2021. The conditional placed or conditions pending groups are 18,363 this year compared with 23,620 in June 2021. Many of these will be awaiting degree results, and this number will reduce next month just as the ‘recruited’ number’ will show an increase. Interestingly, the number that have declined an offer this year is shown as 760 compared with 370 in June last year. Another straw in the wind of how challenging recruitment has become. However, withdrawn applications are down from 1,520 to just 1,002.

There must be a concern that applications – as opposed to applicants – in the South East provider region are down from 14,390 to 10,795. This is the region with the largest proportion of vacancies each year, and where the private sector vies most strongly with state schools of all types for teachers. An analysis of acceptances by subject by provider region would help schools identify the seriousness of this decline, and whether it is in both the primary and secondary sectors?

Applications overall are down for both sectors, with primary down from 48,520 last June to 39,712 this June, and secondary down from 61,480 to 48,047, a very worrying reduction. School Direct salaried continues to be replaced by the PG apprenticeship route that has had 3,864 applications this year compared to 5,315 for the School Direct Salaried route. However, similar numbers have been placed on both routes, at around 500 trainees on each route.

With some schools ceasing recruitment as term comes towards its end, it will be up to higher education to recruit most of the additional applicants over the summer. Will those providers threatened with not being re-accredited show the same appetite to recruit as they would if their future was secure in teacher education? The DfE must surely how so as every extra trainee is a welcome bonus for schools in 2023 struggling to recruit teachers.

Start worrying about September 2023

Posted on June 25, 2022 by John Howson

While I have been waiting for the DfE to produce the June data about admissions and acceptances to ITT postgraduate courses, I thought that I would have another look at the percentage of courses no longer showing as offering vacancies as listed on the DfE website.

In passing, UCAS used to publish a calendar of dates when the monthly data would be published and generally stuck to that regime. There seems to me to be little logic to the reporting by the DfE this year.

Anyway, what are the portents for September, and thus for the recruitment round that will provide staff for schools in the 2023/24 school year? Sadly, they don’t seem great.

The data I used matches ‘courses with vacancies’ against the ‘all courses’ number. Now, of course, a course may only have one vacancy or many, and the data doesn’t show that information, useful although it might be to applicants trying to decide where to apply to at this point in the cycle. I assume that those advising applicants are privy in order to use the data to help maximise successful outcomes.

Below in the table is the percentage of courses with vacancies ranked from least to most.

Subject	24th June vacancies	all courses	% with vacancies
Psychology	28	106		26%
Latin	5	16		31%
Social Sciences	36	115		31%
Classics	7	18		39%
Heath & Soc Care	16	36		44%
Comms & Media Studies	18	39		46%
Physical education	262	563		47%
Dance	35	70		50%
Business studies	170	272		63%
History	406	642		63%
Drama	227	350		65%
Economics	25	38		66%
Computing	373	561		66%
Art and design	325	479		68%
Music	266	387		69%
Primary	1200	1716		70%
Citizenship	14	20		70%
Design and technology	350	494		71%
English	575	808		71%
Modern Foreign Languages	691	966		72%
Religious Education	347	480		72%
Mathematics	630	871		72%
Chemistry	561	766		73%
Geography	501	671		75%
Biology	551	733		75%
Physics	607	796		76%
Science	21	25		84%

Source: DfE website

Only ten subjects have more than a third of courses currently ‘closed’ with no vacancies. The assumption must be that these courses are ‘full’ although there might be other reasons for the course not shown as currently offering vacancies.

Leaving out the small number of ‘science’ courses, there are three subjects, biology, physics and geography with more than three quarters of courses still returned as with vacancies. Even the primary sector has 70% of courses with at least one vacancy.

Such high levels of courses can be seen as a ‘good thing’ if there happens to be a flood of late applications. However, it is possible some school-based providers will no longer recruit after the end of term, and are thus not taking applications after the end of next week.

If the ability and willingness to recruit throughout the summer is not a criterion for re-accreditation then it ought to be, otherwise the government risks shooting itself in the foot by missing out on late applicants. There are those that don’t decide to become a teacher until August, and want to start in September.

As Teach First has started recruiting again, for this summer, it looks fair to say that that data are pointing to 2023/24 being another challenging year for schools needing to recruit staff. Currently, the average number of vacancies for schools in London and the South East stands at 10 per school.

TeachVac’s Premium Service helps schools connect with potential applicants for a fixed annual price of a maximum of £1,000 or £20 per week. With TeachVac’s growing list of teachers and trainees the service offers excellent value for money.

Pay primary school teachers less?

Posted on June 23, 2022 by John Howson

A common pay scale for all teachers has been a feature of pay policy in England since at least the 1950s. It is a surprise to read in a study published today by the NfER; a study supported by The Gatsby Foundation, the following paragraph.

‘Separating the primary and secondary teacher pay scales could be effective at targeting resource where it can have greater gains in terms of overall teacher supply, in a way that is cost neutral within an existing spending envelope.’ The impact of pay and financial incentives on teacher supply – NFER

Adopting this solution would breach this long-standing arrangement of a common pay scale for all qualified teachers subject to regional differences. Of course, there has never been pay parity between the two sectors because, as NfER comment, and readers of this blog with know, it is easier to recruit teachers to the primary sector than to some subjects in the secondary sector. Up to now, incentives have been targeted at specific subjects where there are shortages. So, on teacher preparation courses, some trainees receive greater encouragement than others through the use of bursaries on the largest route into teaching. However, on other routes, such as Teach First, this differential doesn’t seem to apply. Both history and physics trainees receive a salary.

Before schools were provided with budgets, and a National Funding Formula based on average salaries was introduced, the allocation of the number of promoted posts differed between primary and secondary schools, to the advantage of the latter. This was, I am sure an indirect way of creating pay differentials for classroom teachers between the two sectors that was acceptable to the then Trade Unions that recognised the differences in recruitment challenges between the two sectors.

The NfER make the point that paying teachers in different sectors at different rates is already to be found in some other countries. The cite the fact that starting salaries for secondary teachers in Finland are 15 per cent higher than their primary counterparts, and secondary starting salaries are 6 per cent higher in Sweden, as evidence of the case for introducing differential salary rates. It is an interesting argument, but I am not persuaded. Evidence about recruitment to the primary sector largely only available at the macro level as anyone with QTS can be recruited to any post, and it isn’t clear if there are specific challenges in some subject specialisms and age-related posts.

The NfER report that is well worth reading despite this recommendation does make the point that I have made regularly relating to the relationship between the wider economic situation and recruitment into teaching. This was last apparent at the start of the pandemic when a fear of mass job losses before the furlough scheme was introduced caused a short-term serge of interest in teaching as a career. The NfER study makes the point that at present the graduate labour market is stronger than the government seems to appreciate.

Perhaps the most depressing feature of the report is the fact that neither physics nor IT will ever meet the target number of trainee teachers required on any of their scenarios. The government really does need to address the issue of teacher supply, not only in these subjects but also across the board.

John Howson

Education and the numbers that affect what happens

Tag Archives: teacher preparation