Scaremongering!

Posted on August 14, 2013 by John Howson

So now I know I am officially a scaremonger. 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.’

Well the first thing to note is that I haven’t said that there is a teacher shortage, just that training places are not being filled: not the same thing. Indeed, I have said a teacher shortage is less likely than in the past in the near future because Mr Gove has mandated that qualified teachers from Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the whole of the USA can teach here as qualified teachers with no need to retrain. With an oversupply of teachers in parts of both Canada and Australia that should prevent any short-term problem developing even though another part of the government isn’t very keen on importing workers from abroad, presumably including from within the Commonwealth and a one time colony.

More serious is the charge of using ‘incomplete evidence’ in reaching my conclusions. If the DfE has figures to show that more places will be filled this September on teacher training courses than I am predicting, then please will they share them with the wider community, if not, will they please justify what they mean.

It could be that they take issue with my colleague Chris Waterman’s assessment of the number of those likely to be taught Mathematics by unqualified teachers. However, it is worth noting that earlier this year the DfE produced its own evidence to show that 17.9% of the Mathematics hours taught to years 7-13 were led by those with ‘no relevant post A Level qualification’. That was some 85,000 hours of instruction. Assuming each class of pupils has six hours of contact per week that makes more than 14,000 classes already being taught by unqualified staff, and with no programme in place to improve their qualifications if they are intending to teach the subject for a period of time. If each class has only 20 pupils, the total number of pupils already being taught by teachers with no measurable post A Level qualification in Mathematics can easily be worked out. It is also worth pointing out that the DfE showed that in November 2012 less than half of those teaching Mathematics had a degree that could be classified as a Mathematics degree, with 23% having a PGCE as their highest Mathematics qualification and a degree in another subject, hopefully with lots of applied mathematics as a apart of the degree.

As Chris Waterman has rightly pointed out the raising of the participation age to 17 this September and 18 a year later should increase the demand for Mathematics teachers as the Wolf Report endorsed the now widely held view that more youngsters should continue to study Mathematics until the age of18.

The government has taken a bold gamble with teacher education: moving training to schools; introducing pre-entry tests in literacy and numeracy; raising the cost of training in many subjects to £9,000 for fees plus living costs. It is important that there is a credible debate about how these changes are working.

After all, in 2010, Mr Gove promised 200 teachers of Mandarin would be trained each year, and although some providers such as the London Institute offer it as an option I doubt that target was ever reached. It is time for a radical overhaul of teacher preparation to really meet the needs of a 21^st century education system.

STEM subjects lead retreat from teaching

Posted on August 7, 2013 by John Howson

In March 2010 I talked to the UCET (University Council for the Education of Teachers) Research and Development Committee about reading the runes on what might happen to teacher supply. My final slide predicted the next teacher supply crisis would be in London in September 2014.

Now I may have been premature in the arts and humanities subjects because of the time the economy has taken to recover from the battering it took after the banking crisis of 2008, but the latest evidence seems to suggest that in the STEM subjects I was right to be concerned. An analysis of the two key routes into training that are covered by DfE targets – School Direct and Higher Education/SCITTs suggests that unless there is a late surge in acceptances recruitment to STEM subjects will be down on recent years.

The following table is based upon data collected over the period 2-5^th August, i.e. last weekend.

Current acceptances 2013 AUG
COMPARED with the 2012 TARGET			SUBJECT
-113			ENGLISH
-844			MATHEMATICS
-146			BIOLOGY/ GEN SCI
-235			CHEMISTRY
-411			PHYSICS INC PHYSICS WITH MATHS
-452			ICT
-465			D&T
-183			MFL
-31			GEOGRAPHY
170			HISTORY
8			ART & DESIGN
-51			MUSIC
79			PE
-127			RE
-29			BUSINESS STUDIES
-65			CITIZENSHIP
130			OTHER

The advent of pre-entry skills test in numeracy and literacy makes it less likely than in previous years that there will be a significant number of last minute entrants. Indeed, it might help matters if the government suspended that requirement for this year while it sorts out the common admission framework for next year. At present, we don’t know how many candidates may be holding more than one place, and we also don’t know the level of ‘no shows’ when courses actually commence. Of course, these figures will be boosted by those national providers such as the OU that don’t reveal their acceptances as part of the national monitoring arrangements, but that won’t eliminate the shortfall.

So, if the data is anywhere near accurate, schools may have to start looking for alternative sources of mathematics, science and computer studies teachers in 2014, especially in London and the South East where turnover of teachers doubled between 2010 and 2013. As teachers from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the USA can now teach in England with no further training needed, and as academies and free schools don’t even need to employ qualified teachers – not that any school ever did in a crisis situation – any gaps will be filled somehow. But teacher shortages are likely to make a mockery of the government’s avowed policy of closing the achievement gap between the rich and the poorest in society.

The government will also need to look carefully at the level of bursary support it provides trainees, although it is somewhat prescribed by starting salaries as there is no benefit in trainees having to take a pay cut when they finish their training on top of starting to pay back their tuition fee loans that already reduces their real incomes in many cases.

With a general election in 2015, the government cannot afford the seeds of another teacher supply crisis even if it is based upon an improving overall economy. A world-class education system cannot be built on a teacher supply crisis, and it would be even more ironic if the success of UK schooling for overseas pupils sucked the brightest and best teachers from the domestic State system at the very point where there weren’t enough to go around.

Conflicting evidence on pupil behaviour?

Posted on August 5, 2013 by John Howson

Recently I pointed out that there had been a slight increase in the level of exclusions from schools, particularly in the primary sector. It therefore came as a bit of surprise to discover the results of a survey showing that teachers in general think pupil behaviour is improving. The data for the latter comes from the NfER Voice Survey and specifically the questions asked on behalf of the DfE. The analysis can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/210297/DFE-RR304.pdf

In view of the fact that half the profession is now under thirty-five the responses by age groups were especially interesting. Teachers in the younger age groups we less likely to report that behaviour was ‘very good’, only 20% of those under 25, and 21% of NQTs did so, compared with 40% of teachers aged over 50. Now the latter category will have included a number of heads and other school leaders, so perhaps it is not surprising that they think behaviour is better than do relatively new teachers. 88% of those teachers over 50 agreed that they felt equipped to manage pupil behaviour compared with just 73% of the under-25s, and 63% of NQTs; a worrying low figure for those just out of training. 37% of young teachers didn’t feel parents respected a teachers’ authority to discipline a pupil, compared with just 20% of teachers over 50 who felt that way. NQTs were also less likely than other teachers to use force either to remove a pupil from a classroom or to break up a fight. Interestingly, male teachers stated that they were also less likely to use force that did female teachers.

Compared with a previous survey in 2008 there was an increase of seven percentage points in teachers seeing behaviour as ‘good’ or ‘very good’. As this has been a period of stable staffing in schools, it may well be that after a period of turmoil pupils in general are becoming better behaved. Alternatively, acceptance of low level disruption is now such that after a few years what is acceptable becomes different to standards expected by new entrants to the profession. I suspect that there may be a bit of both at work in the responses.

Nevertheless ‘persistent disruptive behaviour’ is the main reason for pupils to be excluded from most schools so there still remains a bit of a mis-match between the two sets of statistics. I think in this case I am more likely to accept the evidence of the exclusions, based as they are on actual events rather than the answers to hypothetical questions posed as part of a survey. But it may be that a small number of pupils spoil the good behaviour shown by the majority.

However, I am sure most schools are full of better behaved pupils than when I started teaching in 1971. In those days, the key task for a new teacher in the area where I taught was keeping the pupils contained within the classroom. As ever, the better the lesson the more chance one had of achieving that result; only then could teaching and learning begin.

Quality comes at a price

Posted on July 12, 2013 by John Howson

Teach First have recently filed their accounts with the Charity Commission for the year ended 31^st August 2012. Anyone interested can read them at http://apps.charitycommission.gov.uk/Accounts/Ends94/0001098294_AC_20120831_E_C.pdf

There is no doubt a lot to be said for the school-based approach to converting graduates into teachers for two years in the hope that some will remain in the profession. 89% of those who started the programme in 2010 completed their two years in teaching. Curiously, although 80% became ambassadors for the programme after two years, the review accompanying the accounts seemingly doesn’t say how many remained in teaching for a third year. As numbers on the programme grow that performance indicator assumes more importance because if it is below the figure for other types of teacher preparation programme, such as School Direct or the higher education routes, it will be a hidden cost because it will require extra numbers to be trained as teachers. Of course, if it is lower than wastage through other routes Teach First can claim to be more cost effective.

Located in an expensive part of London, even though it is now a national programme, the accounts reveal a cost base that many teacher trainers can only view with awe. The average salary with on-costs for the 216 employees in 2011-12 was £48,000, with the Chief Executive earning a salary similar to one of the best paid secondary heads in a London Academy. Although the trustees weren’t paid, one did claim the equivalent of £400 per week in travel, subsistence and office costs for the second year in a row. That’s over £40,000 across the two years. No doubt their experience is unique and cannot be replicated for less.

Still you would have thought a programme that has trainees placed in schools wouldn’t need to spend much money on rent for offices. Teach First appears to have spent around £750 per trainee on premises costs and rent, although since they also run other programmes it might be better to halve that figure to £375 per trainee. Similarly, the £1,450 staff costs might be better reduced to £700 to allow for the other programmes. Whether it is possible to reduce the £4,600,000 spent on graduate recruitment by spreading it across other programmes may be more of a moot point. Using the 7,000 applications received in 2012 that works out at around £650 per applicant. If you just look at how much it cost per successfully recruited participant the figure is nearer £4,500. This is the equivalent of the DfE spending £46 million on recruitment for School Direct or universities more than £80 million on attracting students to PGCE programmes. It would be nice to see these figures benchmarked both against other graduate recruitment programmes and against the less well-funded teacher preparation programmes. In their 2008 accounts the Charity spend £1.1 million to recruit 373 new trainees, so there doesn’t yet seem to be any economies of scale in the recruitment process. Undoubtedly the assessment centre process used by Teach First is expensive, but I well remember being told it couldn’t be afforded for trainee head teachers, so should it be part of selecting new teachers?

The next few years may be testing times for the Teacher First programme as it has to compete with both a recovery in the wider graduate recruitment market and the growing School Direct programme that seemingly offers many of the same benefits to would-be career teachers without the need to work in a challenging school. Hopefully, they those managing the programme will be able to rise to the task without having to spend even more money to achieve their goals.

Has Teach First had to rely on the ‘redbricks’ for growth?

Posted on July 10, 2013 by John Howson

Teach First is the premier teacher preparation programme when it comes to publicity. This week it managed to convince the world it recruits more graduates than any other employer. The DfE as the ultimate paymaster for School Direct, let alone the higher education route into teaching, must has managed a wry smile at the hyperbole created by Teach First’s marketing department.

However, there is something of a more complex picture when you look more closely at the data on applications for Teach First across the first decade of the programme that were revealed in a parliamentary answer recently. In order to compare the original applicants to Teach First back in 2003 with those applying in 2012 you have to strip out the four universities that only joined the Russell Group in 2012, after transferring from the 1994 Group. Between 2003 and 2012 the number of applicants from the original Russell Group of universities for the Teach First programme increased from 873 to 3,563, or an increase of just over four times. The bulk of the increase came after 2009, and the 2012 cohort of applicants will largely have applied for Teach First in the autumn of 2011 when the graduate labour market was still feeling the full effect of the economic recession.

Nevertheless, not all Russell Group universities have seen the same level of increased interest in the programme. Although Oxford and Cambridge attracted applications from 11% and 10% of their average finalist classes in 2012, and could have filled a sizeable percentage of Teach First positions, their shares of total Teach First applications fell by 8% in the case of Oxford and 7% for Cambridge between 2003 and 2012 to just 7% each of the total of original Russell Group applications in 2012 as the programme expanded and sought more applicants. Manchester University took top spot in 2012, accounting for 10% of all applicants from the original Russell Group universities.

However, it is the behaviour of students at the London institutions of Imperial, LSE, University College and Kings College that is possibly the most interesting. Of these four institutions, only Kings College has a School of Education, so undergraduates at the other three institutions are not affected by any loyalty to their alma mater when it comes to deciding where to train as a teacher.

% share of applications to Teach First

2003 2012

Imperial College 8% 2%

University College 8% 5%

LSE 4% 2%

Kings College 5% 3%

In the case of Imperial College, although there were 106 applicants as recently as 2010, the number had declined to 68 in 2012, just one more than the 2003 total. At the other three institutions in London the actual growth in the number of applicants has been healthy between 2003 and 2012, but it was still only around six per cent of the average finalist class size at each institution. The importance of Imperial College as a source of future science teachers probably cannot be overstated, so the relatively poor figures from that institution that mean only one in 20 graduates at Imperial choose to apply for teaching as a career in 2012 through the Teach First route may be worth further consideration. If it reflects the fact that overseas students have not been excluded from the figures for finalists then, on the one hand, the picture may not be as bad as presented here; on the other hand it might raise other issues about the future supply of science teachers.

Outside of Oxbridge the largest percentages of Teach First applicants now come from two of the Russell Group’s newest members: York and Durham Universities. As might be expected, three of the four Russell Group universities outside of England have the lowest percentages of finalists heading to Teach First, although Edinburgh University had six per cent applying to Teach First in 2012 compared with only two per cent from Glasgow University.

Seemingly, if Teach First is to grow much further it will need to either refine its marketing to some Russell Group students or start to cast its net even wider. Perhaps we will soon see Russell Group applicants accounting for around half of all applicants to Teach First rather than 60% of the total as in 2012.

The figures for Teach First applications for 2013 will also be especially interesting to see whether these trends have continued in the face of the wider introduction of School Direct that also offers school-based training, and in some cases is closely modelled on the Teach First approach, but reduced to one year of training.

Has Michael Gove failed to learn the lessons of history?

Posted on July 2, 2013 by John Howson

There is a view currently fashionable among political analysts that cabinet ministers should stay in the same post for several years, preferably after having shadowed the portfolio in opposition or presumably worked as a junior Minister during any longer term period of government. This view is based upon the fact that Ministers who stay in post longer are thought to be more competent, and thus better at their job. It’s a point of view, but not one I necessarily subscribe to. Firstly, it presupposes ministers are competent at their jobs, and not appointed for other more political reasons, and secondly, not all minister enjoy the routine tasks associated with running a department of state at Westminster.

All this is by way of introduction to a discussion about how well the provision of teacher training is working now that the DfE has taken its oversight in-house after nearly 20 years operating through an external agency.

Regular readers of this blog will recognise that I have expressed some concerns about the new School Direct system that has replaced the former employment-based Graduate Teacher Programme and at the same time has been significantly expanded as part of a wish by the Secretary of State to transfer training from the university sector back to schools. To save new readers the chore of trawling through my previous posts I have summarised the relevant bits below:

This is what I wrote in March about the state of recruitment this year;

For the purposes of this blog I reviewed the data provided on the DfE web site regarding the total number of places on School Direct, and how many remained available at the middle of March in two subjects. Physics was chosen because it has traditionally been a ‘shortage’ subject, and even those not offered a salary can claim relatively generous bursaries. By contrast, history has not been regarded as a shortage subject, and those not on the salaried scheme may find little by way of financial support to help them through their training.

The results when I looked on the 15^th March were that only 4% of the ‘salaried’ School Direct places for Physics were shown as ‘unavailable’, as were just 6% of the ‘non-salaried’ Physics ‘Training’ places. That’s a total of 29 places out of 572 on offer for Physics shown as ‘unavailable’, and presumably, therefore, filled. In history, the position was better, with a quarter of the 336 places shown as ‘unavailable’, and presumably filled.

Now it is too early to be sounding alarm bells but, with the Easter holiday fast approaching, schools probably won’t be holding many more interviews until sometime in April. By the end of that month there will be just four months before the new school year when the School Direct candidates will be expected to start their training. By now Teach First has usually closed its book to new applicants, but this year even that programme is still accepting applications in the sciences, mathematics, computer science/ICT and English.

Taken together, the fact that the three leading routes used for preparing teachers are finding this a challenging recruitment round means that the government must take notice and, if necessary, action.

Now it may be that School Direct partners are just slow in notifying the DfE that they have accepted candidates. It may also be that they are used to recruiting teachers for September largely between March and May, and don’t appreciate the fact that training places have generally been organised earlier in the year than that. Schools may also be expecting a higher standard from potential applicants than higher education has sometimes been able to demand. Whatever the reasons, we will not produce a world-class education system unless we have enough teachers. johnohowson.wordpress.com 19^th March 2013

Early in May after the government posted data about applications to School Direct. I commented that;

The government released data today that showed around 20,000 applicants had made more than 64,000 applications to become a teacher through the new School Direct route. That’s around seven applications per place, and well above the ratio for the university teacher preparation courses, where applications through GTTR for postgraduate courses rarely hit the level of four applications per place except in very popular subjects such as History, Physical Education, the Social Sciences and Drama. However, since GTTR measure applicants rather than gross applications so on that basis School Direct is probably doing little better than GTTR in terms of applicants per places available. But, without a breakdown of applicants as well as applications by subject and phase to School Direct it is impossible to be sure.

With so many applications to choose from you might expect School Direct to have filled all its places by now, just as Teach First has already closed its door to applicants for this year. But, you would be wrong, if data from the DfE web site is correct. Over the Easter weekend only between 7% and 45% of the salaried places were filled, depending upon the subject, and there was a similar percentage range of places filled on the non-salaried training route. With so many applicants, this means that only between two and nine per cent of applicants appear to have been offered places on School Direct so far. This is a much lower proportion than for the courses offered by universities through GTTR.

The obvious questions that arise are whether there are better applicants for the GTTR courses than School Direct or are perhaps admissions tutors in universities being more generous in making offers than their colleagues in schools? Take Chemistry as an example: on the School Direct Salaried route, 11% of the places were filled by Easter, and that represented just four per cent of applicants being offered places. On the School Direct Training Route nine per cent of places were filled, and just three per cent of applicants had been offered a place. By comparison on the GTTR courses 46% of the applicants had been offered a place although this was down on the 51% accepted at the same time last year. Given that it is unlikely anyone without the basic academic degree class bothers to apply, it seems odd that so many applicants have yet to be offered a place through the School Direct programme, especially as applications have been arriving since the autumn.

However, there is still about three months to go, so all is not yet lost, but the government will need to keep a close eye on whether schools are being slow at interviewing applicants that applied sometime ago or whether schools have decided the quality of the applicants are not good enough. There is certainly no guarantee that a flood of high quality applicants will turn up at the last minute, and too many empty places could cause staffing problems for some schools next summer. A teacher supply crisis in the year before a general election would be embarrassing for the government that made much of the large number of applicants to the School Direct programme in its announcement today. No doubt the lack of a similar announcement about the numbers accepted was an oversight that will be quickly rectified. johnohowson.wordpress.com 8^th May 2013

On the 1^st June, I commented further that;

… earlier this week I worked out that less than a quarter of training places in Chemistry on the School Direct route were being shown as filled on the DfE web site compared with about double that figure for the higher education routes in the subject.

Now, as I have maintained before that difference in acceptances could well be because of schools requiring higher standards than universities from their would-be trainees. If so, then there is little more than three months left to find the trainees to fill the remaining places at a time when the market for graduates appears to be reviving. If the schools and universities haven’t selected from those who have already applied, why should those who apply now be any better in calibre? An analysis of application patterns over recent years has shown that once the rush of applications from finalists who haven’t yet thought about life after university is over there are relatively few other applicants as the summer months pass by. Now, this year may be different, but it is difficult to see why it should be if the overall market for graduates is better than in recent years, as those yet to make a decision about their future have more choice than in recent years, unlike their colleagues in many other European countries. johnohowson.wordpress.com 1st June 2013

These comments come from a single researcher working alone and unfunded and reveal the possibility of a crisis unfolding that will potentially cause a shortfall in teachers seeking to enter the profession in the summer of 2014. With the resources available to the government, anything less than a complete understanding of the situation seems like a dereliction of duty.

At the end of June I conducted a full review of the availability of places as shown on the School Direct web site. This has led me to consider the likely outcome for different subjects.

Those subjects where all places are likely to be taken up in 2013

Primary

Art

Business Studies

Those subjects where there is some risk in one route of not all places being filled

English – both routes

Music – training route

Physical Education – training route

History – training route

Those subjects where there is a substantial risk of a serious shortfall against places available (33%+) in one or both routes

Modern Languages

Biology

Design & Technology

Chemistry

Religious Education

Mathematics

Computer Science

Physics

Geography

Coming, as this outcome does, after several years when recruitment to teacher training has largely not been an issue, the present situation is a wake-up call for all concerned, and ministers must take urgent action if we are not to see a re-run of the crisis in teacher recruitment that occurred in the early days of the Blair government. There are two months left before the training courses start, so all is not yet lost. However, if my predictions prove accurate, some schools are going to struggle to recruit teachers next summer: good news for recruitment agencies, but probably not for some pupils. And, as I have said before, this is no way to create a world-class education system.

Ethnic minority teachers: some progress, but where are we heading?

Posted on June 16, 2013 by John Howson

In the autumn of 1997 the new Labour government held three conferences designed to raise awareness about the need to recruit more teachers from ethnic minority groups. Over the following 15 years the TTA, and its successor the TDA, continually tried to encourage more recruits into teaching from among students with an ethnic minority background. Their success was mixed. As the following table shows, students from a White background were more likely to be accepted into teaching than were those students from minority backgrounds, at least as far as courses for graduates to train as a teacher were concerned.

Applications and acceptances by ethnic grouping – UK domicile UK degree 2007-2010
Ethnic Group	Applications	Accepted	% accepted	% of the total accepted
Asian	14,787	3,176	21.40%	6%
Black	6,008	905	15.00%	2%
Other/Unknown	9,441	2,475	26.00%	5%
White	147,833	48,359	32.70%	88%
Total	178,069	54,915

Source: The Author

As a result, it has been estimated that if there were thee hundred graduate would-be teachers; 100 each from the Asian, Black and White groupings: 24 of the white group, 14 of the Asian group, and just nine of the Black group would be likely to fulfil their aspiration of teaching in a state funded school classroom. Even in the sciences, where shortages have been the greatest, out of three hundred would-be science teachers there would be 34 White teachers, 17 Asian teachers and 11 Black teachers.

This suggests that is a need to understand why this discrepancy between the groups arises, especially so since with School Direct decisions now being made at the level of the individual schools. There is evidence that even when students from an ethnic minority have gained QTS they find it more of a challenge to secure a teaching post.

A second concern is that when ethnic minorities do secure teaching posts they tend to do so in areas where there are large numbers of pupils from ethnic minorities in the schools. A study of the 2012 School Workforce Survey revealed 115 schools where two thirds or more of their teaching staff were from ethnic minority groups. Overwhelmingly, these schools were in London. Of the 31 local authority areas with at least one school that had two thirds or greater ethnic minority staff, 23 were London Boroughs, and only Birmingham among the other eight authorities outside of London had more than two schools where the staffroom was comprised of more than two thirds ethnic minority teachers. The London Borough of Brent had by far the largest number of schools; 28 in all that met the two-thirds criteria. Many of these schools, along with those in other authorities, were primary schools, including the school I attended for six years as a primary age pupil, but there were some secondary school in the list. The other London Boroughs with more than five schools with high concentrations of staff from ethnic minorities included; Ealing; Hackney; Lambeth; Newham; Tower Hamlets and Haringey.

This concentration of teachers from ethnic minorities in a small number of schools raises the issue of whether this might increasingly create schools that are monocultural in nature, and whether this is desirable in a multi-cultural society? Outside of the big cities, teachers from ethnic minorities are probably far rarer sights for white pupils than the Asian corner-shop and the Chinese, Thai or Bangladeshi Restaurant. Can this developing divide be healthy for society?

Troops into teachers or children into soldiers

Posted on June 10, 2013 by John Howson

Last week the government announced it was going to create a route to allow ex-military personnel to become teachers. Essentially, for graduates in the military, the route will be the same as for other graduates, but with more cash, and possibly some ring-fenced places on either one or all of the routes into the classroom.

The main interest in the media was in the training to be offered to non-graduates. As the non-graduate scheme envisages the bulk of the trainee’s time during training will be spent in school, presumably it is assumed that sufficient subject knowledge will have been acquired during a military career to make the time spending acquiring a degree unnecessary. Now I might be persuaded that a physical education instructor; a chaplain – if any enter the forces these days without degrees; or even a musician, might have acquired enough specialist subject knowledge to teach their subject in a secondary school. But, outside of areas where the work in the forces is at least congruent in some ways with what is taught in schools I cannot see how military life would prepare someone for subject teaching in schools. Many former military staff members have for a long while made worthwhile contributions to the further education sector where their specialist vocational skills can be in high demand. Perhaps the government is thinking that many on the ‘troops to teachers’ programme will work in the burgeoning 14-18 sector of UTCs and studio schools.

Much has been made of the attitude to discipline those with a military background might bring into schools, but discipline in a uniformed service, where a refusal to obey a lawful order might result in a charge, is not the same as either helping a frustrated teenager act out their angst against society during a bad day at school or even just any class or youngsters that feels like playing up a new teacher to test the boundaries of their authority. This is not to deny the great strides the forces have taken in recent years in moving away from a ‘do as I say’ mentality. However, war does require obedience to orders, in a way that society more generally has moved away from. And in the end, the armed forces training is designed to prepare personnel for armed conflict.

Nevertheless, the BBC quoted David Laws as saying that military values such as leadership, discipline, motivation, and teamwork would benefit children.

“We want to capture the ethos and talents of those leaving the armed forces and bring this experience into teaching. We know that our highly-skilled servicemen and women can inspire young people and help raise educational attainment.”

But, perhaps more worrying was the section of the DfE press notice that said:

“We are already working to bring military ethos into our education system to help raise standards and tackle issues such as behaviour. In June the Prime Minister announced a £10.85m expansion of the school-based cadets to create around 100 more units by 2015. Extending the scheme in state schools will allow even more young people to benefit from the life-changing opportunities that cadet forces offer.”

At a time when the armed forces are being severely pruned, perhaps it would have been better for any uniformed units created in schools to have been based upon a civilian service model, and not on a military model dreamed up after the South African war over a century ago. As a means of instilling values such as, discipline, motivation, and teamwork it would bring the same benefits to children without the militaristic overtones. Next year we will be remembering the foundation of army formations such as the Glasgow Boys’ Brigade (16th Battalion, Highland Light Infantry) Battalion as one of the many ‘Pals’ battalions formed at the start of World War One. How far the cadet forces aided recruitment in 1914 is an interesting discussion point.

By all means let’s ensure discipline in schools is as good as it can be, but not at the price of creating a militaristic culture in our schools. So, I welcome ex-service personnel who want to become teachers, just as I welcome those from other walks of life, but schools must no longer be expected to become the training grounds for our next generation of the armed forces. Let it be an adult decision to take the Queen’s shilling.

Missing the target is a known. By how much is still a known unknown.

Posted on June 1, 2013 by John Howson

This week’s Education Journal carried a piece by Chris Waterman, my co-author of the new book on Teacher Training Places in 2013. His article was entitled ‘Teacher supply: how the Rumsfeldian model is coming along’ and it considers the knowns; known unknowns; unknown unknowns; and the ‘don’t want to know questions’ around the current confusing teacher preparation landscape. I won’t rehearse the various discussions under each of the headings, save to say that earlier this week I worked out that less than a quarter of training places in Chemistry on the School Direct route were being shown as filled on the DfE web site compared with about double that figure for the higher education routes in the subject.

One thing that might help recruitment is a review of the benefits from the various routes. On some routes you receive a salary, plus pension contributions, plus pay National insurance that unlocks other State benefits, whereas on other routes you are a students and get nothing more than the right to repay the loan as a tax of 9% for the first 30 years you are in teaching. It is indeed unlikely that many students with a degree plus a PGCE will ever repay the full amount of their loans unless the government changes the rules. How long the Treasury will accept this situation is an interesting question as there are already rumblings about the long-term cost to the Exchequer. I think it would be sensible to return to a level playing field where all who wanted to become a teacher were treated in the same way. After all, the Ministry of Defence doesn’t give officer cadets destined for the infantry a different financial package to those entering the armoured regiments or the engineers. I am quite surprised that a clever lawyer hasn’t cited the Human Rights legislation to show it is unfair to fund the education of some intending teachers in one way, and those of others in another less rewarding manner.

As half-term week comes to an end, and second half of the summer term starts is slide towards the summer holidays, I am confident enough to predict that the glory days of recent years, when every subject except computer science was filling all their places for trainee teachers, has come to an end. The question is: how large will be the deficit across the board by the time courses start in September?

Applications good: acceptances better

Posted on May 8, 2013 by John Howson

How good do you have to be to become a teacher? Should it be as hard to enter the teaching profession as say to become a doctor, dentist or vet? Or does the need for such large numbers of new teachers, around 35,000 enter training each year, mean the focus must be on quantity over quality?

The government released data today that showed around 20,000 applicants had made more than 64,000 applications to become a teacher through the new School Direct route. That’s around seven applications per place, and well above the ratio for the university teacher preparation courses, where applications through GTTR for postgraduate courses rarely hit the level of four applications per place except in very popular subjects such as History, Physical Education, the Social Sciences and Drama. However, since GTTR measure applicants rather than gross applications so on that basis School Direct is probably doing little better than GTTR in terms of applicants per places available. But, without a breakdown or applicants as well as applications by subject and phase to School Direct it is impossible to be sure.

The obvious questions that arise are whether there are better applicants for the GTTR courses than School Direct or are perhaps admissions tutors in universities being more generous in making offers than their colleagues in schools? Take Chemistry as an example, on the School Direct Salaried route 11% of the places were filled by Easter, and that represented just four per cent of applicants being offered places. On the School Direct Training Route nine per cent of places were filled, and just three per cent of applicants had been offered a place. By comparison on the GTTR courses 46% of the applicants had been offered a place although this was down on the 51% accepted at the same time last year. Given that it is unlikely anyone without the basic academic degree class bothers to apply, it seems odd that so many applicants have yet to be offered a place through the School Direct programme, especially as applications have been arriving since the autumn.

John Howson

Education and the numbers that affect what happens

Tag Archives: teacher training