Six Months Teacher Training Plan

People could qualify as a teacher in England in six months rather than the usual year, under new government plans.

Schools Minister Jim Knight announced proposals aimed at tempting more outstanding people to teach.

Two hundred people seen as future head teachers will also be able to move into school leadership within four years via an accelerated headship programme.

Education unions have reacted with alarm and scepticism about the need for the schemes or their practicability.

‘Life experience’

Mr. Knight said: “There are thousands of highly talented individuals in this country who are considering their next move, who want to do something challenging, rewarding, that is highly respected and where good people have great prospects. My message to them is to see what they can offer teaching and what teaching can offer them.” He added: “By cutting the initial teacher training course to six months for the most able candidates, we will make teaching a more attractive choice for experienced people who want to get into the classroom quickly but need high quality initial teacher training.”

Cabinet Office Minister Liam Byrne told the BBC the plan was to intensify training for “good people” with “life experience behind them”. “We know there are a lot of fantastic mathematicians, for example, who would have once perhaps gone into the City but now actually might be more interested in a career in teaching,” he said.

Liberal Democrat education spokesman David Laws said the government’s plan was “timid”, ducking an opportunity to bring about much-needed reform of the education system.

,p>“Getting more talented people into the teaching profession and school leaderships roles is important. But ministers need to couple this with giving all schools extra freedoms and more money so that they can focus on raising standards.”

Shadow schools secretary Michael Gove also said the government could go further.

“We have been calling for much greater power for heads over recruitment, the need for greater rewards for good teachers and specialists, and much greater flexibility in teacher training, including a new graduate scheme based on going straight into the classroom.”

‘Gimmicks’

Education unions are to be consulted over the next few weeks on the details of the programmes, which have yet to be finalised. But one union said the scheme did not seem to be addressing an urgent need – especially when enquiries about teacher training have jumped as the recession has taken hold.

The general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, Mary Bousted, said: “We have fought very hard to make this a graduate profession and I have grave doubts that you can accelerate teacher training like this.”

England’s Department for Children, Schools and Families said the fast track teacher training scheme would be aimed at people with several years’ professional experience in areas such as the financial services or hi-tech industries.

But Dr. Bousted said: “It sounds like an employment scheme for unemployed bankers, but this may not be the best way to go about it.” She added: “I’m becoming very worried about the plethora of different gimmicks and initiatives the government is coming out with – this looks very much like back-of-the-fag-packet stuff.”

An existing scheme – known as Teach First – recruits high calibre graduates and, after six weeks’ initial training, places them in tough schools to continue learning the ropes for a year.

They then are expected to continue teaching for another year before moving into their intended careers.

Quick Teacher Training: ‘No way’

People who have made a career switch into teaching have been commenting on the government’s scheme to “fast track” people with industrial experience into England’s classrooms with just six months’ training.

David Townsend did a one-year post graduate certificate in education in business and economics, qualifying as a teacher just after his 50th birthday.

Before that he had spent 16 years as a Royal Navy officer and another 16 in industry, then completed a three-year university degree.

‘Have a go’

“I have had a successful and rewarding teaching career for the last nine years and recently obtained a Master of Teaching degree,” he said. “There is absolutely no way that I could have coped with teaching after just six months’ training.

“You cannot just transfer your skills from industry into the classroom, you have to learn both the theoretical and practical methods of making a difference to young people’s lives and that takes time, lectures, and teaching practice.”

He added: “To be a graduate of a six-month initial teacher training course would always make you the PCSO to the real policeman. Respected, but not quite there.”

But he said he would fully encourage older applicants to become a teacher, as it has given new meaning to his life, reinvigorated his self-worth – and might “make a difference”.

“Don’t moan about the younger generation, teach them,” he said.

‘Don’t miss the City’

London teacher Ian Gordon-Brown may be just what the government has in mind, having turned to teaching after 14 years as an investment banker.

His feeling is that the training requires a minimum of a year.

“Six months is insufficient because you have to deal with psychology of children, sociology of children – you have to deal with the fact that potentially you have a hostile audience,” he said. “Children don’t necessarily want to be at school. They don’t realise that it’s actually good for them.” It was unlike the sort of experience someone might bring from their previous job. “In the City if you are just a normal lecturer or you are giving a presentation, all the people that you are meeting and your are lecturing to or teaching there are there because they want to be.”

Commitment

Most people qualify as teachers by completing a one-year postgraduate certificate after their main degree, or do a three-year education degree.

Angie Alloway, a class teacher at Studfall Junior School in Northamptonshire, has been in teaching for two years after completing a three-year course at the University of Northampton.

“I had to be dedicated to teaching to commit myself and my family financially to my new career,” she said. She warns anyone thinking of doing the same that teaching is not the easy option she thinks it increasingly is viewed as being. “I had previously worked in sales and had responsibility for a turnover of £2.5m in my area but nothing compares to the pressure of teaching. Regularly working 10-hour days at school and then at home and during the holidays you really need to be committed.”

The government’s plan has generally been greeted with skepticism by those commenting on the BBC News website.

Well I never, what a surprise. Another initiative from the Government, overturning decades of best practice on a whim, not thought through, designed to grab some headlines and save some money.

What next? “Doctor in a Day”? “Lawyer in a Lunchtime”?

The only one that really rings true is:

“Cabinet Minister in a Minute” – No thinking required!…

Andrew Carter, London, United Kingdom

My husband has been trying to get into teacher training for 3 years now, there seems to be a brick wall at every turn, to be quite honest I think it is because they are looking for more ethnic minorities in our area rather than the educated working class white.

Rachel, Romford Essex

Of course you can cut training to six months – if you want partly competent staff. If you want to employ “outstanding people” you need to pay them “outstanding pay” and provide them with “outstanding working conditions”. I don’t see these proposals doing that so they will fail.

Tio Terry, Epsom, United Kingdom

So, cutting a few months of training will suddenly bring more people to the teaching profession? This is a gimmick, a cheap attempt to save money in a dying system. Fix schools and show the teaching profession respect, and you’ll get more teachers.

But that’s too hard for Labour, isn’t it?

Realist

I’m a parent to a three-month-old daughter.

Personally I’d quite like her to be taught by teachers who’ve had a decent and proper amount of training. Not ex-city types who’ve been fast tracked into a state job after destroying the economy and her future.

James Shepherd, London

Teachers are born, not trained.

For some, their natural talent could be tweaked easily in six months and then real classroom experience would do the rest.

For others, all the training in the world would not make them teachers.

[dozy_nora]

Why would anyone in the right frame of mind ever want to go into the current teaching system? With the endless lesson plans, stress of Offsted inspections, little or no support from parents, children who spit in your face and physically assault you and yet are allowed to remain in schools. Why would you want to be in a school where children’s right to be abusive is above that of the teachers who want to teach.

Think on improving the system and you will improve the number and quality of recruits.

Prymuz, Essex

The basics of teaching can certainly be taught in six months, but becoming a good teacher is a long process that takes years of experience. The best teachers I had at school were all experienced – few of the youngest ones were very effective.

Mark LV, Reading, United Kingdom

‘Under new government plans’ says it all.

30 years of ‘Government Plans’ have wrecked our education.

Give teachers respect, independence from bumbling politicians, (and better pay) to pull the top minds.

It works on the Continent – professionals call the shots there. It used to work here.

C L, Glasgow

Oh dear! A panic reaction to growing unemployment from an utterly incompetent, discredited and impotent Labour government. This is not even an original idea. Schools in the UK have so often been the government’s dumping ground for ‘surplus bodies’. What is new is that the UK education system has never been so ruined and half-baked through continual government interference and attempts at social engineering. This means more public servants that taxes from the private sector can ill support.

Peter, Cambridge, UK