To wonder why on earth Troops to Teachers is considered to be a great idea?

[ballinacup]

Before we start, I'm not armed forces bashing, I'm sure there are some troops out there who would make excellent teachers. But why on earth offer a fast track course to troops without a degree?!

It seems like sheer madness, why not offer the fast track course to anyone? Am I missing some glaringly obvious fact that makes it all make sense? Or has Gove got a vision in his head of classrooms running with military precision if he has soldiers at the helm?

Can someone please explain it to me, because I'm genuinely puzzled.

All primary teachers are going to have to teach outside of their degree specialism, but there is no shortage of primary teachers, so I doubt the scheme will focus on getting ex-military into primary classrooms.

At secondary level, subject knowledge is a must in addition to good teaching skills. Someone who is well qualified will not necessarily make a good teacher, but someone who does not have required subject knowledge (beyond the level they are teaching to) can not by definition be a good teacher at that level.

Most secondary teachers ime are expected to be able to switch from teaching the most able year 13 groups to being able to teach bottom set year 8 at the blink of an eye. Yes, that means they require a ton of people skills to deal with that diversity, but they also need secure subject knowledge to be able to effectively switch between such diverse groups so quickly.

In my last school we had isolation for the particularly naughty children. The discipline at the school was awful, largely due to the deprived circumstances in which the pupils were growing up and then because senior management would rarely back up any discipline decisions that the classroom teachers made. Anyway, one year the school employed an ex-military man to oversee isolation. Was he any more effective than anyone else? No. He couldn't resort to the sort of sanctions he had in the army. Children don't have automatic respect for someone just because they've been in the forces. They were just as rude and defiant to him as they were to everyone else.

I think people who have served in the armed forces have some excellent skills that would be very useful in teaching but like some other posters I am very concerned about making teaching a non-graduate profession.

I have daydreams in which I put Gove in front of a class of children...I'm sure he'd be a WONDERFUL teacher.

People should be treated equally when assessing their suitability of training for a profession irrespective of what their previous profession has been - how can troops be treated as a special case and there not be issues of equality for all entrants ?

Some one further back in this thread made a statement saying that the military - 'all of them have great organisational and leadership skills'
what a load of total bollocks - my god son, although a lovely boy is not blessed in the brains department (he is in the RAF) and is only capable of
doing his job because this is what he is trained to do and can only follow order, not work out for himself what to do. One of my sons friends, also in the RAF could not tell a sheep from a goat in a field until it was explained to him. His job is to put fuel into military vehicles.

Unless these troops are already educated to university entrance standard
I do not see how they will be able to teach.

Agree with Badvoc, it's an utter bollocks of an idea.

I am ex military (left about 12 years ago) and (knowing next to nothing about this scheme) I suspect that the majority of people to whom it will appeal will be graduates. I went into the RN with a law degreee, did 7 years, and then became a lawyer. My DH was a geology graduate, did over 20 years in the RN, and left last year. In his time he did several instructor jobs, and would have made an excellent teacher - he has chosen to do something else (no vested interest here!) although it was discussed as a possible option. We have a friend who is head of a big comprehensive who said she would be delighted to employ people like him.

Allmycats - yes, there are undoubtedly many people in the services who are good at their (sevice) jobs, but aren't particularly intellectually minded. I cannot believe that anyone would consider those people suitable for a teaching job.

The whole ethos of this is such bollocks.

It is Gove talking tough about restoring discipline to schools by using ex-forces personnel and then offering a sop to the troops who are being laid off.

A career in the forces doesn't prevent anyone being a good and comitted teacher, but neither does it ensure that they are any good. I don't see why they should get a short cut not available to others who have had a career before turning to teaching.

Until the early 1960s almost all male teachers would have had some militiary experience, either during the second world war or as a result of national service. Were teaching standards or the classroom ethos significantly better? (having heard my Uncle's stories about having stand up fights with teachers in the classroom, I'd say not).

FWIW I had two ex-service teachers, one was passable, the other was poor to below-average. I think the former was in the submarine service and the latter was a stores corpora. I'm not sure how a life of handing out pairs of boots made them uniquely suited to a teaching career.

Just love how we've progressed from "army grunts" to "handing out boots". This scheme is NOT aimed at those people, it is aimed at the personnel (eg aircraft engineers) who have had 22 years of experience carrying out diagnostics and repairs on complex systems and who have had teaching experience during their career.

it is aimed at the personnel (eg aircraft engineers) who have had 22 years of experience carrying out diagnostics and repairs on complex systems and who have had teaching experience during their career.

If this is the case, why not extend it to civilian engineers with similar experiences?

Won't the majority of aircraft engineers end up working in civilian engineering fields where they will have qualifications and skills that are directly transferable and mean something?

If so, why not launch a scheme encouraging telecoms companies or radar manufacturers or whatever to employ suitably qualified servicemen and women rather than shoehorning them into a teaching career which they aren't fully qualified for?

I don't think this scheme is about shoe horning anyone into a career that they aren't fully qualified for. It's more about getting technically qualified people into shortage categories. For example some REME NCOs meet the requirements for CEng.This normally requires a Masters. Is anyone seriously suggesting that people of this caliber aren't as capable of teaching technical subjects as a 22 year old with a PGCE?

Depends, are they any good at teaching teenagers?

If that is the case Redbindy surely civilian companies will be lining the streets to give them jobs in engineering trades? Therefore there's no need for a scheme like this.

Anyway the difference between knowing a lot about a subject isn't the same as being able to deliver the subject to a bunch of uninterested 15 year olds.

Does this help with career choices?
www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitecontent/documents/workingintheuk/shortageoccupationlistnov11.pdf

More engineers required than teachers it seems.

Hi, I've just read your message on google and have set up this account just so I can reply...
I am one of those troops looking into teaching, I have served the British Army for 22 years and since 1994 I have been qualified to teach, Instruct, coach, mentor and recently to assess my other instructors in a large number of different subjects. Yes these subjects are mainly military based but I have taught new recruits (aged 17) and worked in a number of training establishments.
I have recently received my Certificate in Teaching in the Life Long Sector (CTLLS) and also have the opportunity to complete my Diploma (DTLLS) before leaving the army.

Don't get me wrong, my teachers will be turning in their graves at the thought of me teaching but I believe I now have 19 years experience in teaching (and qualifications) that the Troops to Teachers scheme will be the ideal opportunity for me to leave the services and take up a job I love.

My qualifications will go towards my degree and reduce the time I will have to spend studying (that's why its only two years), the time spent studying is to learn the subject I'm going to teach and I already have that knowledge and experience of teaching.

This scheme is not for everyone, it is for those who like myself have spent most of their military careers instructing and mentoring and want to continue once they leave the services. it is all about what experience and qualifications you leave with and can use towards your degree.

Its not about the discipline and shouting (though some parents I know wish it was) its about using the skills we have learnt during a 24 year career and can take with us to benefit others...

I hope this explains the scheme better to you and be assured the prospect of going to university at the age of 46 is a lot more scary than being a soldier.

markjohn that is really interesting, you sound like exactly the sort of person who should be working with young people. Best of luck in your new career, it sounds like you're destined to make a huge success of it :)

WOW!!!

I too 'googled' the subject of 'Soldiers to Teachers' and found this topic and felt that I had to register.

MARKJOHN had pretty much summed up everything that I was going to say, but I would just like to echo his point that we have some VERY good instructors/teachers amongst our ranks.

Please do not picture spotty hard done by killing machines that are looking at this career. Having just read the briefing note on this, the selection procees seems very rigorous.

I am also coming to the end of a 22 year career and have been teaching on and off for the best part of 17 years of that time.

I have also done my CTLLS, DTTLS, PTTLS and completed my Cert Ed a couple of years ago with Southampton Univerity.

I must say that I am quite shocked at some of the comments on here, if some of the opinions expressed by some on here are people's genuine belief of us Soldiers.........well, I'm lost for words.

Not out to cause a row, just wanted to put my point across.

Our local primary school has taken on a couple of ex-soldiers, and it's made a huge difference having male teachers. The discipline has improved no end, with no reports of hangings from the yard-arm!

Whilst it must have been a lovely experience for all of you teachers with a degree to leave school and go to university and doss around for 3 or 4 years before having to enter the real world, many, including myself spent much of what might have been their university years in Iraq or Afghanistan. The fact that many of you are criticising or questioning what ex-forces personnel could bring to this country's education system is appalling. You trust the military with the defence of this country but not to have the aptitude to teach your children; and further to that, you don't think they deserve the chance. Get a grip and stop being so small minded and elitest

we had a really drippy soldier - takes all sorts!

I'm so disappointed reading some of these comments. Thank the Lord for Markjohn, Traynor26 and appleofmyeye36 otherwise I'd be tempted to tell my husband to quit this scheme already if this is a true representation of the parents of the children he will be teaching.

Firstly - if you read the eligibility criteria for this course on the Troops for Teachers website, you would realise that these are not uneducated individuals. My husband is one of very few individuals who have got onto this course, based on the courses and teaching experience he has gained in his 12 year career in the military.

Secondly – what do some of you think a degree qualifies you to do? Do you think that getting a 2.2 in philosophy or geography means you did anything more than sit around drinking for three years? I have a 2.1 in law and I am certain I don't have anywhere near the skills he has to teach, or knowledge of the current sylabus.

Thirdly – please lets not use Jack Nicholson from A Few Good Men as our example of a soldier! These are people, often with financial and family commitments, who are so committed to teaching that they're going back to the classroom on a salary of peanuts for two years because they are so convinced that they can make a difference to children's lives. They already have careers – they are not 21 years olds straight out of university who can't think of anything better to do.

Fourthly – and in general, nearly everything you read in the media is biased somehow, in this case politically. Please, please read the facts, go to the source, before writing off people like my husband, who will be bringing child psychology and French qualifications, rugby coaching and trail cycle leadership qualifications to name a few, to a school that has no language programme whatsoever and no after school sports clubs.

I think the more recent posters are being over-defensive. I'm sure that the experience that people like markjohn have had will make him an excellent teacher, and it makes sense to fast-track him; the point is that there are people outside the forces who have similar experience who should have the same opportunities.

I also find it worrying that Gove ties this in with his initiative to introduce a so-called "military ethos" into schools as if that is something that is automatically desirable. I think that is highly debatable, and I think it is doomed to failure anyway. He is putting an awful lot of money into this which could be far better spent just on ensuring that there are adequate school places in adequately built and maintained schools.

nennypops I'm interested in what you believe "military ethos" to be, and why you find the idea undesirable?

Necroposting here but 6 months into the programme have there been any reports of low-skilled ex-soldiers drilling kids around the yard?

Didn't think so...

just replying to the idea of 'military ethos'
i dont want to live in a militarised society
in whose interests would it be for young people to have a military ethos?
warmongers and dictators!

I don't think Britain was run by warmongers/dictators through the 50s and 60s.

Though if unsuitable people are reaching classrooms (via this or any route of teacher training) then urgent reassessment of standards in teacher training are indicated.

It's a myth that the Army is full of people shouting at each other all the time. It really isn't like that. However, there are lots of people with energy, charisma, discipline and personality.