To expect my child to be taught by a teacher with a degree in that subject?

[northlundunmum]

My child is in year 8 and in their school
has “Humanities” which is history and geography combined rather than taught separately- not great in my view but ok. However, this year they are being taught by a music teacher. No doubt a very talented musician but according to my child they admit not being very good at teaching history or geography.

I do understand there are teacher shortages and sometimes some teachers will have to cover for others but this seems to be a permanent arrangement at least for this year.

Does anybody know what the DfE / Ofsted rules / guidance are on this? I understand you have to have a degree in a subject in order to train to teach it at secondary level (or at least used to) - does that not extend to actually teaching the subject in school?

Grateful for advice from anyone who knows the law / regulations here as want to approach the school about it and want to be clear what’s reasonable to expect and what they should in fact be doing according to govt policy.

Thank you!

The option would be your child wouldn't have that option.. there is a huge lack of teachers..yabu.

Schools are absolutely fine until they're not though. In my current school, no-one is taught science by someone without a science degree, although it's not always in the subject they are teaching. However, when they last had to recruit, they had to advertise multiple times, and they could easily have ended up with an unfilled vacancy. They got lucky with someone looking to move schools at the last minute in the summer.

It's a nice school, in a cheapish town with good transport links. The latter two are relevant because it means an ECT can afford to live here, and people commute in from quite a large area because it's relatively easy (decent A road, mainline train station etc). We're still finding it harder and harder to recruit. We have good links with ITT programs at the moment, so it's easier to recruit ECTs as well.

I've equally worked in schools in more expensive areas where it's hard to find a rental property, and you can't get to the school easily without car. That quickly limits your recruitment pool.

I've also worked in a school where the science department was fully staffed with specialists when I joined. And it was fine for a couple of years. Then our HoD left (for a promotion) and the person they recruited to replace him was a lot less experienced and it caused some issues. At the end of that year, we lost a full time member of staff, a part time member of staff and someone went on maternity in about October. We didn't manage to recruit for September, and it was chaos. The pressure put on those of us who were left was completely unrealistic.

Amazingly, we did manage to recruit mid year, but because things were so bad, people were leaving whenever they could. So we lost 3 members of staff, that year and only recruited one. I couldn't face another year like that and left, another friend left at Christmas the following year.

In departments like that it can become a vicious cycle- we're a few years down the line and they're still short staffed now. Most of the staff I worked with in that department have left. I think the department is in a better state than it was, but the school is still advertising for science teachers. After a while, when you see the same adverts come up again and again, teachers start to assume there is something wrong with the school. But 5 years ago, it was fine.

I don't think any school is immune, especially if something happens like a change in leadership or a bad Ofsted.

PE teachers tend to get used a lot teach lots of other subjects. Good at crowd control esp with students who are either desperate to get selected for teams or don’t want to be ‘picked upon’ during PE lessons.

Does anybody know what the DfE / Ofsted rules / guidance are on this? I understand you have to have a degree in a subject in order to train to teach it at secondary level (or at least used to) - does that not extend to actually teaching the subject in school?

You don't have to have a degree in the subject at all. For some subjects, you can do an 8 week subject knowledge enhancement course to "get up to speed".

I suppose the way to look at the situation is this: would you expect to buy a £1 million property when you can only afford a property that costs £200k because someone out of their good of their heart is going to pay the shortfall of £800k? It’s the same with teaching, people are expecting that people will work practically for very little and give all their time and energy out of the goodness of their hearts🤷🏻‍♀️ it’s just completely unreasonable and unrealistic!

Or, more cynically, PE teachers are used because they're one of the few secondary subjects that is easy to recruit and therefore they're less likely to leave if made to teach outside of specialism. Plus it's far easier to recruit a PE teacher and ask them to teach a bit of maths/science/geography than to recruit a part time teacher in those subjects.

You are not being unreasonable but there is a huge recruitment & retainment crisis in teaching. School budgets are cut to the bone.

It’s not good.

OP - what good do you think contacting the school is going to do?

They're aware that they have a non-specialist teacher teaching the subject, and they probably don't want to have one, but if they advertise for a job and no-one with the necessary qualification applies, what do you expect them to do? Magic one out of thin air? Head to the local uni's geography department and kidnap someone?

In reality what will happen is that your complaint will be forwarded to the Head of Geography/Humanities, who is probably already completely over stretched and stressed as they're trying to deal with supporting non-specialists in their subject, and it will be just one more stressful incident that might end up making the HoD want to also leave...

If the teacher is able to hold the pupils' attention, keep behaviour under control and explain the content in a way that the class can understand, then you should count yourself lucky, as they have it better than a lot of other schools...

I've got a PGCE and my QTS. My degree is a French language one. I've taught RE, History and English in Y5, 6,7 and 8. It wasn't my choice, I was asked (told) to teach those subjects alongside mine. I agree having a degree in the subject helps delivering it but recruitment and retention of teachers is so dire right now that you'll see more and more non-specialists teachers, and probably unqualified staff as well. You can raise it with the school but they've probably already tried every avenue to cover these lessons.

I just had a look and it seems all the local schools are offering qualifying courses with a lot being paid for by Government bursary or even getting paid £17k whilst I do the training. I do have a degree but not one with a high classification. I didn't realise teaching was that in need. When I was at school I very rarely had a substitute teacher and my teachers seemed knowledgeable in their subjects 15 years ago

In reality what will happen is that your complaint will be forwarded to the Head of Geography/Humanities, who is probably already completely over stretched and stressed as they're trying to deal with supporting non-specialists in their subject, and it will be just one more stressful incident that might end up making the HoD want to also leave...

Absolutely. Then on top of their own workload and supporting the non-specialist, they then have to respond to your complaint!

l very rarely had a substitute teacher and my teachers seemed knowledgeable in their subjects 15 years ago

I wonder what’s been happening over the last 14 years…

Out of 5 lessons today, my son had supply teachers for 4 of them. He's year 10.

I know several PhDs/former post-docs who now teach at secondary. PCGE is only a year, and you get a good bursary - it's an easier road than most career changes.

This is sadly really common, and I think it causes kids to disengage with education because they don't have invested class teachers or specialist support.

I also think it has a massive negative impact on behaviour when students bounce from supply teacher to cover lesson and back again- even when they see a permanent class teacher.

Those students will unfortunately also go into Y11 with massive gaps, and even if they get a permanent specialist teacher, it may be too late to address the issues they are facing.

Many independent schools struggle to recruit and retain teachers too. The amount of teachers available, especially some subjects is in massive decline.

That said, most independent schools have more classes taught by subject specialists and see a lower turn-over of staff. Those that pay more clearly attract staff, plus the longer holidays and generally better behaviour and resourcing makes it more attractive, even if the hours can be extremely long. But then, this is hardly surprising is it?

Teachers might be motivated to teach and make a difference, but it’s not surprising that places that pay better and have better conditions might attract them. People who can pay think the specialist teachers and continuity make a difference. Few children in the state sector will get through their GCSEs with the same set of teachers they started out with.

It does feel like we are going back towards a Victorian system, of a small number of teachers, and then ‘monitors’ who back then were teenagers supervising the class, but today are increasingly TAs or cover supervisors. Given that the government is only prepared to fund schools to the level that fewer teachers can be attracted and afforded, that will be the future.

Definitely ask your children - how many lessons had a cover teacher this week or today. Ask how many changes if teacher have they had this year. Ask if their teacher teaches lots of subjects and if they teach A Level in the subject they are teaching them.

My DC's school appears to be able to, though I assume it is unusual as they make a point of telling us that all the Science departments are fully staffed by specialist teachers

My school too. No problem recruiting well-qualified teachers in all subjects. But it's an excellent girls' grammar school (the onmy one in the area), so no mystery there. Whereas my Y11 ds has had lessons in the main hall with multiple other classes in the last few weeks due to teacher shortages/absence/lack of available supply teachers.

That would annoy me greatly! But I'm guessing that's the best they can get, very depressing if this is the future

Independent schools are leaving the teachers’ pension scheme in their droves, making the remuneration package much less appealing. The independent sector is rapidly losing its cushion against the national staffing crisis.

Yeah, I did a career change into teaching, it was reasonably ‘easy’ in that they were wanting to recruit teachers. I managed to get a non-qualified teacher salary along with my fees all paid for, but I knew during the course I couldn’t do teaching as a profession as it wasn’t good and I didn’t want to end up having a nervous breakdown which was the only career trajectory I could see happening in teaching sadly 😔 , lots of other people from my course who got the salary and fees paid for have also left or gone private or abroad, the package came to £30k for each of us, I believe government money… Well spent eh 🤷🏻‍♀️ maybe the ones who paid for the PGCE etc stayed on longer… On the positive side by doing the course I got exposed to another much more lucrative and less stressful career which I’ve stayed in ever since!

You could always pay it back 🤷🏻‍♀️. I imagine they take cheques.

I think the government needs to address the teaching issue, this is the reality. I didn’t want to leave but I just found out everything bad about the profession was true and more. One retired teacher told me if there weren’t school holidays you would die, and I remembered thinking: Christ, I believe you. I think it’s probably a sign it’s not the place to spend your life working in sadly. If I could afford to volunteer just to teach (only teaching, non of the bureaucracy etc) I’d do it though so maybe one day I’ll be able to pay it back that way! My qualifications don’t expire (they stopped the time limit on that due to the crisis) so if the education sector improves dramatically I’d think about
going back then!

I agree. Independent schools will be losing the small cushion they have. Teaching in all settings looks increasingly bleak as a career option, or certainly as a long term one. I’d imagine they will continue to struggle to recruit trainees but some will also ways sign-up due to a desire to make a difference. However, the reality of working in chronically under-funded schools and excessive workloads will mean few stay long.

I imagine that those with children just starting school now, might see quite a different kind of teaching and schooling by the time they leave education. The government just isn’t willing to pay and fund what is required to resource schools and pay proper qualified professionals.

My degree is psychology and my PGCE is in teaching ks2&3 science.

As well as those subjects, I’ve taught (and examined) sociology at A level, philosophy and ethics (a level) health and social care (level 3) child development, GCSE, TOK (IB), geography (ks3) EPQ (level 3/AS)

Teaching outside your specialism is very common!

And the real problem with all of this is it's not going to get any better, and it is definitely about to get a lot worse.

The government missed its secondary teacher training target for September 2023 by fifty percent.

Job adverts going out now are going to be unfilled for September because there won't be the ECTs to take them up. The number of vacancies is set to increase, the workload caused by a lack of subject specialists will increase.

And this in turn will cause more teachers to quit.

Those figures are locked in.