The best Independent schools generally take the highest qualified teachers?

[Hamishbear]

It might be obvious to many that the most academic schools insist that their teachers have an outstanding degree from one of the best universities but it wasn't to me.

For example if you want a job in Maths at Guildford High school allegedly you need a first in Maths from a well regarded university. You obviously need to be an outstanding teacher in the fullest sense too.

So do the elite schools usually have the best teachers? I suppose it stands to reason that there is more competition for jobs at schools that have a fantastic reputation?

The top state selectives and the top independents will be looking for the same sort of teacher on the whole. But the teachers at the top independents, while having to deal with the same sort of intensive prep for lessons etc. etc. are likely to have less pressure overall due to class size. The lists Xenia has linked to indicate far, far more teachers per pupil than their state peers. Crowd control isn't a particular challenge; volume of work at a high level is - and longer terms.

Hopefullyrecovering you asked for names: which was the superselective whose list you checked?

Just checked the DC's teachers' list. As I suspected, not one teacher hailing from Gloucester University (?).

Just as the pressures in each and every type of state school, right through the range of comps, are different.

Some independents employ execrable teachers who wouldn't be employed in the state sector, and the other way round.

Hopefully - my colleague, who hails from Gloucester University, is an outstanding teacher.

You sound like a snob.

The Habs list actually shows a fairly broad spectrum Hopefully. Are you going to link the list to this superselective?

I had to write to both the superselective and the local comprehensive school to get the equivalent information. The information for my DCs schools (both independent) is freely available on the respective websites. I'm reluctant to link to it in public, but I'll cut and paste the list with the teachers names anonymised if you PM me.

I really did an exhaustive comparison when it came to picking out a secondary school. Not just the quality of the teachers (and I absolutely acknowledge that qualifications do not necessarily a good teacher make) but the sports, music and drama.

Also the exam results, which was a painful exercise because of course they had differing qualities of intakes and I had to look at multiple years' results as well - so I had to try and work out how to factor both of those in. The selective academic independent actually had pupils with lower IQs on entrance than the superselective grammar. The superselective grammar had 72% A & A at GSCE which was worse than the selective independent (78% A & A)

So it seemed to me that the selective independent did better with the quality of its intake than the superselective grammar, IYSWIM.

It all took a very long time to work out, but it meant I was making a decision based on clear facts rather than feel. I'm a bit mistrustful of feel-based decisions.

Adding some more personal experience to this thread (statistically, as useful as a chocolate teapot, of course).

I am very (most would say far over-)qualified for my job as a state primary school teacher in a school with an...interesting...mixed intake. First class Oxbridge degree, PhD, PGCE,management experience in industry etc etc.

I almost never use the content of my 'subject' degrees in class teaching (although, enquiring 7-8 year olds being what they are, I dip into it when answering individual questions on a surprisingly regular basis).

I use the skills my 'subject' degree and PhD taught me - rapid assimilation of new information, synthesis of different sources of information into a coherent whole etc - a lot. Planning a topic or a block of lessons is very similar to planning an essay in many ways.

During my PhD, I tutored undergraduates, and that did give me some experience of direct 'knowledge transmission', imparting information in a structured way to bright children.

It is my PGCE which taught me how to teach, and in particular, how to teach children who may not be disruptive, may never waste time in a lesson or require superior 'classroom management' skills but do find it hard to learn, ie for whom straight 'knowledge transmission' teaching is never going to work.

It seems to me that a false dichotomy is being set up in this thread between 'teaching bright children in a selective school, who need lots of 'lesson content'' on the one hand and 'teaching children in other schools, where the main job is classroom management'.

Where I teach, classroom management is a doddle. Behaviour is excellent. What is a huge challenge is teaching classes with a spread of abilities spanning 6 years or more (in a single year group) and ensuring that all the children make progress. I find teaching the (extremely) bright children in my class easy - they learn as I do, and I find my own education useful in understanding how to challenge them. Where I expend huge quantities of thought and intellectual energy and teaching skill is in understanding what it is my lower ability and SEN children do not understand, what their barriers to learning might be, and how to accelerate their progress. The knowledge I need to do that comes from the training I received during my PGCE - at the university but more particularly through coaching and mentoring during teaching practice - but the 'intellectual capacity' which led to me gaining the qualifications I got in the first place comes in handy when juggling lots of competing information about lots of different things in order to plan the best way forward.

(That was a long-winded way of saying that

• If I had chosen to teach science in a selective academic secondary, I would use my degree and PhD more.
• As I have chosen to teach primary in a very mixed primary, I use my PGCE more
• Other teachers at my school are equally successful in teaching our very mixed classes effectively. They have a wide range of backgrounds, and the bits of the job that they find 'intuitive' vs the parts they 'work hard at' are different to mine, but the results are equally good. There is no one 'recipe' to make a good teacher, even for the same group of children in the same institution.)

I can see that, Teacher. I can see that if you stuck one of the charming but very academic teachers from the DC's school into the local comprehensive, they could potentially struggle. There is no (or not much) need for classroom management in a private selective secondary where the children are generally well-behaved, there is no classroom disruption and they are quite close in ability range.

TW2K - you have summed up perfectly! Welll said.

Hopeful, I think you have missed my point - there is no greater need for classroom management in my school than in a private prep, as behaviour is not an issue despite the intake. There is virtually no poor behaviour and there is certainly no classroom disruption.

The challenge - where 'trained teachers' not just 'people with academic qualifications' are needed - is in teaching children who find learning difficult and enabling them toi make progress which is at least as fast, and if possible faster, than those who find learning easy (all children in my school are targeted to make the same amount of progress - above that expected nationally - despite the different starting points, and in fact many of the children who find learning more difficult are targeted to make MORE progress in order that they may catch up) . Nothing to do with classroom management, everything to do with the skill of teaching.

Not sure if you meant me - I did get your point, and I do not assume that all state schools require crowd management - I have taught in one that did not - just that poor teachers or lazy ones can hide behind crowd control, and it is in state schools that you will find them.

(sorry, just seen that you were addressing hopeful

However, the laziest teacher I know teaches in a local prep school (I know her socially through our sons). Because she has a class of compliant children of very similar ability, for whom a straight 'transmission of information' teaching style is appropriate, she has the same Powerpoint and the same worksheets for year after year, and those are the only teaching tools she ever uses. She talks, then she gives out the same worksheet to every child, then they complete them. End of lesson, on to the next. Yes, she may have had to prepare more 'subject coverage' per lesson once upon a time, but she never worries about resources, different learning styles, never uses ICT for the pupils, never does any active learning, never changes the content. Just talks, then hands out worksheets. Ticks them, marks 'well done' (she doesn't do formative assessment), job done...

An ex-colleague moved from the state comp I teach in to a local independent school. At her interview, she wowed them with what she considered a "safe bet" fairly conservative lesson and they considered an all-singing, all-dancing affair. I agree with T2K that it can be easier to be a "lazy" teacher in a class of compliant kids. But as a previous poster said, the challenges are just different.

Teacher, I understood what you were saying about teaching a range of abilities. The issue about classroom management surely doesn't much manifest itself at prep/primary level does it? Or does it? Mine are both at secondary now, and it is a huge issue in the local comp, still an issue but not much of one in the superselective grammar, and doesn't seem to exist as an issue in the selective independent secondaries.

I'm with teacherwith2kids. I do teach secondary Science, but in a challenging school with a very wide ability range. I teach students on track for an A* at A2 and students on P scales. The intellectual challenge is teaching the range. I recruit bright, well educated teachers. I think you'd be pleasantly surprised at a list of where we came from. In a school like mine, it's particularly important I think.

"But as a previous poster said, the challenges are just different."

Absolutely agreed.

There are good, and bad, teachers in both sectors.

Some of the good ones in each sector will have high academic qualifications, as will some of the bad ones.

A teaching qualification is no guarantee of being a good teacher in either sector.

The intellectual challenge of teaching may come from the subject content, from planning how to overcome barriers to learning or misunderstandings, or from tyhinking about how to engage disaffected pupils, or from managing parental expectations, or from wrestling with data ... or from a balance of them all, and that balance may be different on different days, let alone in different schools. That's what makes the job fun.

The chemistry which makes a good teacher for a particular pupil is not always predictable, and is definitely not correlated in any way with on-paper qualifications.

Apologies if this has already been said: but surely the point about independent schools generally is that, not that they necessarily take the best teachers but that they take the most able students.

The difference between a successful school and an unsuccessful one is overwhelmingly down to the quality of the teaching staff. As tw2k says teaching effectively is a complex business and the HT has to find the right fit for his particular school and its intake, the particular department being recruited for and its existing staff. His choice may be very limited because of the subject, because of his needs in relation to the existing make up of the department, the time of year an advertisement goes out, and even the geographical location of the school. Big name London independents tend to have their pick. The point about different abilities is relevant in all schools, even those with a high achieving intake: there is not a single school in the country where a teacher can go into a classroom and not face a range of abilities (even if that range is narrow) and a range of personalities which affects each student's learning.

blink - some take the most able students from those who apply.

Same with teachers - surely every employer takes the best person for the job from the pool available (ie the applicants)

To read some posts on this thread, one would be forgiven for thinking that in any one year, everyone who wants to be a teacher is put into some kind of rank order, then allocated employment based on where they come in the list. Same with children.

I teach in a comp in an area with state grammars. Some parents choose not to send their kids to the grammars. In one Year 8 class, I have one girl who is so far ahead of her peers that she has been put in for GCSE Art this year, and is also streets ahead in terms of literacy. In my subject (drama) she is one of three in the class who are at Level 7a. In the same class, I have students who are barely hitting a Level 4a.

Should the 7a students be taken out and put in an independent school?

I agree with teacherwith2kids as well.

I work in a state school (admin) and have a DS in an independent school.

The best teachers are not the ones with the best paper qualifications, in either school. A certain empathy, understanding, ability to "get" children and connect with them is something I don't think can be taught - you either have it, or you don't.

Same with teachers - surely every employer takes the best person for the job from the pool available (ie the applicants)

I wonder if this isnt a key question sometimes. I am sure most parents think that teachers are selected according to who is the best but I have found from experience that in many state schools cost is the most significant factor in appointment ( and when budgets are pushed this means young/ inexperienced or NQT's - or even non qualified because it is not true state schools must employ qualified teachers at all) where in a school such as that where I work, qualifications and experience as a teacher ( and exam track record for those teaching top of the Senior School) is important.

It is very difficult to get a list of qualifications to make comparisons. I never had and still do not have a clue as to the qualifications of my ex colleagues from the state school I last taught in. I do know the composition of those in my current school. I can say that most of my current school are graduates in the subjects they teach, are graduates from Oxbridge / Durham / London or an old Red Brick - I dont use the Russell Group definition as it is largely a self promoting group of universities who have hyped themselves up in my opinion. A significant proportion of the staff where I work are also Ph.D holders or Masters degree holders and all have a teaching qualification and are QTS. Although I cannot say exactly what classification of degree they would hold, I would say a lot of them had at least an upper second ( of the old school of awards - not those now!) and I do know there are at least three with firsts. But we are nearly all old foggies - the youngest teacher on the staff is 35 . We dont lose staff and many are almost as long serving as "Mr. Chips" . A lot of us had careers before working in independents. I also know a lot of us " served our time" in state schools to " give back" to the system before jumping ship.

Does all of that make them good teachers? Some would say not here but it certainly explains why we have top examination results from pupils who are larely those who the local selective schools decided were not " good enough" for them. Although of course we have our share of scholarship pupils who do well in exams and push standards up . We also have a fairly broad selection of more challeneged pupils too .

Although, as I said, I do not know what qualifications my ex colleagues from state school had, I know a large number of them were young,inexperienced and often started out as NQT and often stayed less than five years in the school. I also know a lot of them were not specialist in their subject areas because they had said so to me.

So, it is true that independent schools may look for different characteristics in teachers and that cost is often not an element in their choices.