Teaching to stop being a graduate-only profession - 18 year old teachers.

[noblegiraffe]

There were rumblings about this a while ago when the apprenticeship levy was introduced, but it looks like Justine Greening is going to introduce an apprencticeship route into teaching.

schoolsweek.co.uk/greening-teaching-will-cease-to-be-only-for-university-graduates/

I'm very concerned that in secondary schools, specialist subject knowledge won't be a pre-requisite for going into the classroom, it will be seen as something that can be picked up across the years, shortchanging the classes who get the apprentice in the first few years of the training (how long is an apprenticeship?).

In primary school, the education of a class for a full year could fall to someone just out of school themselves.

This isn't just about training on-the-job, we already have that as a route into teaching. This is about deprioritising a certain level of education for teachers and devaluing the profession. It's saying you don't need to be well-educated to teach, because you could be teaching straight out of school. The 'learning how to teach' part of any teacher training programme is so intense, that acquiring degree-level subject knowledge will certainly not be a priority from the start.

The wage for apprentices means this is just another way for schools to get teachers on the cheap and hang the consequences for education.

And knowing how many parents already view young teachers, fresh out of uni and just finished their PGCE, how will they take to having their child being taught by someone who hasn't even been to university?

You know the current, existing, school centred ITT schemes - they'll look the same. That's what'll happen. Boring huh?

titchy
You know the current, existing, school centred ITT schemes - they'll look the same. That's what'll happen. Boring huh?

You mean the ones where they have to stand in front of a classroom and teach in their first year?

But with 18 year olds rather 21 year old graduates, no?

But they are funded completely differently ? And are post graduate?

I am still confused...

You know the current, existing, school centred ITT schemes - they'll look the same. That's what'll happen. Boring huh?

But that is a post-grad scheme!

OK, so... according to The Guardian, the government wants to attract big company sponsorship for this (which is a concern in itself) and, in particular, thinks this should attract STEM teachers. That does rather sound like secondary maths to me!!

To me, the age is less of a big deal to me as it is to some. It's the logistics that bother me .

It's only this thread that has mentioned 18 year olds! You won't get 18 year olds in secondary.

The funding is different in that schools, or MATs will use their levy to pay the university fees. They're being charged the levy anyway so this way they can use it (they can of course use it to fund other Apprenticeships - a teaching assistant one, maybe the school bursar could do the Manager degree apprenticeship and lab techs another one).

So a French graduate could be employed as a teaching apprentice by a school who pays for their PG qualification by drawing on their levy fund. The graduate is earning a salary which they wouldn't as a full time student. The school supervises them in the same way they supervised those on school based ITT last year.

That all sounds sensible titchy but it definitely isn't what Greening said. She has explicitly stated that teaching will stop being a graduate at entry profession and that apprenticeships will provide degree and training.

As I said, I don't care of they are 18 or 45. I have seen shocking late career entry teachers far more often than ones who enter at 21/22.

I can't see the need for post graduate apprenticeships under your model when there are already so many entry routes these days.

The pay is very low. That's why people are thinking that young people-perhaps with parents who can support them-will be the most tempted. Many older people who have children, mortgages and bills, can't afford to be paid £3.50 an hour.

Ok, so I misunderstood, titchy, I thought the apprenticeship levy would be used to pay the apprentice salary. It's not allowed to be used to do that.

So what you're thinking will happen is that schools will pay an apprentice a salary out of their staffing budget, use the apprentice levy to send them to university and not actually be allowed to use the apprentice to teach any classes, especially not in secondary.

Can anyone see any problems with this?

A few thought from Schools Week on some of the issues. What she says about he two routes with QTS being like giving a GCSE to both GCSE and A Level students is particularly interesting, I think.

schoolsweek.co.uk/why-teaching-apprenticeships-are-a-mess-and-how-to-solve-it/

It’s training through a degree apprenticeship so they will get a degree at the end of the apprenticeship

Brilliant.

I did the GTP course. Quite frankly it was a joke. I didn’t have a clue. I had one day a week of sub standard training and the teacher I was assigned to was, I now realise, dreadful. My degree is nothing to do with education and I had never worked in a school before. 15 years in I now feel I know what I am doing. I don’t see a problem with someone doing a much better course over 3 years, but I do think you should be at least 21.

Can anyone see any problems with this?

Well schools pay School Direct trainees now out of their budgets....

But hiding, who will ensure it is better??

It's the being charged a levy anyway that I have the issue with. Public sector bodies that are being forced to cut staffing budgets should not also be forced to pay a levy.

It should be possible for them to choose not to pay the levy and also choose not to have an apprentice. If it isn't then that money will have to come from reducing the hours of other staff or making them redundant or not replacing existing staff as they leave.

Unless I'm misunderstanding and the levy isn't payed by the employer but by central government from another budget.

titchy Schools Direct trainees teach pretty much a full timetable and are in sole charge of classes.
Your apprentices would be off at university, not even in school, and when they're in school you're insistent that they won't be in front of a class, let alone in charge of one.

It's the being charged a levy anyway that I have the issue with. Public sector bodies that are being forced to cut staffing budgets should not also be forced to pay a levy.

Yes I'd agree with that! Imagine how much the NHS's levy payment is....

I'm not insisting they won't be in a class at all (they'll be at university one day a week btw - they're part time), merely pointing out that the reality is that teaching Apprenticeships are pretty identical to current schemes. Just that they provide schools with a way to access the levy they've already paid, and trainees with a salary and free qualification.

I work in the NHS, I'm well aware of the issue with apprenticeships and the levy. I used public sector rather than schools for a reason.

they'll be at university one day a week btw - they're part time

Ok, and in that 1 day a week they'll be expected to pick up the subject knowledge that normally takes 3 years of university?
They won't be picking it up the rest of the week because that will be spent learning the practical teaching side of things which normally takes a year. Except they won't be as good at the teaching side of things as a Schools Direct trainee because they won't actually have a degree.

It's rather putting the cart before the horse, teaching them the practical side of teaching when they don't actually know the content, isn't it?

How long will this apprenticeship be expected to last?

Are these one day a week degrees going to be like BEds or will a wannabe maths teacher get a maths degree?

That genuinely is befuddling me.

It was all OK until noble told me that the lions' share is spent at school When I thought the school bit was one day a week , could just about get it...