Should the DfE be offering £26k bursaries to train as a Classics teacher?

[noblegiraffe]

Given the recruitment and retention crisis and the school funding crisis, is it really the best use of funds to be paying £26k for teachers to train in Classics (and then presumably sod straight off to the private sector)?

Although I doubt they're expecting many takers, it does seem to display completely messed up priorities.

I'm half wondering if Toby Young has said he needs more Latin teachers for his WLFS and the DfE has, as ever, pandered to his whims.

The exams in question were GCSE

What I am repeating is that Classics is a rigorous degree, not that every Classics graduate is inherently intellectually or morally superior to all other graduates because that would be daft. Please stop imputing to me things I haven't said.

Not all Arts subjects teach the same skills therefore you can't cluster them as equally valuable under the same umbrella.

Quite right Bubbles, I'd go so far as to say the Bar is not only not prejudiced but looks very positively on Classics graduates. Logic and language - a good combination for the sharper end of the law.

Re Classics students being so clever - people seem to be mixing correlation and causation. Students who take Classics are bright because they are picked from a bright population, not because study of Classics makes them that way.

Interesting
Wonder where the stats are from.

Students who take Classics are bright because they are picked from a bright population, not because study of Classics makes them that way

This may be generally true (more likely to be taught in selective schools)
but interestingly in the case I cited, the children were mixed ability, at a nonselective, non-fee paying school, and achieved their A* As at GCSE in half the normally expected time with no extra hours per week allowed to compensate for it. Something fired them up, something was clicking.

Yes wild but how is that any different from any other teacher training?

So noble the logical corollary of your point about correlation and causation is....?

PIggy:
In the case mentioned the trainee taught English too. So they got 2 for one. This may be happening more than people realise.

It is not different from any other subject. All teacher training should have a bursary imo. But Classics must have been in specially short supply. Classics graduates who were on the difficult language university courses (some with higher debts) are also attracted to law and banking
HIgher bursaries/incentives are offered for science and maths I think..

I taught German when I started. If it was nowadays, I'd be reluctant to do that, having been paid less to train than an MFL teacher!

Surely if there were more Classics teachers in state schools it would enable more children to access the subject. It would bring about wider participation and what is wrong with that? Assuming we believe that Private schools don’t have a monopoly on bright children of course!

Because, Bubbles, this is the backdrop. www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/education-42862996

Schools can’t afford the teachers they have and the subjects already on the curriculum. What makes the DfE think (and I don’t think they do, btw) that extra Classics teachers floating around will enable more schools to offer it? Lack of teachers isn’t the only limiting factor.

They can often afford hugely inflated salaries for Execitive heads though. Classics should still be an aim and you shouldn’t refuse to teach Classics because you cannot get Maths teachers!

Bubbles the choice could easily be between Classics being re-introduced and ICT and D&T going, or any number of other subjects come to that - ICT and D&T are just two examples. There's no imperative to retain all the subjects currently on offer and different stakeholders will have differing views.

Our head was persuaded by a very inspiring (non specialist ) ex teacher to introduce classics. She did Latin GCSE and A level herself and then wanted to introduce it. The students loved her and results were OK but uptake was only big enough to teach mixed year groups. She left and the subject is now taught by a physics teacher and a German teacher. The physics teacher is very enthusiastic about classics in state schools. But uptake does remain low and last year's results progress measures wise (of course largely because our students are being measured against typical progress and results of classics students nationwide who tend to be at selective schools) were abysmal. Maybe this situation would be resolved by recruiting a specialist - but it won't happen, I am sure.

I fear the subject will be allowed to fizzle out.

I don't think my school is ruthless about stuff like this but if we need the physics teacher to teach all physics, they won't recruit a classics teacher to replace a small amount of teaching.

The schools opting to take on a Classics trainee presumably do this out of their own choice having weighed up the pros and cons. And presumably they do it thinking this would benefit their school, especially as such trainees are likely to have other subjects they can teach too. It seems doubtful they would do it if it meant not hiring a needed maths or English teacher.

I think it would have helped a lot to have a specialist in the school you mentioned Piggy. Unselected state school pupils can take to this subject and do very well. It is abstract and logical and can be a satisfying subject for this reason, as well as for the usual linguistic ones.

I don't understand what you mean by unselected?

I think classicists are likely to have other subjects there is no shortage in!

What did I mean by Unselected, Piggy?: sorry that was unclear.

Because you had mentioned
(of course largely because our students are being measured against typical progress and results of classics students nationwide who tend to be at selective schools)

I meant pupils who were at schools where they had not been selected for their ability, being taught Latin regardless of their ability.

( Some non-selective schools might opt to only allow the top streamed set to study Latin. These would be the known able children. But others can do well, find they take to it and start to blossom.)

Classists might very easily have English or maths as a subject - I think Noble mentioned both of those as being in short supply. They might well have a modern language too, and music.

I do of course recognise that schools have financial pressures and have to make choices. BIL is teaching Geography but he’s a MFL specialist. However it would be best not to close the door to any subject or indeed teachers that could teach several subjects.

I don't think you understand the progress measures I was referring to maybe wild .

Classicists are most likely to have history as a second subject. Either way it's been in the past a whole other thread about the desirability of teachers teaching outside of subject specialism.

And as I said, if I was a history or English teacher who had received a smaller bursary to do the very same job and a classicist was teaching my subject as a bit of backfill because there wasn't enough of their own subject for them to teach, which I was arguably better at teaching , I'd be a bit miffed!

I don't really know what progress measures are, but as you said they were abysmal I thought that might be because there had not been a specialist teacher.

As I said I think all subjects should get a bursary. But I wonder how you feel about physics, languages, computing, chemistry, geography, getting £28,000? biology £26,000? and maths up to £30,000?

These all attract a higher bursary than English, D & T, History, Music and primary maths do?

I forgot to attach shots of the page I saw those bursary figures.

Surly LA/academy chains could employ a Classics teacher between their schools.

I do not think the massive disparity between the bursaries offered for different subjects is a good thing, though I know there is reasoning behind it. I think it can often lead aspiring teachers to train in a subject different from the one they most love and would most like to teach, opting instead for subject with a higher bursary. Then they either burn out more quickly, or, having qualified in their shortage subject, move to teach in the non-shortage one they always wanted to teach anyway.

Incidentally, though, there is a shortage of Classics teachers in state schools; the number of Classics teachers required in state schools is growing, and more state than private schools offer Latin in the UK. There are not enough University places to train these teachers which is why, increasingly, state schools are offering School Direct for Classics. I do not think Classics teachers who get the Government bursary to train are any more likely to then disappear off to private schools than trainees from other subjects: the jobs are there in the state sector if they want them. Private schools are still generally flexible about employing Classics teachers without QTS, and there is a popular on-the-job private-school route to a PGCE through Buckingham University.

So, I think most Classics trainees taking the Government Bursary (leaving £17,000 after course fees are paid) are doing so because they want to work in the state sector; otherwise, they could get the same or more money through the Buckingham route, or even forego the PGCE altogether.

Thanks for that crickets : genuinely interesting.

Are the preponderance of state schools offering classics in pockets of the country or are they spread about?