Schools advertising for 'unqualified teachers'

[roamingespadrille]

This is what a number of our local schools are advertising. Very low pay attached to it. Job description is a full teaching job.

Yes, the SLT of the school. It would suit them very well to get staff on the cheap.

I'm an uqt in an academy
I started off in this role as a cover teacher/ teaching assistant. I then started building up my teaching hours. 4 years later I feel ready to become qualified. I already have a degree.
I have a mentor who works with any other qualified teachers and nqts.
I'm subject to observations the same as everybody else. I get paid the sane wage as an not in their first year.
The thought that I wouldn't care who I'm teaching/have the necessary knowledge is quite insulting. You can't judge everyone the same just like you can't judge all teachers the same

Can you imagine, work as an unqualified teacher (on a pittance)for a year before training. Work as an unqualified teacher, fail to uphold the policies of the school including safeguarding, fail to understand national standards and progress measures, miss targets, struggle with behaviour and classroom management, be eaten alive by the kids, parents and SLT....oh and then in your second year decide to train as a teacher. Hahaha!

I teach part-time and have twice job-shared with unqualified teachers. In reality, this has meant I had to do the lion's share of the assessment, paperwork etc. Also means I have to teach all PE and lead all school trips for insurance purposes. I'm not sure how they get around this in academies with full-time unqualified teachers.

User I'm sorry my teaching qualification isn't meaningful or rigorously assessed according to you.

Thank goodness I work in Scotland where all this unqualified teachers/TAs working as teachers etc doesn't exist.

I can assure you our qualifications are both meaningful and rigorously assessed.

For context, I actually support the use of unconventionally qualified teachers.

I am a second in department at a very respected international school. My first degree isn't in the subject I teach, although I do have a PGCE & 20 years experience.

One of the best teachers in my department has no formal teaching qualifications. She fell into teaching 30 years ago after accompanying her teacher dh to Forn Parts.

Should she be eligible to teach on the UK (she's eccentric but not totally bonkers, so unlikely she'd want to tbh). Absolutely. There should be a fast track mechanism in place to UK QTS.

On the job schemes like Teach First? Fine.

Where I part company with User14 is that by her own account the school in which she has a somewhat amorphous & debateable role is quite dreadful. TAs are incompetent & not managed or supported. Exam administration is blood curdlingly incompetent to the point of jeopardising the legitimacy of results. Apparently, students telling teaching staff to fuck off & leave them to play on their phones is both endemic & unchallenged.

At this point, when user14 tells us that unqualified teaching staff are just as good qualified staff, I'd argue that she has failed to prove the case.

To weigh in to this debate (as a qualified teacher of many years experience) I have to say that advertising for an unqualified teacher feels like someone is stamping a big red 'ANYONE CAN DO YOUR JOB' on my forehead. And that really pisses me off. Yeah right - you don't need any training to do so...thanks.

It also feels like saying to our kids 'Of course your education is highly important - but you don't actually need to be taught by anyone who is qualified to do so'. How the hell do we convince our pupils that working hard for qualifications is crucial if they are being told by the schools and the government that actually it's not. Cos hey, you could get a job as a teacher.

There should be a fast track mechanism in place to UK QTS.

There is. The Assessment Only route for already qualified individuals who just need an official stamp of approval on their teaching. This should take less than 3 months.

User appears to be talking about staff in her school who are not in a position to be signed off in this way, but are also not on an approved training path, but with the promise that they will eventually get QTS. This seems dubious.

she is hugely inconsistent in her many posts

Yep, holding up her school as an example of apparently good practice, stuffed with amazing teachers with no qualifications, then on the other thread holding it up as an example of terrible practice. Still I guess all those unqualified teachers explains why they have so much money to hire TAs.

Thanks noble. It's outside my direct experience in the UK as everyone I worked with there had QTS via the obvious routes of PGCE, Teach First etc, but that sounds entirely sensible.

We're a bit more Wild West about these things overseas, with frankly mixed results. I've just spent two years managing, & ultimately managing out, a colleague whose qualifications a) didn't really qualify him to teach the courses we needed him to cover, & b) were distinctly whiffy on investigation anyway.

He was a nice guy but a total liability. Has now moved on to a headship somewhere where they're desperate for English speaking teachers & aren't fussy about references.

4 years later I feel ready to become qualified

This is so bloody depressing. Someone has been working as a teacher for 4 years before deciding that they actually are ready to learn how to do it properly. How have you been duped into not training sooner?

That's interesting about the assessment only route noble. I know someone interested in doing this. What qualifications do you already need, do you know?

teachers without a PGCE are not teachers

I have been teaching in England for nearly 10 years. I don't have PGCE. I do have QTS.

I can't teach in Scotland without a PGCE mind you.......

Grace you need a degree or equivalent, GCSE C in maths and English, or equivalent, have passed the skills tests (so standard teaching requirements). You also need to have taught in two different schools as an unqualified teacher, and the government guidance suggests that anyone with less than 2 years teaching experience wouldn't be eligible.

I've just looked more closely at the criteria and it says your degree has to be from a UK institution so I guess that would rule out overseas candidates.

www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/548016/AO_criteria_supporting_advice.pdf

The degree requirement means that that job advert I posted earlier for an unqualified maths teacher with an NVQ level 3 won't be headed for qualified teacher status any time soon.

Work as an unqualified teacher, fail to uphold the policies of the school including safeguarding, fail to understand national standards and progress measures, miss targets, struggle with behaviour and classroom management, be eaten alive by the kids, parents and SLT...

I don't understand why you think these things are more likely without a PGCE!

User I'm sorry my teaching qualification isn't meaningful or rigorously assessed according to you.

it is entirely subjective

Thank goodness I work in Scotland where all this unqualified teachers/TAs working as teachers etc doesn't exist.

so you have a PGDE instead of a PGCE?

so you consider yourself "qualified" but many in England won't? And many in Scotland wouldn't consider a PGCE of any value!

The constant arguements in schools about whether or not to employ people as qualified if the "only" have a Scottish qualification just shows how meaningless it all is.

I can assure you our qualifications are both meaningful and rigorously assessed.

possibly, possibly not, it is not only entirely subjective but it is also frequently rubber stamped by people who have no interest in anything other than the pass rate.

I've known people with PGCEs be unable to hold a job for more than a couple of weeks, because they are so lacking in any knowledge or skills

incidentally, I have also known PGCE students who HAVE BEEN well taught and well supported.

stuffed with amazing teachers

Actually, I am talking about more than one school, but yes, since you ask, the school I am currently in IS stuffed with amazing teachers, some are beyond brilliant, ( including some who are not qualified, but are heading that way after their two years experience)

The policies imposed by the government and ofsted are awful, the behaviour is awful and the management is insanely awful, but some of the teachers are the best I have ever come cross.

Which shows how meaningless targets and PM is, because they will never get the statistices that a teacher in a better school will get, even though the teacher in the better school may be less than half as good.

I do find that a lot of people on these threads show no familiarity at all with the reality of the English education system as it actually is on the ground, and don't like it when their little assumptions and illusions come up against the actual real truth!

Remember the story of the Emperor's new clothes? The PGCE is very much like that!

Our school very occasionally employs UQTs. I've been here 8 years and in that time we've employed 2. Both were already working at the school in support roles and when an opportunity became available the HT wanted them to be able to train. The difference being that they are given very small timetables (about 50%, I think) and are only ever used as UQTs for the year that we spend training them. Using unqualified staff to teach full timetables on a permanent basis shouldn't be legal. It's exploitative and the only real benefit is that it's cheap. If you have someone who would make a great teacher then as a school you should invest in training them properly, IMO. That doesn't have to be a traditional pgce but it does need to result in QTS.

some who are not qualified, but are heading that way after their two years experience)

So your school is screwing these people by hiring them as cheap unqualified teachers for two years with the carrot of then doing the assessment only route (how do they get their requirement to teach in two schools?), not on a recognised training course, when they could have done a Schools Direct salaried training course, been qualified and on the better paid main teaching scale after one year and you think this is a good thing?