Is your school allowing trainee teachers in?

[RooTheRabbit]

Hello

I'm a trainee teacher. I'm doing a PGCe with an English university.

Sadly, because of COVID, I haven't been given a placement yet. Some of my course mates have, but most of us haven't.

The Uni claim that it's the schools' fault. They say that the schools don't want us at the moment as they're too busy. Is this true?

I'm really worried that I won't qualify.

I'm not young, so I can't afford to spend another year studying.

We’ve got trainees in.

We've not, despite having trainees for at least the past 2 years (I wasn't in school before then). Not sure if that is covid related but I suspect it might be unfortunately. That sounds like a really difficult situation for you to be in.

We’ve got three in my school and they’re staying until July.

Yes we have

Yes but not as many as usual.

Yes, but only one per class. Everyone"s got one though.

We have, but again not as many as usual and only from the local SCITT instead of from the large uni which is quite a distance away.

In science we could accept up to two trainees usually but this year we have only taken one as we have nowhere they could work in a socially distanced way.

A lot of schools are in chaos right now, so even if they had previously agreed to take a trainee they might have changed their minds.

I do feel bad for you, but unis will have had some idea of the situation in September, and perhaps should have deferred students rather than accepting them knowing it would be difficult to find placements.

I think you need to ask for an honest discussion with the uni about what happens if they can't find you a placement.

BTW, I don't think it's a case of "too busy" - I think it's a case of either staff shortages or worrying it is a risk to have external students coming in and passing coronavirus on to school staff and students.

If students are having to self isolate a lot, schools may also feel they can't offer a good training environment!

We have 2 compared to our usual 8 or 10. We only have them in our large departments where we can allocate a few members of staff to mentor and support them. We don't have the slack anywhere else plus staff have to volunteer to mentor as they do not get extra time or money for it. This year is more difficult than ever.

I would normally take 6 now and 6 next placement. I have none. We're not allowing any visitors at all - except the ofsted team who came in.
It's not "too busy"; it's "too risky"

My eldest is doing her PGCE this year and started in her placement school a week before half term and will be there until February. She is however currently off for 2 weeks as her mentor tested positive. She is doing her first online lesson this week! She is one of 3 trainees in her large primary. Hope you get sorted soon.

We have trainees in, but I know that our training coordinator is inundated with pleas to take more as so many schools are not having trainees this year.

I'm on a PGCE and have been in school since September (scitt). However, we were all due to move schools in January and we are all staying put in our first school. I think switching trainees about is just too risky.

Have your uni got a back up plan for you all? Don't you have to get so many teaching days in before you can qualify? We're due to finish about a month before schools so we have a bit of 'catch up' time if necessary

We run School Direct. All our trainees (over 50) are in school and have been since September, although with a more gentle start than usual. All but one is also attending face to face training with us ( and that one is joiningus via Zoom, along with whichever other trainees are self-isolating that week.

The difficulties we have is in the primary trainees crossing bubbles to observe other teachers, us getting in to observe the trainees, and the constant in-out as bubbles pop.

But they are in, and training, and in the midst of everything else, the school mentors are doing a great professional job of supporting them.

We have trainees in, but fewer than usual as our nqts need much more support than normal due to only having half a training year.

We've got trainees in (secondary).

What is your uni saying about how you will pass if there aren't placements? Are you paying for your course?

My infant school has a number of trainee teachers in at present.
Unfortunate they've pretty much all managed to catch COVID here, along with a lot of the staff. They're all back now though and in long term. Mix of in service type training and PGCEs. No degree students yet, but normally that's later in the year for us,

My dd is in her first year of a primary teaching degree and they aren't having placements this year. It's been moved online to be virtual, no idea how that will actually work out. The PGCE students are the same. Their university have blamed the schools in west Lancashire for the lack of placements.

A friend is at a primary school near Birmingham. They allowed a trainee in and then a couple of days later she tested positive. The trainee initially declared she had not symptoms which is why it was allowed. Now my friend has tested positive so she if off school!

People who have trainees at your school, are the trainees staying for both of their placements or will they be moving on after their first placement as usual?

We have trainees in, they have a much gentler timetable and aren’t allowed to fully teach lessons that are both in school and on teams synchronously, but yes we have them, and yes they are teaching. Some ( don’t know about all) are staying for the entire year rather than 2 different placements. Your uni is being quite unreasonable though, you cannot pass if you haven’t had any teaching practice.

@StaffAssociationRepresentative

A friend is at a primary school near Birmingham. They allowed a trainee in and then a couple of days later she tested positive. The trainee initially declared she had not symptoms which is why it was allowed. Now my friend has tested positive so she if off school!

We had almost the opposite. The trainees came in. It was our school COVID going round that infected the students. One had only been in a school a couple of days before the teacher tested positive.

@Popsicales
All our primary trainees will be moving to a placement in a second school, and changing key stage too, at February half term. Usually their first placement ends at Christmas and their second runs Jan - June, but we have evened them up because we frontloaded the training to give them and the schools a softer start due to Covid.

A couple of our secondary trainees are staying in the same school throughout.
They are in subjects where it was harder to find good placements this year eg. some secondaries are not currently teaching practical PE or practical music.

The DfE is allowing single school placements this year, and a reduced number of school placement days, but for the good of the trainees, we have kept the breadth of their trainee year experience as far as we possibly could.

@Popsicales

People who have trainees at your school, are the trainees staying for both of their placements or will they be moving on after their first placement as usual?

Ours is moving and AFAIK we are getting a new one after Christmas. As the swap over is either side of Christmas, I don't think its especially risky - they will have had slightly over 2 weeks away from any school. And then trainee 1 comes back after Easter.

If they were swapping over in the middle of term it might be a bit different!

I thought trainees had to experience 2 schools. Can they qualify if they don't?

I'm training this year and we're all staying put in placement 1 after Christmas. We may move to school 2 at Easter (covid depending) but the scitt has said as long as we have experience of 2 key stages ( primary) we could still qualify. Maybe they've changed the criteria this year. I'm just thankful that I'm actually in a school and teaching (well not brilliantly, but you know!)

Thanks everyone.

Sadly, my university is very unresponsive and cavalier towards the whole situation. Everytime someone asks whether we will qualify or not, the tutors just say that they don't know but that they're trying to work something out.

I know that times are unprecedented, but they have had since February to prepare! They should have at least had a few back-up plans up their sleeve, I think.

I'm not blaming the schools as I know that bringing strangers in is risky.