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Improving teacher training ‘central’ to Covid recovery plan, says Williamson

Improving training for teachers throughout their careers will be “central” to the government’s Covid recovery plan, the education secretary has said, but he’s keeping quiet for now on how such improvements will be made. Gavin Williamson told the NASUWT teaching union conference this afternoon that the country needed “to go further, faster, to improve the […]

Revealed: The 77 schools set to run new £65m ‘teaching school hubs’

Seventy-seven schools have been selected to run 81 new teaching school hubs across England, with £65 million in funding made available by government. It takes the total number of hubs to 87. Six initial hubs were announced in January last year with £1.1 million in initial funding, though this represented a scaling-back of the original […]

Schools forced to rethink teacher training after ‘short-sighted’ grant cut

Schools are being forced to rethink whether their entire teacher training programmes are “viable” after the government took an axe to the level of teacher training bursaries and grants from next year. All bursaries previously offered to teacher trainees in shortage subjects have either been reduced or scrapped, while the much-vaunted early-career payments of up […]

1 in 5 new teachers not employed in state schools within 16 months of qualifying

Nearly a fifth of teachers were not teaching in a state-funded school in England within 16 months of qualifying, new statistics released today show. Figures released by the Department for Education reveal that the percentage of teachers working in a state school a year and four months after being awarded qualified teacher status dropped from […]

School-led teacher training routes pull further ahead

The proportion of trainee teachers that took the government’s favoured school-led route into the profession increased again last year, new figures have revealed. The Department for Education published initial teacher training statistics for 2016-17 this morning, and figures show the overall number of trainees gaining their QTS has remained stable at 91 per cent, the same […]

‘Strengthened’ QTS proposals will cost at least £336 million

Schools need at least £336 million more per year to pay for the government’s proposed changes to teacher induction, according to new figures shared exclusively with Schools Week. New plans to extend the induction period of new teachers were positively received last week, but without more money to provide the additional support, schools won’t be […]

DfE ‘looking at’ resilience measure for trainee teachers

A Bradford teacher-training organisation has reduced drop-out rates by screening applicants for their resilience. The wastage rate of teacher trainees at Bradford SCITT fell from 10 per cent to one per cent in the first year after applicants’ resilience was measured and those with low scores were targeted with support. The man behind the idea, […]

Teach First increases trainee numbers more in south than north

Teach First has made progress placing trainees in the north of England but is still struggling in some areas, reflecting the recruitment difficulties faced by schools there. Figures seen exclusively by Schools Week show 630 trainees have been posted in northern areas and the Midlands this year, while 741 are stationed in the south including […]