Teacher recruitment plans for 2023-24 have been compared to ‘filling a bath without a plug’ as they fail to address chronic retention issues.
The Department for Education has announced £196 million, an 8.9% increase, to attract more teachers across key subjects, funding scholarships, bursaries and salary grants to help thousands of candidates through their initial teacher training.
Scholarships for those opting to teach mathematics, physics, chemistry and computing will be increased to up to £30,000 tax-free, to attract more trainee teachers to support the delivery of the new Advanced British Standard, announced by the prime minister last week.
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Existing teachers in the first five years of their careers teaching priority subjects in disadvantaged schools will receive £6,000 tax-free per year.
Education secretary Gillian Keegan said: “The new Advanced British Standard will expand the range of what our 16 to 19-year-olds learn and finally end the artificial divide between academic and technical education.
“We know teachers will be key to its success – just as they have been to raising standards since 2010. That’s why we need the best and the brightest teaching throughout our schools. These bursaries give trainee teachers even more choice and support to help them start their journey into the classroom.
“Since its launch, the department has made considerable progress delivering its teacher recruitment and retention strategy to attract, retain and develop the highly skilled teachers needed to inspire the next generation.”
It’s like filling a bath without a plug to keep the water in. Almost 44,000 teachers left the profession last year and retention rates for new recruits after their first-year teaching actually fell” – Ian Hartwright
Recent data has shown that schools in England now have more teachers than ever before. There are now 470,000 teachers in the workforce, up by 27,000 or 6% since 2010.
But Ian Hartwright, head of policy at school leaders’ union NAHT, said: “These proposals follow a well-worn path which has failed to deliver and by focusing so heavily on recruitment the government isn’t doing nearly enough address the similarly concerning crisis in retention of teachers and school leaders.
“It’s like filling a bath without a plug to keep the water in. Almost 44,000 teachers left the profession last year and retention rates for new recruits after their first-year teaching actually fell. While the government points to record numbers of teachers in schools, it fails to mention that the number of pupils in state-funded schools in England has risen by almost double the rate of the teaching workforce.
“Without a far more ambitious and comprehensive approach from the government, school leaders will continue to struggle to ensure all children have the teachers they need to flourish. It’s vital the government’s refreshed recruitment and retention strategy includes tangible measures to tackle the route causes of this crisis, including not only unsustainable levels of workload, but also the damaging impact of Ofsted inspections and the real-terms pay cuts inflicted on the profession over the last decade.”
The Department for Education also said the international relocation payment pilot will continue for a second year, supporting candidates from abroad.
The government last month announced a teachers’ workload reduction taskforce to help reduce working hours for teachers and leaders by five hours per week.
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