Developing people, improving young lives NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED School/University Partnerships: Beyond Outstanding? UCET Conference 3/4 November 2011

developing people, improving young lives NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED

School/University Partnerships: Beyond Outstanding?

UCET Conference3/4 November 2011

NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED

The Context

• Last Autumn’s White Paper

• This Summer’s Green Paper

• The new Ofsted Framework for Initial Training

• The imminent Implementation Plan

• The 2012/13 Targets and Allocations


What is the Implementation Plan likely to cover?

Quality Systems

• Teacher Standards• Application System• Skills Tests Pre-Entry• Bursaries• Priority Subjects• Specialist Primary Teachers• SSP, behaviour etc• Timing of Targets/Allocations• Regulation & Accreditation

Quality Programmes

• Mainstream• Teach First• GTP• SCITT• School Direct• Troops to Teachers• University Training

Schools


i. What are likely to be the drivers of future

school/University partnerships in initial

teacher training?


Is this a fair summary of the likely drivers?

• Trainees to have more access to outstanding schools and outstanding teachers?

• More schools to have the key say on who gets recruited and who does the training?

• More schools to be approved as trainers in their own right? • DfE funding likely to be restricted to the very best entrants in the

subjects with the greatest need? • More pressure on providers to improve quality still further, or lose

training places?


ii. What is the best way of regulating future

partnerships in initial teacher training?


What are the key things we want to get out of regulation?

• Greater stability and certainty? • All ITT to be supported and quality-assured by a

top-quality University?• More room for the best training departments and for

those with a strong research base?• More focus on what schools need to do to be

outstanding partners?


Do we know what we want to regulate? And how?

The Whats?

• Schools• Universities• Consortia• Partnerships• Trainers• Those conferring QTS

The Hows?

• Accreditation• Licensing • Allocations• Funding• Inspection


Is it time to move on from accreditation as a model?

• How well does it ensure that schools play their full part in partnerships?

• How well can it cope with the emerging models of school-based training, which start from an assessment by schools of their own supply needs?

• How well do the accreditation arrangements mesh with the systems for allocating places to providers?

• How well does it cope with geographical needs?

• How good a guide does it offer potential students, as they exercise their consumer choices in the new fee-based system?

• How well could it cope with any consolidation in the provider world?

BUT what could replace it? Would that be worse?


iii. How do we attract more high potential

candidates into teaching?


Recruitment has been promising, but there are some potential icebergs

• 2011-12 has been a good recruitment year, and the best ever for physics and chemistry

• There is clear evidence that the Secretary of State’s aspirations for teaching to be a top profession have reached the public

But it is hard to predict the impact of …– Future revival of the economy– Changes in funding arrangements– Adverse media claims that there is over-training/not enough jobs for

NQTs.


We need to keep a clear focus on what attracts people into the top professions

• The status the profession has in the eyes of the public

• The opportunity for career progression

• The chance to have a wider influence

• The opportunity for personal renown

• The likely financial rewards, especially for those with seniority


The routes to the top in other great professions all look something like this:

Medicine

• Medical Degree• Foundation Doctor• Speciality Registrar• Consultant

Law

• Law degree• Student Barrister• Pupillage• Junior Barrister• Queen’s Counsel


We have been very successful in creating for teachers a strong path to senior leadership and management roles, through the superb work of the National College…

…We have not yet created for teachers a path to the top for our leading practitioners,

equivalent to being a Silk or a Surgeon.


But Singapore has gone even further than that:


If we could create a path for our leading practitioners, we would go a long way to realising …

• Significant new opportunities for career progression, within schools and through joint appointments with Universities

• Increased chances to have a wider influence, eg through research undertaken in a subject specialism and its pedagogy

• Greater opportunity for personal renown, eg by being a nationally and internationally renowned academic/consultant teacher

• Better financial rewards, for the minority who achieve the pinnacle of the profession.

Thereby improving the status of teaching in the eyes of the public.


We would also give effect to Michael Gove’s aspiration for “teachers to be seen alongside University academics as the intellectual guardians of the nation”.

Making progress on this ambition will require a fundamental rethink of what we

mean by school/university partnerships.


iv. How will we know we have gone beyond

“outstanding”?


A provisional list …?

• Schools would find it hard to achieve an outstanding Ofsted rating unless they made a strong contribution to partnerships?

• The best Universities would help the teaching profession conspicuously “own” the responsibility for training the next generation of teachers?

• Partnership would cover the spectrum of ITT and CPD, notwithstanding the different funding arrangements

• Joint staff appointments by outstanding schools and Universities, in teaching and research, would be commonplace?

• The best schools and teachers would continually be learning from the best universities and academics, and vice versa?

• The best providers would offer training in parts of the country where performance was less strong?


Discussion

Documents

Developing people, improving young lives NOT PROTECTIVELY MARKED School/University Partnerships: Beyond Outstanding? UCET Conference 3/4 November 2011