CONTRIBUTORS
Can partnerships help ease the challenges for teachers?
This month NAOMI HOWELLS, Managing Director at recruitment specialists Class People and regular Education Today columnist, talks about how partnership working can alleviate pressure on teachers
The Teacher Regulation Agency (TRA) has recently announced a record number of teacher misconduct reports, fuelled in large part by parent complaints. They have seen a 60% increase in just 12 months, rising to almost 1,700 reports for the 2023-24 academic year alone. Despite not meeting their own targets for hearings to be held, the TRA has highlighted that 1,059 of the referrals have so far had no further action, due to not
meeting the threshold for serious misconduct. Regardless, it is clear that teachers are under pressure, and changing remits have the potential to impact standards.
This trend is further reflected in our meetings with schools this year. Discussing their objectives and challenges, it is evident that the role of teacher has unofficially evolved beyond its traditional boundaries. No longer simply delivering the curriculum, today’s educators are tasked with increased responsibilities: acting as a parent, friend, carer, and psychologist, all crucial in supporting the learning and development of young minds. Yet this evolution is also making the role unmanageable, adding stress to an already extensive remit, and potentially accelerating the loss of teaching staff through long-term sickness or leaving the profession altogether.
To help alleviate some of these challenges, there is potential for partnership working with other, regional educational establishments, or with appropriate charities. We’ve seen both successfully undertaken by schools this year, and I am struck by one leading example that shows the power of the collaborative approach.
Class People met with one school that has enlisted the support of charity Place2Be, to address the mental health needs of its pupils. Mounting year-round pressure on young people has fuelled 1 in 6 pupils to experience mental health challenges nationally; a trend also observed at the school. Teachers without specialist mental health training often find the issue overwhelming, lacking the necessary tools to adequately support the child. Yet the charity, with specialist skills, resources, and funding, can deliver an exemplary service, improving the lives of pupils, and alleviating teacher pressure too. The added bonus of the partnership is support to teaching staff, aiding them in identifying their own mental health issues early on and offering an outlet to process the emotional impact of working with pupils facing such challenges. Charitable and business partnerships are not the only approach. We have also seen regional educational groups forming between schools, as they seek to pool resources, share best practice, and foster collaborative working.
There is optimism that the change in government and the pledges made will fuel positive sector change, but only if they actually come to fruition. Between now and then, there is a long road for schools to navigate, tackling key issues of being under-resourced, dealing with teacher attrition, and facing growing remits. It is essential therefore that schools use every tactic available to them. We see partnerships as an incredible opportunity for schools to alleviate at least some of the mounting pressure.
September 2024 Does individual agency
matter in CPD? In his column for Education Today this month, GARETH CONYARD of the Teacher Development Trust discusses the challenges surrounding CPD for teachers and school leaders
Most teachers and school leaders need no persuading that ongoing professional development is a necessity, not a luxury. They know that ongoing investment in their knowledge and skills helps them to support the children in their schools. But it is too often a challenge to find the time to
even think about what professional development might be most helpful, let alone to undertake it. In the face of high workload (made worse by issues around recruitment and retention) and unrelenting expectations, investing in yourself can feel less urgent, even indulgent.
Given the lack of time for individual teachers to think about their own development, it is no surprise that some in the system have looked at ways to take on that thinking on behalf of the wider profession. The DfE convened a selected group of experts to agree the evidence underpinning the Early Career Framework (ECF) and National Professional Qualifications (NPQs). The EEF exists as the ‘what works’ centre to demonstrate the evidence behind particular interventions and approaches to CPD. And countless organisations (TDT included) seek to find ways to bring together experts and ideas and present neatly packaged ‘solutions’ to schools, obviating the need for the individual teacher, school leader, or CPD lead to do the actual thinking about what professional development they might best benefit from. The time and effort to do the hard thinking is essentially ‘outsourced’ to those with (perceived) greater expertise and dedicated time.
Unfortunately, this approach is not necessarily meeting the needs and expectations of teachers. For example, as a report published by Teacher Tapp showed earlier this year, around 60 per cent of teachers say they got little or no value from INSET provision (a good example of development based on the thinking of others rather than the teachers themselves), and only 4 per cent of teachers felt that training on behaviour management would have a positive impact (despite this being an area of significant external thinking and funding).
So, whilst it might be true that ‘outsourcing’ the thinking and creation of professional development may lead to high quality courses and training, it may also be true that the process of thinking about your own professional development is important to ensure that any CPD is successful. NFER research (2020) shows that teacher autonomy over professional development is a strong indicator of greater job satisfaction (and therefore retention), whilst at the same time highlighting the low levels of autonomy too many teachers feel.
Perhaps the biggest challenge for an entitlement to CPD (a policy in the Labour election manifesto) is therefore less the content of courses or the evidence being used, and more the time and support needed to help every teacher and every school leader think clearly and deeply about what professional development they want to undertake.
https://tdtrust.org/ www.education-today.co.uk 17
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