Commenting on the Prime Minister's
speech to Conservative Party Conference which confirmed plans for
an Advanced British Standard for all 16-18-year-old
students, Daniel
Kebede, General Secretary of the National Education
Union, said:
" is doubling down on
pie-in-the-sky education policies. He is completely out of touch
with reality.
"The Government's long-standing
failure to hit its own training targets, compounded by the
haemorrhaging of teachers due to high workload and below
inflation pay, made the Prime Minister's call in January for more
maths teaching an impossible dream. HisGovernment's reduced
training targets were again missed this summer. The Advanced
British Standard, briefed out last month and confirmed today, is
even more misconceived and extends his detachment from reality.
There is no magic wand to create English and maths teachers in
sufficient numbers to educate 11-16 year olds, let alone at
A-Level too.
"We already have a shortage of
secondary teachers. One in six English teachers and one in five
mathematics teachers do not have a post A-Level qualification in
the subject. We need an additional 4,300 mathematics
teachers and 2,600 English teachers to cover current
needs.
"Post-16 curriculum reform is worthy
of debate, but simply increasing the number of hours taught would
require an additional 5,300 teachers. This year the Government
missed their recruitment target for secondary teachers by
48%.
"School leaders are telling us they
are struggling to recruit and retain across all subjects. The
recruitment and retention crisis is caused in the main by
excessive workload and below inflation pay. This is a root and
branch problem not solved by bursaries, ‘golden hellos’ and
other Whitehall gimmicks. They cannot have a lasting impact
on subject shortages, which have been badly behind year on year,
when the fundamental causes of teachers leaving remain in
place.
"The casual headline-seeking
announcements of the Prime Minister are no substitute for serious
planning to address the needs of all our 16-year-olds, whatever
courses they take.
" missed an opportunity today to
reset an education system in crisis. The Prime Minister said that
he would prioritise education funding, but this is after 13 years
of real-terms cuts. When became Prime Minister in
2010, Britain spent 5.7% of national income on education. Today
it stands at 4.2% - among the lowest rates in the OECD. We
believe that rate should be raised to
5%.
“Education unions have called for at
least £4.4bn+ extra per year for school buildings, following the
RAAC disaster on this Government's watch. We also need answers on
workload. The narrow obsession from the PM means also that the
Department for Education has taken its eye off the ball on the
failure of T-Levels and the need to retain funding for
General Applied.
"The Prime Minister is unwilling to do
the hard work on fixing the major challenges facing education.
Any education reform needs to deal with and confront the crises
facing our schools and colleges, and this must be done in
consultation with the profession to avoid yet more unworkable
ideas."
