Qualified to teach
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29 / 04 / 2008 | Author: dnorris
Qualified to teach.
A teaching qualification is a teaching qualification is a teaching qualification.
Well you would think so and to an extent it always has been so, but now that Qualified Teacher Status is not quite the end of the road some of the anomalies that it has thrown up are beginning to be addressed.
Resolving some of the differences between various forms of teaching have always been a bit confusing, so predictably sorting out the new status is proving to be just another muddle.
Consider the simple process of training to be a class teacher.
Training involves a certain amount of specialism. Trainees opt to follow a course leading to teaching either primary, juniors or secondary children. However Qualified Teacher Status does not disqualify a secondary school teacher from teaching in a junior school or a junior teacher teaching in a secondary school. Many teachers swap. They realise that their aptitude lies in one or the other and they simply apply to teach in a different school. Many teachers have also opted to take on extra work in the evenings at adult education institutes.
Invariably such work involves subjects taught in schools such as Maths, English, French, IT, or perhaps Book-keeping, but this is not always the case. Teachers who had a special aptitude can use their teaching qualification as a passport to teaching other subjects. I have known a teacher who was also a regional badminton champion. He ran coaching courses. Another teacher runs courses in bird watching and a third one teaches the guitar. Their teaching qualification was recognised in what is called the Further Education Sector, i.e. teaching pupils aged 16 and above.
That state of affairs still applies, but lecturers in Further Education Colleges can come into teaching by yet another route. They may be chefs, hairdressers, motor mechanics or physiotherapists. More often than not such tutors will have taken a Further Education Teaching Certificate over a one year period.
The Further Education Qualification that they now have to study for is called ‘The Qualified Teacher in Learning and Skills.’ Significantly it requires a period of induction just the same as does the new Qualified Teacher Status.
As from September, such an induction will be recognised as a transferable qualification. In other words it will be possible to work in Further Education and should you then work in schools you will not slide right down the ladder of experience in terms of pay and increments.
This marks an interesting development. Teachers who have made a similar move in the past have found themselves treated as a new teacher in terms of salary grades even though they could have been teaching for many years.
Teaching in F.E. has a wide range of options. You can indeed teach 16 year olds the traditional 6th form subjects, but you can also teach special needs students who can take qualifications for a number of years beyond 16. There are adults needing training in Literacy and numeracy. There are adults needing to learn English as a Foreign Language and there are any number of recreational classes in such diverse fields as pottery, using a digital camera, interior design as well as Languages, IT, Art and Textiles.
All of these courses require teachers. All of them are open to qualified teachers and the field of F.E. as a stop gap occupation for teachers returning from a spell of teaching abroad represents a significant area of employment now that one of the hidden penalties has been removed.
