Abstract
ABSTRACT There is widespread concern about the shortage of secondary school teachers in England. Recruitment to initial teacher training regularly fails to meet its intake targets. The secondary school pupil population is increasing. Teacher vacancies have risen, and more teachers are reportedly leaving the profession prematurely. Despite considerable investment in a wide range of initiatives, costing millions of pounds, the government has acknowledged that it has been unable improve the situation substantially. This paper presents time-series analyses of official data and documentary analyses of government publications. These suggest that teacher shortages are partly created by government policies themselves - including flaws in the selection system, and school funding system, the official extension of the education and training leaving age, and increases in the number of small schools. It is difficult when planning for teacher supply to anticipate the impact of such varied policy changes years ahead. Consequently, estimations of the numbers needed to be trained are hardly ever accurate. This paper suggests a reconsideration of the current selection processes for initial teacher training, independent review of the Teacher Supply Model, and a long-term approach to teacher supply planning, considering other policy changes in a more coordinated way.
Highlights
Education systems all over the world strive to provide good quality education for its citizens
This paper focuses more on teacher supply, and retention will be covered more fully in a future paper
In 2015, the Initial Teacher Training (ITT) intake target was increased by 33% from the previous year, and recruitment increased it did not increase by 33% immediately
Summary
Education systems all over the world strive to provide good quality education for its citizens To achieve this requires a good supply of qualified and knowledgeable teachers, which has become more difficult in recent times because of challenges in recruiting and retaining teachers. In England, there are growing concerns that the situation is going to get worse as government data (Department for Education [DfE], 2016a) shows that teacher vacancies have tripled between 2011 and 2016, and more people are leaving the profession for reasons other than retirement. At the same time there are predictions of real term funding cuts for schools (National Audit Office [NAO], 2016a). This means that there will be greater difficulties in recruiting the required number of teachers
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