Postgraduate teaching apprenticeship launched

The postgraduate teaching apprenticeship will offer top graduates an alternative route into the profession.

A new postgraduate teaching apprenticeship to offer talented graduates an alternative route into the profession has been announced today (19 October) by Education Secretary Justine Greening.

Developed in partnership with the sector, the new apprenticeship will provide hands-on experience for new recruits and a chance to learn from excellent, experienced teachers during training, as well as the incentive of potential employment as a qualified teacher at the end of the apprenticeship course.

The apprenticeship, which launches in September 2018, will mirror the entry criteria and high-quality course content currently required of all other teacher trainees and will give schools across the country the opportunity to use the apprenticeship to recruit and train new teachers in-house.

Education Secretary, Justine Greening, said:

Getting the best people to train as teachers and into our classrooms is a crucial part of giving every child the high quality education deserve. This new route will provide another pathway for talented graduates into a profession that will give them the chance to change lives for the better on a daily basis.

The new teaching apprenticeship will run in parallel with School Direct Salaried (SDS) training in 2018 that already allows graduates to train while on the job. All apprentices will be paid as unqualified teachers.

Schools who are not eligible for the apprenticeship levy, or who require additional funds, will receive government funding to cover up to 90 per cent of training costs.

CEO of South Farnham School Educational Trust, Sir Andrew Carter, said:

The postgraduate apprenticeship route into teaching will be greatly welcomed by the profession. The opportunity for more graduates to be trained within the school setting has the potential to increase the number of applicants. Working alongside great teachers and learning at first hand is the best way to create great teachers.

Chairing the Employers Group, who put the programme together, was a great privilege. The expertise, enthusiasm and wisdom of the group focussed all that is best in the educational world. Everyone was, and is, totally focussed on the goal which is to create a strong, plentiful and sustainable flow of recruits into this great and noble profession.

Executive Director of the Universities Council for the Education of Teachers (UCET), James Noble Rogers, and Executive Director, National Association of School Based Teacher Trainers (NASBTT), Emma Hollis, said:

We are pleased that the new apprenticeship will be delivered in partnership between schools and accredited Initial Teacher Training providers and will be subject to the same regulatory framework as other ITT courses. That represents a good outcome from the perspective of the employer-led group which UCET and NASBTT were happy to be represented on.

In the future we would like to see the apprenticeship developed to reflect any changes to Qualified Teacher Status and the rationalisation of some of the rules applying to apprenticeships generally which we don’t think necessarily translate well for ITT.

To ensure apprentices are ready to enter the classroom full-time at the end of their apprenticeship, schools have helped set assessment criteria to give them greater oversight of the training of prospective members of staff.

Applications for Initial Teacher Training open through UCAS on October 26, allowing applicants to convert their place to an apprenticeship at a later date.

The development of this apprenticeship is part of the government’s commitment to ensure there are 3 million high quality apprenticeship starts by 2020.

As part of the plan to get excellent teachers into the schools that need them most, the government is also piloting a new programme to reimburse student loan repayments for teachers in the early years of their careers. Around 800 modern foreign language and 1,700 science teachers a year will be eligible for this pilot scheme.