Strategic Board for Teacher Education minutes: September 2024

Attendees and apologies

• Orlando Heijmer-Mason, Scottish Government
• Scott Brand, Scottish Government
• Michael Wood, Association of Directors of Education in Scotland (ADES)
• Garry Graham, Association of Heads and Depute in Scotland (AHDS)
• Stuart Bain, Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA)
• Lesley Whelan, Education Scotland
• David Burgess, Education Scotland
• Susan Quinn, Educational Institute for Scotland (EIS)
• Pauline Stephen, General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS)
• Tara Lillis, NASUWT
• Barrie Sheppard, National Parents Forum for Scotland
• Ruth McKay, School Leaders Scotland (SLS)
• Zoe Robertson, Scottish Council of Deans of Education (SCDE)
• Barbara Couper, Scottish Catholic Education Service (SCES)
• Fiona Dalziel, Scottish Secondary Teachers’ Association (SSTA)
• Khadija Mohammed, University of the West of Scotland
• Stuart Robb, Scottish Government
• Zak Tuck, Scottish Government
• David Leitch, Scottish Government
• Angela Felvus, Scottish Government
• Annabella Balloch, Scottish Government

Apologies

• Laurence Findlay, Aberdeenshire Council
• Duncan Lawrie, Teacher
• Lorraine Davidson, Scottish Council for Independent Schools
• Archie Glen, Community Trade Union

Items and actions

Welcome and introductions

The Chair welcomed members to the meeting. He informed the board that the order of the agenda would be revised to accommodate the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills.

Minutes of 27 June 2024

Clarification was asked for on action point 4 regarding inviting the Diversity in the Teaching and Education Workforce Sub Group Chair to present at a future meeting to ensure visibility of this work. It was noted that Khadija Mohammed is the Chair of the Anti-Racism in Education Programme (AREP) and the Secretariat would further discuss with her how to ensure read-across on these areas of work.

Action points

• Secretariat to discuss with Khadija Mohammed and Tara Lillis how we increase coherence across the work of the Board and the Diversity in the Teaching and Education Workforce sub-group
• Secretariat to publish minutes and papers from 27 June meeting

Matters arising

There were no matters arising.

Discussion with the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills

The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills was welcomed to the meeting. She made the following comments to the board:

• employment opportunities for teachers is a significant issue with many teachers contacting the Scottish Government about lack of offers, post probation
• Scottish Government currently in discussion with COSLA regarding keeping teacher numbers stable with the offer of £145.5m to enable this
• aiming to have a voluntary agreement with local authorities on learning hours as this should not be a route for reducing teacher numbers
• the review of the Teacher Induction Scheme will consider revisions to the probation structure and alignment with initial teacher education
• current support for probationers is inconsistent and needs addressed
• concerning downward trend in initial teacher education applications and there is an urgent need to make the profession more attractive

Workstream 1 - Workforce planning and increasing diversity of the profession

The Secretariat updated on progress with this workstream. The following points were made:

• Scottish Government and COSLA jointly leading on this workstream
• aim was to develop a 3-5 year planning cycle which has proved to be challenging due to the annual nature of local workforce planning arrangements in the local authorities
• work has progressed on a national analysis of primary and secondary teacher numbers data
• pilot being considered with Scottish Teachers Advancing Computing Science (STACS) and others around increasing the number of computing science teachers. This was looking at arranging for current teachers to promote the profession to computing science undergraduate students
• the workstream also plans to look at the range of current routes into teaching to see how effective they are at meeting subject and geographical requirements
• there is an operational urgency to moving to a system with robust data that allows for longer-term planning

Workstream 2 - Improving the promotion of teaching as a valued career

The Secretariat gave an update on progress with this workstream. The following points were made:

• the plans for a social media campaign had been paused due to the introduction of SG financial controls regarding advertising expenditure
• a shared narrative promoting teaching had been developed and will be shared with stakeholders

Action point 

Secretariat to action request from Cabinet Secretary to further investigate the opportunities to secure funding to run the social media campaign

Workstream 3 - Workshop on framework for teacher education and development in Scotland

Updated framework paper 

GTCS introduced this item. They stated that the Workstream leads have focused on further developing the Framework through an analysis of the Scottish system along with international systems and consideration of feedback gathered to date. The general principles and key phases had now been developed into a high-level blueprint.

SCDE made the following points on the revised Framework:

• this has been a collaborative approach lead by GTCS, SCDE and Education Scotland with the aim of addressing teacher support and retention
• the Framework covers all career stages and connects with and supports workstreams 1 and 2
• aim is to bring coherence between stakeholders and ensure clarity of their responsibilities
• phase 4 of the Framework aims to expand support for fully registered teachers, developing their teaching practice and building capacity in the system. It should allow teachers to develop specialisms and achieve further academic credits
• current workforce arrangements are long established and there is a need to consider if they can be revised to ensure teachers are where they need to be in schools with the relevant qualifications
• need to recognise that teacher education is complex and core principles reflect this. They include critical engagement, situated learning and flexibility in meeting teacher’s needs

The Cabinet Secretary made the following comments:

• need to better workforce plan in partnership with COSLA
• focus should be on delivery of the Framework
• the board should identify priorities and quick wins to improve recruitment to initial teacher education and employer recruitment practices

Board members made the following comments:

• reduced class contact time can potentially enable teachers more opportunity to engage with professional learning, enable more teachers to be employed and encourage recruitment
• a more uniform approach to teacher employment is needed across local authorities
• framework needs to be flexible to support fully registered teachers new to the Scottish system
• curriculum currently too expansive for the teaching hours that teachers have

Framework should make explicit the need to address all teachers’ professional learning needs

• local authority workforce planning challenging as data on retirements and maternity difficult to gather. Also, numbers allocated through Teacher Induction Scheme and actuals in schools in August can be substantially different
• framework offers the system flexibility but there is a need to value primary teachers for their specialism. Those primary teachers adding further qualifications should be valued for their skills and not be seen as a fix for the system
• supporting pupils with Additional Support Needs (ASN) becoming more challenging for teachers with some local authorities not replacing ASN specialists
• teachers are the best advocates for promoting the profession and a social media campaign is needed
• health and wellbeing support being offered to some student teachers and should be there for every teacher
• teacher induction is pivotal to learning and future career development and should be considered as a priority area for support
• COSLA supportive of better workforce planning to tackle recruitment challenges
• resourcing the Framework is vital for implementing it. Inflationary pressures, especially on pay, affects this. The £145.5m on offer to local authorities supports fewer teachers due to the pay uplift from August 2024. The Cabinet Secretary highlighted reduced class contact time and a social media campaign as possible immediate priorities that will help maintain teacher numbers

Action point

Scottish Government to continue to progress work to enable a reduction to class contact time and delivery of a social media campaign

Summary of SBTE feedback on framework

Education Scotland presented the feedback on the development of the Framework so far as context for the World Café sessions. They said stakeholders were positive of the Framework aims and direction of travel and identified the following as key points:

• ongoing stakeholder engagement will be a critical element in its development
• clarification around the language is important for both the Framework and the roles identified within it
• time required for teachers to engage in both development and enactment and the funding of the proposals were an issue
• more detail need on the role and qualifications required for school based educators
• uncertainty over the one school model proposal for student and probationer teachers
• more clarity needed on the roles of the new Centre for Teaching Excellence and Education Scotland
• the roles of different organisations, their decision-making powers and the role of SBTE need to be developed as part of the next steps

World Café feedback

Members undertook 3 world café sessions covering phases 1 (student) and 2 (graduate), 3 (early career) and 4 (career enhancement and enrichment).There was discussion on what is already in place, what is planned and what the gaps are. Facilitators reported back on discussions on each phase.

Phase 1 and 2

• the teacher preparation phase is seen as the core to developing and progressing through the other phases
• importance of students and graduates being in a school with a school-based educator was recognised
• the role of the school-based educator needs to be developed and agreed
• the review of the Teacher Induction Scheme is crucial to these phases and the future model of preparation

Phase 3

• health and wellbeing and pastoral care are gaps for early career teachers
• need to create and map out roles of the mentors throughout the different stages
• time and conditions for professional learning need to be put in place and this is a matter for the Scottish Negotiating Committee for Teachers (SNCT) with opportunities arising from the reform agenda

Phase 4

• a need to revisit what is already in place e.g. promote career pathways
• funding for professional learning opportunities is needed
• greater flexibility for teachers to undertake secondments and also to work part-time is needed
• the Chair said that there was broad agreement on the priorities and quick wins and that the Cabinet Secretary would be kept aware of progress. It was also acknowledged that rural issues and equalities needed to be further developed within the early action

Action point

Workstream 3 leads to develop immediate priorities for agreement with the Cabinet Secretary and board 

Any other business

No other business was raised.

Date of future meetings

The next meeting to be scheduled for early December. 

Action

Secretariat to schedule the next meeting for early December

SBTE Secretariat

October 2024