Today (Tuesday 12th September 2017), the National Audit Office has released a report on Developing and Retaining the Teacher Workforce. It has produced a helpful infographic, reproduced below. [Source: https://www.nao.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Infographic-Retaining-and-developing-the-teaching-workforce.pdf]
Commenting on today’s report, TDT’s Chief Executive David Weston and former Chair of the DfE Teachers’ Professional Development Expert Group said:
“We welcome this report from the NAO which shows the scale of the challenge in our system. There are some uncomfortable questions and challenges here for government and the system. Why do so many schools still struggle with funding and time to provide enough high quality professional development for their staff?
We therefore welcome the Department for Education’s work and future plans to increase spending and focus on this vital area of the school system. The Secretary of State has made it very clear that this is a very high priority. TDT’s own research has shown how variation in school expenditure on professional development is far too wide. We’d urge DfE colleagues to revisit recommendations from the DfE Expert Group which addressed a number of the concerns raised by the NAO, including supporting systematic leadership of development and improving schools’ and teachers’ access to high quality expertise. All of this should be underpinned by the Standard for Teachers’ Professional Development which needs significant further support from the Department to raise awareness and increase understanding.
While teacher recruitment remains the highest profile issue, we’re pleased to see the renewed emphasis on retaining and developing the existing workforce. Having worked to establish the new Chartered College of Teaching, we look forward to working with colleagues there and within the Department to bring greater investment and greater system coherence to solve some of the real challenges laid out in this report. “
