Member News
All teachers will be expected to meet new standards of competence and conduct from September 2012, the government has announced.
Under the plans teachers will be set "clear and unambiguous benchmark for teachers", regardless of whether they are newly qualified or have been in post for many years.
The new rules say teachers must "uphold public trust in the profession" and maintain high standards of ethics and behaviour inside and outside of school.
This includes an expectation that teachers do not undermine British values such as democracy, liberty and respect, and remain tolerant of others.
Ministers said the review was carried out because the existing standards are "not fit for purpose".
According to the Department for Education more than a third of teachers do not feel they provide a good definition of teacher competence and 41 per cent believe they do not make any difference to the way they teach.
Education secretary Michael Gove said the old standards" placed a premium on bland statements and platitudes" over practical use for teachers and they had to be improved.
He said the new rules would "make a significant improvement to teaching by ensuring teachers can focus on the skills that matter most".
But the teachers union the NASUWT said the new standards were "a stick with which to beat teachers".
Chris Keates, the union's general secretary teachers' union said the coalition had a punitive mind set towards teachers.
"The new standards are vague, poorly drafted, lack clarity, are open to wide interpretation, will breed confusion and uncertainty and will simply serve as a stick with which to beat teachers," he said.
While Philip Parkin, the general secretary of Voice, the union for education professional, said he doubted whether all the standards can be reasonably met by a newly qualified teacher or by centrally-employed or supply teachers.
"Voice is wary of the inclusion of specific teaching methods masquerading as standards, and the implication that managers should also be assessing teachers' conduct outside school," he said
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