Row over 'teacher in six months' plan

Unemployed professionals could qualify as a teacher in England in six months, under new government plans.

The fast-track scheme will take the best candidates and half the amount of time that they would normally take to train.

And some unemployed professionals will be eligible to run schools after just four years.

The initiative is part of the government's latest attempts to encourage high performing candidates into the classroom.

And the proposals are the headline policy from the public service reform paper which has been published by prime minister Gordon Brown.

The government is keen to focus the six-month professional qualification on people who lose their jobs in the financial services or high-tech industries, filling teacher shortages in subjects like mathematics and science.

And up to 200 "potentially excellent" teachers will be identified within their work and put on fast track managerial schemes.

The 'Accelerate to headship' programme is due to begin in September next year, led by the National College of School Leadership.

But Christine Blower, acting general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, told the BBC that six months was "very, very far from being enough" time to train teachers.

"I would say that it actually takes a lifetime to train a teacher but clearly we can't be training quite that long," she said.

She told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that the government's recommendation of a fast-track teacher qualification was "demeaning" to those already in the profession.

And she warned that those who enter the profession in the recession are less likely to remain as teachers.

Blower said:"In a downturn, lots of people come into teaching and some of them stay. But the point is that in the past, we have never said that they can whip in after six months and be qualified.

"Actually, I think it demeans the position of people who are teachers at the moment. And it certainly undermines really what is the importance of a profession which is that people have to understand not just the curriculum, not just about behaviour management but actually how teaching works with young people."

She added that for people working with children in the early years, "then there is no way that they can do that after six months".

And Blower warned: "It doesn't seem to me to be a sensible idea at all. And colleagues who have even done the PGCE will tell you that they really didn't spend enough time on child development and reflecting on pedagogy."

But schools minister Jim Knight stressed that the new scheme was not just about recruiting from the banking sector.

He told the BBC that the initiative intends to build on the success of 'Teach first' and rejected Blower's criticisms, explaining that additional training would still be given after the first six months.

"Of course this isn't just about bankers although some of our very brightest mathematicians have gone into banking," Knight said.

"If we have got an opportunity to get some of the best mathematicians and put them in classrooms properly trained and delivering for their children. Maths is one of our shortage subjects.

"But really, this is about building on the success of a scheme called 'Teach first', which attracts our very brightest graduates from our best universities and gives them a six week intensive training period before then sending them to the classroom and continuing to train them in that environment."

He continued: "It is drawing on some of that experience that means that we are very confident that we can compress the 12 month postgraduate certificate in education into a six month period with ongoing support in the classroom and moving into the Masters in teaching and learning.

"We are not saying that it is six months and then that is it – they are let loose."

Knight said the aim is "to grab that opportunity by adding another option to people to be able to get into the profession and earning a salary".