Brunel University

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Flexible Routes into Teaching Professor Steve
Hodkinson

• Brunel University
• Kingston Lane
• Uxbridge, UB4 8NY
• steve.hodkinson_at_brunel.ac.uk

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Summary

• What is a flexible route?
• Why flexibility?
• What about CPD and flexible entrants?

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What Is a Flexible Route?

• A training programme that gives full recognition
  to the prior experience and learning of the
  prospective teacher in terms of the length and
  content of training

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The Elements...

• A training needs analysis
• A training programme to meet identified needs
• Assessment against QTS Standards
• Career Entry Profile

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The Routes...

• Graduate teacher programme
• Registered teacher programme
• Flexible (modular) PGCE
• Could be in teaching in 6-8 weeks!

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Why Flexible?

• Competition for the best graduates who are
  inshort supply
• The high cost of a career change into teaching
  time, financial , personal/domestic costs

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Schools and Trainees...

• Full-time PGCE, 3/4 Year BEd working in HEI
  partnerships
• GTP/RTP employment-based working independently
  or in HEI partnerships
• Overseas trained teachers

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CPD and Flexible Entrants

• Flexible routes are about sufficient training to
  meet the minimum professional entry requirements
• Training targets needs. It does not target a
  wider study of education and the disciplines that
  contribute to it

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CPD and Flexible Entrants

• Flexible entrants will be mature entrants who
  have made a life change decision
• They will increasingly be employed in schools
  whilst they train and will have the dual
  responsibility of succeeding for themselves and
  for their pupils

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The Challenge to Schools...

• Is to provide a training environment that
  supports the realisation of these dual
  responsibilities, and CPD opportunities that
  allow new colleagues to develop both as
  practitioners and as educators

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This Implies a Need for...

• Advanced mentoring skills that can add the
  education dimension to a beginning teachers
  developing classroom practice
• Training departments in which all staff are seen
  as potential mentors of trainee and newly
  qualified teachers

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And...

• New partnerships with LEAs, HEIs and others for
  employment-based initial training, and to ensure
  that CPD provision reflects the changing skills
  and knowledge base of those who enter teaching

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Finally...

• A consequence of teacher shortage is a rapid
  change in the demography of the school
  staff-room. CPD needs to be responsive to this
  changeand quickly