Teacher Shortage Crisis

Ed Selley

Well I did say that some would look at that way and sure enough you did.

You should be aware that most countries have a visa system and if you want to work then you have to state your qualifications, and you will be granted a work permit--but only if the country requires your skills.  If most 3rd world countries can operate this system I am sure we can.

If US citizens want to teach in the UK ,then they could be granted visas.

We are in this mess because of the uncontrolled EU immigration numbers. If we didn't have that problem, then I am sure the government wouldn't have introduced a sledgehammer policy to control non EU migrants.

Teachers, nurses and other highly trained but moderately paid people from any country could work here and benefit the UK.

I have noticed that you don't look at any reasoning logically if there is a hint we might be able to work better outside the EU. Anyway, don't worry Rasczak, many will vote to stay in, not because its a better proposition, but because they fear change.

Pecker

It's better to have a qualified US teacher than none at all, but it's far better to have a qualified UK teacher.

Firstly, someone brought up in the UK will better know its cultures and expectations.  Teaching isn't just about subject knowledge, some students need very careful handling to bring out their best.

And, of course, 'imported' teachers are less likely to hang around.  Experience and stability are both very important, and an education system filled with the product of a short-stay, revolving door workforce is not the most beneficial.

Steve W

Ed Selley

Agreed. I hope we can maintain a British workforce.
I would not like to see teaching go down the same path as the NHS. - and I say that with no disrespect to expatriate staff- they do a good job. But given the choice we should be training and paying our own countrymen appropriately.

Pecker

Lots of my colleagues are off.

We're only a small school - maybe 60 teaching staff.  Last term we lost an English, maths and science teacher.

None of them have left to teach in a secondary school in the UK.  Never had anything like it before.

Me, I'm 51 and too long in the tooth.

Again, all this 'life of Riley' stuff, it's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying that teaching has become a far less attractive profession, and this is causing shortages.

And there's nothing in the horizon which is due to make it anything but worse.

Steve W

Ed Selley

But this is part of a much (much) wider argument. Teaching is of course relevant to you so it will be of the greatest interest but this is being repeated throughout occupations and in most countries in the first world. The pay and conditions that baby boomers wrangled for themselves have collapsed in themselves and the result is that lots of occupations- especially fixed rate professions- have seen this slide back in Ts and Cs. The costs as negotiated by people uninterested in the future after they themselves retired have come back to haunt us.

This can be framed as a 'race to the bottom' but on a wider, blunter level it is a recalculation of the costs we incur the state. In the immediate term, it's going to be messy and the results unpredictable but they are happening all over the first world for much the same reasons.

Pecker

Well, you could make it a wider argument, but I see few stories about similar shortages elsewhere.

Where there are, there's an improvement in T&C.

We're told by the government that we have to get rid of the deficit and decrease national debt do its not passed on to our children.

But our children are suffering now.

Steve W

EarthRod

BT lost 37,000 telephone engineers in the late 1980s and early 1990s including nearly 7,000 senior managers through redundancy.

New electronic telephone exchange technology rolled out throughout the UK in the 1970s and 1980s replacing the old electro-mechanical exchanges meant much less maintenance by engineers, hence the redundancies.

Not too much of a problem - high percentage of the engineers had qualifications and got other jobs in the private and public sectors.

I doubt 37,000 people loosing their jobs in today's world would go so quietly, no fuss, and with very little notice by the media. But there you go - that was then and this is now.

Ed Selley

At various stages on this very forum, we've had threads on shortages of Doctors, nurses, Police Officers and (I think) a number of specialist positions in the armed forces. I'm sorry but it is not specific to teachers. If you negotiate as an occupation rather than an individual and your predecessors negotiated a really, really sweet deal, the only direction you're likely to go is backward.

Pecker

When will it sink in.

I'm not talking about me.

There's a saying - you only get one chance in education.  We're facing a whole cohort of kids facing a secondary school education where half of their teachers are not qualified at the subject they're teaching.

They'll carry the end result with them for life.

Steve W

tapzilla2k

I'm also guessing the daft academy plan will go pearshaped further damaging children's education in the long run (the much heralded academy chain call me Dave likes is going down the pan).
When you've got the likes of Toby Young spouting about progressive eugenics and his love of academies, it makes me fear for the future of education. If you think the skills shortage is bad now.....

Toby Young on progressive eugenics (it gave me an intense case of eye rolling) -
The Fall of the Meritocracy