Partnership discusses the future

A year ago, Graham Donaldson published his review of teacher education, "Teaching Scotland's Future". It set out a compelling vision for raising standards in Scottish education, through improved professional learning for teachers. This was based on the good evidence that no single thing that we can do to improve quality in education can make a bigger difference.

In response, the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning set up a National Partnership Group for Teaching Scotland's Future.

Its role is to co-ordinate implementation of many of the main recommendations, bringing together the expertise and capacity of local authorities, universities, Scottish Government and other national partners, including GTC Scotland.

The group has developed a clear understanding of what it wants its work to achieve - professional learning focused on achieving the best possible outcomes for learners, sustained by a culture of professional and collegiate responsibility and supported through the effective use of available resources and expertise, through partnership working at every level.

To achieve that, they have begun work to develop detailed thinking on the implementation of Graham Donaldson's recommendations. Some of the most important changes will be:

  • More rigorous selection to the early phase of teacher education
  • A new model for the early phase of teacher education, building one coherent experience through initial teacher education and induction
  • Replacement of BEd degrees with degrees combining professional studies with in-depth academic study beyond education
  • Enhanced career-long professional learning, at Masters level, centred on self-evaluation and outcomes for children
  • Systematic identification of priority areas for continuing professional development
  • Development of a clear, progressive and cohesive educational leadership framework

Much of that work will be undertaken by June by sub-groups of the National Partnership Group. Some of those changes will take time and there will be a need for support for teachers as part of their implementation.

However, there are recommendations that teachers and schools can already be implementing. Those include:

  • Continuing to shift the balance of CPD activities from set-piece events to more local, team-based approaches which centre on self-evaluation and professional collaboration (recommendation 33)
  • Planning and evaluating CPD more directly on its intended impact on learners (recommendation 34)

You may already be considering how you can do some of those things. If not, you can start that process by working with colleagues in your establishment and more widely to consider the following questions:

  • How consistently do I and my colleagues link the planning and evaluation of professional learning to improvements in teaching and learning?
  • Is that link a core focus of our professional review and development (or equivalent)?
  • Is the balance of the professional learning that we undertake shifting so that it is more collaborative and team-based, centred around self-evaluation and achieving an effective balance between tailored individual development and school improvement?
  • Is our professional learning of sufficiently high standard - always challenging and stretching us professionally?

This information is provided by the Chairs of the National Partnership Groups.

You can contribute to discussions via the Engage for Education website www.engageforeducation.org and shortly through a dedicated area on Glow, which you can find by visiting www.NPGTeacherEducation.org. You can also email NPGTeacherEducation@scotland.gsi.gov.uk.

Issue 43
January 2012