Professional practice under the spotlight

Issue 30

Photo of Martin Osler

Martin Osler

Trusted regulation which is proportionate within a spirit of openness and fairness - that is the ethos of the Professional Practice department at GTCS which deals with conduct and competence matters.

Martin Osler speaks to the Head of Professional Practice, John Anderson and Investigating Officer, Mark Paxton to find out more…

Tell us about your day-to-day job.

Mark Paxton: My job is investigating complaints made about teachers to GTCS. This involves contacting the teachers involved, contacting employers and perhaps the police and law courts to get information. I also prepare papers for our Investigating Sub-Committee that considers cases first to decide whether or not they should go forward to our Disciplinary Sub-Committee. There is a lot of policy work involved in my job too, such as looking at how we investigate allegations, how we deal with complaints from the general public and how we interact with teachers and other stakeholders.

John Anderson: My tasks follow on from what Mark does. In the interests of justice it is important that the investigating and disciplinary parts of what we do are separate. I am responsible for ensuring that the Disciplinary Sub-Committee works smoothly; it hears cases to decide whether action is taken against a teacher, which might include the ultimate sanction of removal from the teaching register. This involves liaising with the GTCS solicitor who pursues cases on our behalf and with Council members who sit on the committees and hearings. I also liaise with teachers and their legal representatives. It is important that the profession and the wider public know about GTCS's work in this area and we spend a lot of time ensuring teachers know about the Code of Professionalism and Conduct and that the public and the profession are confident that we are performing our role of upholding teaching standards in Scotland's schools.

We should not and do not rest on our laurels

How many cases do you generally receive, investigate and discipline in a year?

Mark Paxton: The GTCS Investigating Sub-Committee considered 64 cases in the past year, 28 of which were referred on to the Disciplinary Sub-Committee for a full hearing. Fifteen teachers were removed from the register following hearings before the Disciplinary Sub-Committee and three others were made subject to either a conditional registration order or a formal reprimand.

John Anderson: What is important to remember is that there are over 75,000 teachers on the teaching register in Scotland. The number of cases that actually get to a final disciplinary hearing is very small indeed in comparison. We know that the vast majority of teachers never need to come near GTCS in this sense and are talented individuals who conduct themselves well and do a good job.

Is it right that GTCS performs this role when it also registers teachers? Should an independent body not be responsible for disciplinary cases?

John Anderson: We should not and we do not rest on our laurels. However, we have a good track record over more than forty years and I think if you look at our case outcomes you will see that GTCS takes a strong but fair line with misconduct and matters to do with teacher competence. We have also developed our processes over the last three or four years to make sure that the public and the profession can see what we are doing, and by way of public hearings, can see through the media that we are operating on behalf of the profession and in the public interest.

If you look and see where any regulatory body, whether it is for doctors, lawyers or dentists, sits within the whole judicial process, it makes sense that the proper place for these cases to be managed is by the profession, because it understands where the pressures and difficulties lie. It's also important to remember that, in the public interest, we have lay members on our Council who often offer a different perspective; and with their help our hearing panels come to the right decision in the vast majority of cases.

What are the most common cases you investigate?

Mark Paxton: I don't think there is a pattern to the cases we investigate, there is not one issue that is more frequent than others. We deal with an awful lot more cases that come from criminal convictions purely because each year when students come to register we do background checks. These enhanced Disclosure Scotland checks often throw up previous convictions and all these have to be investigated, regardless of how long ago they occurred or how serious they might have been. That makes up quite a large proportion of the overall number. Most of these are relatively minor, which in general terms and as a one-off would not lead to further disciplinary action.

John Anderson: No, there doesn't seem to be any one common denominator or any discernible pattern. Our cases are generally split into convictions, misconduct allegations or incompetence allegations and each is different with the circumstances looked at on an individual basis.

There have been a lot of high profile cases recently. Do they not give the impression to the man in the street that too many teachers are not behaving or performing to required standards?

Mark Paxton: Our stats show that there has not been any increase in the number of cases we are dealing with at the present time. What has changed is the level of media coverage and perhaps there is more scrutiny of what we do than there was in the past. This scrutiny and media coverage may give the impression that there are more cases but there are not. The vast majority of teachers do a very good job indeed and the numbers we deal with are small compared to a register of 75,000 teachers.

But there were pretty serious cases recently, some in which teachers had already been convicted in court. How does GTCS balance its role with assuring the public that standards are high in schools?

Mark Paxton: By taking the necessary action in the small number of cases where some teachers fall short of the required standard, or indeed break the law, we are helping to maintain trust and standards in the profession.

John Anderson: In every job and walk of life there will always be a small minority who will not make the grade or fail to perform at the right level. Everybody will realise that teaching is no different. We work to make sure the profession and public understand what is expected in terms of conduct by teachers. The Code of Professionalism and Conduct plants the seed of personal regulation in the minds of teachers, the message that as a professional you should know where the line is and not to cross that line. So we work very hard to reassure the public and the profession that standards are, and will remain, high in schools.

Does it concern you that the media cover cases so freely, even to the extent that they are present during hearings?

John Anderson: Our rules require that we hold our disciplinary hearing in public and this means that the media is entitled to attend as well. Hearings (or part of hearings) will only be held in private to protect vulnerable people with the agreement of the hearing panel. There would have to be exceptional circumstances for this to happen.

It is important that hearings are in public so that our process is seen to be fair and transparent. Decisions of the Disciplinary Sub-Committee can have a huge impact on the life of a teacher and as a regulatory body it is vital that we are not seen to be taking decisions in secret. Under the Human Rights Act individuals are entitled to have their case heard in public in order to ensure that procedures are followed fairly and that the public perception is that matters are being conducted transparently. It is also worth remembering that court proceedings are held in public for the very same reason.

As a result of hearings being in public, we cannot control what the media reports, just as we cannot control what a member of the public attending the hearing takes from it or tells other people.

We do ensure that members of the media attend hearings in as unobtrusive a way as possible, but it is a fact of modern life that there is great scrutiny of people in positions of responsibility and teachers are no different. What we work hard with our media team to achieve is balanced and fair reporting of hearings and that media attention does not detract from justice and fairness for the parties.

Do you think we are going to see an increasing amount of incompetence cases and will this be worrying for the profession?

Mark Paxton: As the process of dealing with incompetence beds in(it is still a relatively new process for GTCS) , it is inevitable that cases will come our way. But we are not expecting there to be a huge influx of cases all of a sudden. Again, as with all of the cases we deal with, we are talking about a very small minority of the profession as a whole. What is important is that when these cases do come to us they are dealt with properly, fairly and each on their own merits.

John Anderson: Incompetence cases are judged on the basis of whether or not there is serious professional incompetence and the word 'serious' is very important in this respect. There is a process with which the employer and the teacher must engage before a case of incompetence will reach the GTCS.

I don't think the profession should be worried. It would be more of a worry if we were not dealing with these serious cases. We must all have confidence and trust in a teacher that he or she is capable of doing a good job for children. Therefore, the process which could potentially bring a teacher to the doors of the GTC is one that embraces strategies and support to help that teacher in advance of coming here. It is not as if it's today you are a good teacher, tomorrow you are incompetent.

You launched the Code of Professionalism and Conduct recently. How is that impacting on the number of cases you receive?

John Anderson: We've not noticed any increase or decrease in cases since launching the Code but we have seen an increased awareness in what is expected of teachers. Launching the Code was never intended to increase the number of cases but rather to make pupils, parents and teachers aware of the standards that are expected. The content of the code is nothing new, in effect it writes down and makes more formal what wasn't written down before.

What advice would you give to teachers in terms of conduct in what is an increasingly complex environment they are working in?

John Anderson: Read the Code and Teaching Scotland, look at our website and be aware of the Standard for Full Registration.

You also spend a lot of time promoting the positives in teaching, with bulletins, workshops and seminars about managing difficult issues in the classroom. Is this something that you will expand over the coming months?

Mark Paxton: The main things we do are the Professionalism and Conduct workshops for probationer teachers. Between the two of us we will see all of the probationers over the course of their Teacher Induction Scheme. We talk to them about the Code, what is expected of them and aim not to lecture them but to get them thinking about scenarios and everyday situations that they could find themselves in that might impact on their position as teachers. And also we give them information about how we handle cases, what we do and how the GTCS operates.

John Anderson: We also have regular meetings with the student leaders at the universities, the Trades Unions, professional associations and employers as well. For example, we are currently working on Memoranda of Understanding with various organisations; a MOU with the Scottish Negotiating Committee for Teachers will be launched very soon. A lot of our work is about keeping in touch with GTCS stakeholders and making sure they are informed about our regulatory processes.

Related websites

Copies of CoPAC have been sent to all schools and colleges and can be found at www.gtcs.org.uk/copac

For more information on professional conduct, please visit www.gtcs.org.uk/professionalconduct

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