Teacher Recruitment Bulletin: February 2019

1. Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategy – making it easier for great people to become teachers
2. Becoming a Teacher digital services – get involved
3. Train to Teach – additional spaces for the spring term
4. Scholarships programme – recruitment to chemistry
5. Subject knowledge enhancement (SKE) training to support ITT recruitment
6. Postgraduate Teaching Apprenticeship – increased salary grant
7. Future Teaching Scholars – programme seeking schools to employ Scholars
8. The Chairs Programme – an opportunity for school-led ITT Providers
9. Transition to Teach – bespoke support for career changers
10. Now Teach – bringing experienced professionals into teaching
11. Recruit a Spanish language teacher – no recruitment costs
12. Recruitment of non-EU nationals – Immigration Health Surcharge (IHS)
13. High Potential Initial Teacher Training and Leadership Development Programme

Our new Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategy was published on 28 January 2019 and aims to create a recruitment system fit for the 21st century. Specifically around ITT, the strategy includes:

• Review the ITT market to support it to work more efficiently and effectively. We aim to identify improvements that will reduce costs for providers and explore how we can encourage school-based providers to extend their reach, deliver at scale and do more to support the wider system
• Continue with unlimited ITT recruitment to all postgraduate ITT courses (with the exception of PE fee-funded courses) for the next two recruitment cycles (ITT2020 and ITT2021) to offer all providers maximum flexibility to recruit
• Work with providers to increase part-time ITT and boost undergraduate ITT provision

We will be consulting with ITT providers over the coming months and will share further details of how to get involved in due course.

We look forward to working with you to deliver on the ambition set out in the strategy.

To view full details, please visit the Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategy.

The teacher recruitment and retention strategy announced that we would make it easier for great people to become teachers. We will be introducing new digital systems that will be easier to use and designed to better meet the needs of potential trainees.

The first of our services, Find Postgraduate Teacher Training, launched in October 2018. This enables applicants to search for ITT courses that are right for them through, for example, filtering courses by proximity to their home address or by the financial support available.

Now, we are pleased to be starting development of a new application service for ITT. We will work closely with candidates, teacher training providers and UCAS to carefully introduce this new service. We would very much appreciate your input throughout its development.

Providers who wish to get involved, please email becomingateacher@digital.education.gov.uk.

Updates will be provided via our regular communication channels and a range of engagement meetings.

The below spring term Train to Teach events have provider exhibition spaces available. These are inaddition to places you may have already been allocated.

All events take place from 4.30pm to 7.30pm.

Milton Keynes         Wednesday 27 February 2019
Hatfield                   Tuesday 5 March 2019
Lincoln                    Wednesday 27 March 2019
Colchester              Thursday 28 March 2019

To attend an event, please complete the booking form by 5pm on Friday 15 February 2019.

If you are recruiting chemistry trainees, please promote the £28,000 tax-free chemistry scholarship to your candidates.

The scheme is aimed at high-quality chemists, passionate about teaching chemistry. Successful candidates must secure a training place by September 2019 that leads to achieved QTS status, at an ITT provider or lead school with permission to recruit by DfE. Scholars are expected to have a subject relevant 2:1 (or predicted) degree. Candidates with a 2:2 (or predicted) degree may be considered if they can demonstrate significant subject knowledge or have a relevant post-graduate degree.

Successful applicants will receive additional support to enhance their subject knowledge and gain access to high-quality professional development resources.

Applications are now open. Candidates can apply via the Royal Society of Chemistry.

For further details, including eligibility, please visit Get Into Teaching.

If you are recruiting trainee teachers to hard-to-fill subjects, using SKE courses can help you to widen your pool of potential applicants.

SKE courses are designed to help applicants gain the depth of subject knowledge needed to train to teach their chosen subject.

SKE is funded in biology, chemistry, computing, design & technology, English, geography, maths, modern foreign languages, physics, primary maths and religious education. Courses range from an 8-week refresher up to more intensive courses of 28 weeks. Eligible candidates could also receive a bursary of £200 per week.

For further information and to arrange SKE courses for your candidates, please visit Subject knowledge enhancement (SKE): course providers.

The Postgraduate Teaching Apprenticeship (PGTA) funding manual for the 2019 to 2020 academic year has been published.

The salary grant funding rates have been increased for all priority subjects by £2,000 compared to the 2018 to 2019 academic year. We recommend that you share this information with your partner schools so that they are aware of the increased funding when employing a teaching apprentice for 2019 to 2020.

We would also like to remind training providers wishing to offer the PGTA that applications are now permanently open on the Register of Apprenticeship Training Providers (RoATP). You need to be registered on the RoATP if you wish to deliver apprenticeship training.

To view the funding manual, please visit: Postgraduate teaching apprenticeship funding manual 2019 to 2020 academic year.

For queries, please email teaching.apprenticeship@education.gov.uk.

Future Teaching Scholars are maths and physics specialists on a six-year teacher recruitment programme. They committed to teaching before commencing their undergraduate degree and have engaged in a structured programme of learning, which prepares them to teach and is delivered by Outstanding Teaching Schools, alongside their degree.

We are looking for schools to employ Scholars from 2019. Schools will be required to fund the Scholar’s salary (as trainee teachers). The ITT is provided by the SCITT attached to the programme’s Regional Training Centres. A supportive environment is essential and specific commitments will include releasing the Scholar to attend regular training sessions at one of the programme’s regional ITT providers, and for the national conference.

Subject to an eligibility check, any school with maths or physics teaching vacancies that can offer excellent support to Scholars can express their interest in employing a Scholar. There are only 50 Scholars available in September 2019.

For more information and to register your interest, please visit Future Teaching Scholars.

As part of the drive to increase the number of maths, physics and wider EBacc subject expert-teachers, The Brilliant Club recruits postdoctoral researchers to train and teach across the country through the Researchers in Schools programme.

From 2019, the programme is recruiting trainees to both the School Direct Fee and Salaried routes. The programme is seeking ITT providers to train and place participants in their partnerships for 2019 to 2020, particularly in the West Midlands, Yorkshire and the Humber, and the North East.

To view details, please visit The Brilliant Club and Researchers in Schools.

For further information, email amy.emery@researchersinschools.org or call 07474 214460.

The programme does not provide initial teacher training, but instead aims to work in collaboration with ITT providers to offer an additional layer of bespoke support and guidance that helps this group successfully transition into a new career. Partner ITT providers could therefore benefit from:

• support with recruitment initiatives
• support with assessment
• advice and support on maximising the previous experience of each participant for the benefit of pupils
• improved retention due to the additional layer of personalised wraparound support that participants receive

For further information, please visit Transition to Teach.

For providers interested in getting involved, please email info@transitiontoteach.co.uk.

Now Teach is a programme that is uniquely tailored to support people as they change profession and redeploy their talent and experience in the classroom. Candidates have decades of experience as leaders in a variety of sectors. Now Teach places them in partner schools, supports them through their training and connects them to a professional network that amplifies their impact and accelerates their progress.

Now Teach focuses on recruiting professionals who are motivated to teach those subjects for which there is the greatest need: 58% of the 2018 cohort are STEM teachers and 17% are modern foreign languages teachers.

Now Teach are currently recruiting career changers in the South East, Norfolk and Birmingham.

For providers interested in getting involved, please visit Now Teach.

For further information, email info@nowteach.org.uk.

Are you considering your school staffing needs for the next academic year? If so, please consider recruiting a Spanish teacher to teach modern foreign languages.

The DfE has a pool of qualified teachers from Spain, who are ready for interviews now. All teachers have been rigorously assessed and interviewed by English senior leaders and have Qualified Teacher Status. More teachers will become available at the end of March.

The DfE funds the recruitment cost, so you don’t have to.

Teachers recruited through Spain’s Visiting Teachers programme receive an acclimatisation support package to assist with the transition to living and teaching in England.

For further information, please register.

The Government has recently announced changes to the Immigration Health Surcharge (IHS).

The Immigration Health Surcharge is a surcharge that some visa applicants must pay as part of their immigration application. Whether they need to pay depends on the immigration status for which they are applying.

The Government has recently increased the Immigration Health Surcharge, which is now:

• £300 per year for a student or Tier 5 (Youth Mobility Scheme) visa, for example £600 for a 2-year visa
• £400 per year for all other visa and immigration applications, for example £2,000 for a 5-year visa

To view an overview of the surcharge and detailed information about who needs to pay, please visit Pay for UK healthcare as part of your immigration application.

The department is undertaking work on the potential scope and design of a future high potential programme for delivery from 2021 onwards. We are keen to gain views and insights from users, stakeholders and potential suppliers to help test and shape the future proposition.

The current programme is an employment-based route with trainees completing a two-year Initial Teacher Training and Leadership
Development Programme. Trainees are placed into challenging schools serving low-income communities.

We will be undertaking a period of engagement activity during February and March and are interested in hearing from anyone who has views on this subject. To express an interest in taking part, please email highpotential.ITT@education.gov.uk.

We will shortly be publishing an Early Engagement Notice in the Official Journal of the European Union and on Contracts Finder.

At this stage, the department is not committing to undertake any formal commissioning activity.