Secondary Teaching Apprenticeship Scenario
We all recognise the challenges of recruiting teachers. An alternative which you may want to consider is employing someone who is already in your school but is not yet qualified. You can take them on if they are a graduate as part of the apprentice teacher scheme for which we are accredited at Red Kite. You can read further details of the requirements here and we have tried to flesh this out in the following imagined scenario.
Beth has been a science technician at Oldfield Secondary Academy for three years. She joined the school after gaining a degree in biology but at that time she had no clear idea what she wanted to do as a career. Members of the science department notice that she has good relationships with the pupils Beth and runs a science club on a Tuesday night.
The school has a vacancy for a biology teacher. They take Beth on as an apprenticeship teacher in September. She gets paid on scale 1 but the school also receives £5k towards the cost of her salary. When researching the details of payment, leaders notice that if Beth was training to be a French teacher, she would receive £20k towards her salary and as a physics teacher, she would receive £29k because these are shortage subjects.
Beth starts teaching in September and is expected to teach up to 80% of a full timetable by the end of her apprenticeship in June, but the school gives her less than that to begin with.
Beth spends roughly two days a week out of school when she is receiving training and mentor support. There is no fee for this as it is paid through the apprenticeship levy. There is a 6-week block when she is sent on an alternative placement. The school has plenty of notice about this, so they are able to cover it. They notice that Beth comes back full of ideas because of the insights she gained on placement. The rest of the time, she is in school, taking classes on her own.
Beth settles well as she is familiar with the school routines and the pupils. The Science department is pleased because they already know Beth and trust her. Beth gains QTS at the end of the first year and also completes her PGCE.
Interested and want to know more? Get in touch with the team.