Leadership

Teacher Retention and Turnover Research: How Do Teachers Compare To Nurses And Police Officers?

How do working hours and earnings in the teaching profession compare to nursing and policing, two of the other large and important public sector professions in England? This NFER research compares the characteristics of each profession’s workforce, their hours worked, earnings, and job satisfaction. Leadership Briefing (140)

The analysis shows that despite working the joint highest number of hours annually and having the joint lowest average hourly pay, teachers remain satisfied with their jobs and incomes. However, there is a lot of dissatisfaction with the amount of leisure time they have, which may be affecting retention.

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      string(5254) "a possible performance of normative narratives (i.e. them potentially telling us what they thought we wanted to or should hear), they offered more nuanced takes. In some cases, they felt sharing nudes might be understandable or beneficial, for example in the carrying out of a relationship, being a less risky act than actually engaging in physical sexual activities. Nonetheless, they accepted that discourses amongst their school peers were gendered, that girls sharing photos of themselves was considered less acceptable than boys sharing photos of themselves. Secondly, the students reported that education or advice about sexting was rarely discussed in school, and they were not all aware of the legal implications i.e. that despite the age of consent for intercourse being 16, it is technically an offence to make or distribute indecent images of anyone under 18. The young people reported it being mentioned in one assembly, but that this format clearly didn’t invite discussion. Rather, they suggested covering it in class as part of Personal, Social, Health and Economic Education curriculum, and returning to it every few months. They suggested that this should be conveyed ‘just like conversations’, but potentially separated by gender to overcome their discomfort and the gendered attitudes described above.Third, young people recognised that support structures were important when sexting problems or concerns came up in their everyday lives, but that they generally wouldn’t feel comfortable going to a parent or teacher. On one level, there were concerns of ‘being told off’, or having their mobile phone use monitored, but awkwardness and confidentiality were also clearly factors. Given this, we discussed whether support could come from external agencies such as Childline, or other adults more on the occasional periphery, such as the school nurse, a student mentor, or a youth worker. The idea of a remote support structure such as a phone line or text service was even mooted, to overcome anonymity and embarrassment concerns.We explored a case study with the students, of sexting practices being discovered within a school context, and the student being called to a teacher’s office with the police in attendance before the parents had arrived. This led to a variety of viewpoints. Some felt that parents shouldn’t be informed, while others felt they should. Similarly divisive were views regarding police involvement, with some feeling the police would have better things to do, while others recognised that enforcing a removal of images from someone’s phone might sometimes be necessary. In discussing the case study, they recognised the dangers of sending ‘nudes’; that a photo could be passed on or leaked once it had been sent to someone, but felt that in such situations the victim shouldn’t have been subject to punishment, but that the ‘re-sender’ of the nude should be held accountable and face consequences. There was also some discussion of the responsibility of social media platforms such as Snapchat, Instagram and Facebook to better police their spaces to remove leaked nudes.This work was as significant in its approach as in its findings. It resulted in a set of recommendations that the young people took back into their school—most specifically to do with the approach to education regarding sexting. The young people also clearly appreciated the opportunity for their voices to be heard in this work, as they co-presented a paper detailing the findings of the work at a public research conference at Birmingham City University. If nothing else then, we should, as adults and professionals encountering these situations in our everyday practice, understand the need to be prepared and understand these situations from all perspectives, and openly encourage the involvement of young people in dialogue when problematic sexting situations arise.Dr Jerome Turner is a Lecturer at Birmingham Centre for Media and Cultural Research, Birmingham City University. Researchers Dr Alex Wade, Dr Annalise Weckesser (Birmingham City University) and Dr Clara Jørgensen (University of Birmingham) were also involved in this project.NOTES1. Albury, K., and K. Crawford. 2012. Sexting, consent and young people’s ethics: Beyond Megan’s story. Continuum 26(3): 463–473; Karaian, L. 2014. Policing ‘sexting’: Responsibilization, respectability and sexual subjectivity in child protection/crime prevention responses to teenagers’ digital sexual expression. Theoretical Criminology 18(3): 282–299.2. Clark, A. 2004. The mosaic approach and research with young children. In The Reality of Research with Children and Young People, edited by V. Lewis, M. Kellet, and C. Robinson, pp. 142–160. London: SAGE.3. BBC R4. (2015). Teenager added to police database for sending indecent image. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p031fztz4. Jørgensen, C.R., Weckesser, A., Turner, J. and Wade, A., 2019. Young people’s views on sexting education and support needs: Findings and recommendations from a UK-based study. Sex Education, 19(1): 25–40."
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Digital Learning

Rethinking ‘Sext Education’

12 Aug 2019

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      string(3814) "This report by researchers at King’s Business School and commissioned by the Office of Manpower Economics, explores the impact of apprenticeships on recruitment and retention in the public sector. The report focuses on the workforces covered by the public sector pay review bodies for Primary and Secondary School Teachers, The Armed Forces, Police Officers and National Health Service (NHS) staff.The research comes in the wake of recent national policy developments including the introduction of an apprenticeship levy and apprentice targets, designed to encourage the growth in apprenticeship numbers across the economy. These developments have made apprenticeships increasingly central to workforce management in the public sector.The researchers found that across the 4 workforces the approaches to apprenticeships were uneven:Teaching: The use of apprenticeships is fractured and disconnected, with this form of training gaining little traction to date in teaching.Armed Forces:  Apprenticeships are deeply embedded within the armed forces, able as a consequence to take the recent changes to apprenticeship training in their stride.Police: A degree level apprenticeship has become a key vehicle for recruiting police constables particularly in the context of the government’s uplift in police officer numbers. However, as police forces introduce this apprenticeship at speed and scale challenges are arising in developing the necessary infrastructure and resources to support this model of training.NHS: In the NHS apprenticeships are used less to recruit new, young employees and more to develop career opportunities for existing employees. NHS Trust engagement with the local union representatives in management of apprenticeships remains patchy, while Trust capacity to spend their levy and provide the necessary supervisory support for apprentices remains problematic.Key Findings for Primary and Secondary School Teachers:Apprenticeship arrangements in teachingremain fractured and disconnected. Thus, there is a teaching assistant apprenticeship butthe teaching assistant is unable to move on from this programmeto a three-year degree teacher apprenticeship (In contrast to the NHS where the healthcare assistant canprogress to nurse degree apprenticeship).   There is a Level 6 teacher apprenticeship. However, thisis a post graduate qualification and its take-up by schools and individuals had been limited for the following reasons: The considerable range of already available entry routes into teaching. The limited perceived value attached by stakeholders to this apprenticeship as a means of dealing with recruitment and retention pressures in teaching.  The impact of apprenticeship reforms on the management of the teaching workforce should not, however, be completely discounted. The apprenticeship levy is paid by most community schools into the overall local education authority levy pot, with financial implications, not least their ability to pay staff. Across all four Pay Review Bodies there are shared challenges and concerns including:Resourcing the extended time apprentices now spend away from the workplace on training. Developing the necessary number and type apprenticeship standards required to engage their respective workforces. Organising the new apprenticeship end point assessment in a timely way. Given the cost of apprenticeships, being able to fund and support non-apprenticeship training, for example continuing professional development. Being able to fund apprenticeship infrastructure costs given that the levy can only be spent on the apprenticeship training itself.Link: Apprenticeships and the Pay Review Body Workforces: Final Report"
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Leadership

Apprenticeships and the Pay Review Body Workforces: Final Report

25 Aug 2020

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Leadership Briefing 12.03 (135)"
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Leadership Briefing 12.03 (135)"
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      string(4850) "Leadership BriefingLeadership Briefing – www.teachingtimes.comReports Summaries – a weeklyservice of essential summaries,in-depth reports and criticalanalysis that’s new and relevantto education, linked to originalsource documents.TEACHER RETENTION AND TURNOVERRESEARCHKeywordsTeacherretention,turnover, pupils,numbers,workforce,education policy,teacher supply,key subjects,recruitmentSummaryRecruiting and retaining enough teachers to serve growing numbers of pupils is one of thekey challenges currently facing England’s education system. This interim report funded bythe Nuffield Foundation gains a deeper understanding of the dynamics within the teachingworkforce in England.In recent years, against the backdrop of increasing pupil numbers and teacher shortages in keysubjects, teacher supply has climbed up the education policy agenda in England. There has beensignificant interest in teacher recruitment and retention among policy makers, and from school leaderswho struggle to fill vacancies. This issue is further exacerbated as pupil numbers are forecast to risein the secondary sector by 19 per cent between 2017 and 2026, which will increase recruitment andretention pressures.A thorough understanding of the factors associated with teacher supply in the state sector is crucial toassist policy makers and system leaders formulate effective responses to this complex issue.Key Findings: ■ The rate that older teachers have been leaving the profession increased between 2010 and 2015. ■ The increase in turnover has been greater than the increase in leaving rates, creating even morepressures for schools. ■ The proportion of teachers leaving the profession or moving school has increased across allsubjects between 2010 and 2015. ■ Part-time teachers are far more prevalent in the primary sector than in the secondary sector. ■ Teachers in schools rated as being Inadequate by Ofsted are more likely to leave the professionor move school. ■ There appears to be little evidence to date that MATs are better able to retain teachers byproviding opportunities to move within their structure. ■ The teacher supply challenge in London is particularly acute when compared to other geographicareas. ■ More analysis is needed to look at the impact of wider factors on retention and turnover.Week Commencing 6th November 2017https://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/NUFS03/NUFS03.pdfhttps://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/NUFS03/NUFS03.pdfLeadership BriefingLeadership Briefing – www.teachingtimes.comReports Summaries – a weeklyservice of essential summaries,in-depth reports and criticalanalysis that’s new and relevantto education, linked to originalsource documents.Recommendations: ■ The Government should investigate why the rate of leaving among older teachers has beenincreasing and explore whether they could be incentivised to stay in the profession longer,particularly in subjects with specialist teacher shortages. ■ The Government should give greater attention to the impact of teachers moving around theprofession and develop policies to support schools which are disproportionately affected. ■ Bursary payments, or other financial incentives such as student loan repayments, should bestructured to explicitly incentivise retention in the teaching profession during the first few yearsafter training. ■ The Government and stakeholders in the secondary sector need to look urgently at identifyingways that accommodate more and better part-time working in secondary schools. ■ Further research with secondary schools which successfully offer greater flexibility in workingpatterns should be undertaken and best practice shared. ■ To help improve retention, leaders of MATs should do more to promote the benefits of working intheir organisation to their teachers; for example, by raising the profile of the MAT as the structurethat teachers belong to, and through promoting career paths for teachers to develop andprogress within the MAT. ■ Policy makers should look at how policy interventions, such as housing subsidies, could help toretain teachers in high-cost areas. ■ Further research exploring the geographical flows of trainees into the teacher workforce / duringtheir careers would help to gain an understanding of the detailed dynamic picture within andacross different areas and aid the development of policy solutions.WEB LINKTeacher Retention and Turnover Researchhttps://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/NUFS03/NUFS03.pdf"
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Leadership

Teacher Retention and Turnover Research

2 Nov 2017

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      string(412) "... as teacher control over ‘social decisions’ (such as student discipline and teacher professional development policies) increases, the amount of conflict between students and staff, among teachers, and between teachers and the principal all decrease.Teachers as agents of changeThis resonates with research from Gert Biesta (Biesta et al., 2012) at ..."
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      string(5861) "privatisation agenda and in a chapter written with Alison Gilliland of the Irish National Teachers’ organisation entitled The Teachers’ Voice: Teacher Unions at the Heart of a new Democratic Professionalism (Stevenson & Gilliland, 2016) argues that:“A key feature of the market-driven Global Education Reform Movement is its intent to break-up and fragment, as a deliberate attempt to undermine the influence of professional interests within public education systems.”The systematic de-skilling of the profession in England has had other consequences and may have contributed to a reduction in respect for teachers. In their submission to the House of Commons Education Committee, academics from the Institute of Education (HoCEC, 2017) wrote:“ultimately, the status accorded to teaching is an important factor in attracting and retaining high calibre candidates. According to the OECD, 35% of teachers in England feel their profession is valued by society, compared with 66% in Korea and 60% in Finland.”If there is to be any hope of transforming the life chances of children and of reducing social inequalities, we need a teaching workforce that is confident, well-trained and trusted rather than demoralised, overburdened and under-prepared. While Schleicher (2011) argues for a collaborative model of reform in which teachers play a key part, successive Secretaries of State at the Department for Education have chosen the opposite path: a top-down model that is conceived of and imposed from the centre. The need for an alternative approachIn Wales, where education is currently undergoing an in-depth review to rewrite the curriculum and overhaul assessment procedures, the Welsh Government has recently commissioned a review of its progress from the OECD (2017). In its report, researchers commented that “in the future Wales will need a different type of teaching professional; one who has significantly more responsibility and understands the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ as well as the ‘what’”.In Scotland, with the introduction of the 2010 Curriculum for Excellence (Scotland’s skills-based curriculum), there has been a move away from a top-down model of change to an approach which sees teachers as playing a central role. They are encouraged to be reflective practitioners who can share and develop ideas within their schools. A new National Improvement Framework introduced in 2016 cited teacher professionalism as one of the key drivers of improvement. The question for all who are concerned with education in England – and one that is frequently articulated is: How can the tide be turned so that teachers here feel valued and gain the support that they need to be the best that they can? This is where teacher voice comes in.Collaborative discussionA good start might be to create opportunities for discussion and collaboration within schools to mitigate the professional isolation that many staff feel. Not just opportunities to talk about their work, but opportunities to discuss the values, vision and direction of their school in order to develop a shared sense of purpose. Time needs to be set aside for this as happens, for example, in Finland. Many teachers go into teaching with high ideals. This motivation can be kept alive by encouraging ongoing reflection about school policies and the ways in which these facilitate the positive development of the school. For too long the majority of teachers have been excluded from such debate as it has been the preserve of school leaders and governors. Surely as some of the key stakeholders in a school they need to have a greater sense of ownership over their working environment and practices. While most schools have teacher representation on their governing bodies, their position is rarely one that is given much weight. This needs to change.American studies find that when teachers are engaged in school decisions and collaborate with school leaders and with each other, school climate improves (Singh, 2012). This promotes a better learning environment for students, which raises student achievement, and a better working environment for teachers, which reduces teacher turnover. Schools, therefore, have everything to gain from developing a more reflective and a more participative ethos. According to researcher, Richard Ingersoll (2003), data from the Schools and Staffing Survey administered by the US Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics shows that as teacher control over ‘social decisions’ (such as student discipline and teacher professional development policies) increases, the amount of conflict between students and staff, among teachers, and between teachers and the principal all decrease.Teachers as agents of changeThis resonates with research from Gert Biesta (Biesta et al., 2012) at the University of Stirling carried out as part of an ESRC project on Teacher Agency and Curriculum Change. Biesta points to the importance of relationships in the building of a collaborative culture which enables teachers to take responsibility and develop a sense of agency in their work. Studies he conducted in schools in Scotland which have introduced the Curriculum for Excellence, indicate the value of less hierarchical school management structures in enabling teachers “to address the complexities encountered in their implementation of a new curriculum”. In Scotland, education policy supports teachers to become agents of change and so it is instructive to look at the factors that make this possible.Some of the messages that can"
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HR and Staff Wellbeing

The Teaching Crisis

10 Oct 2018

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