GTC

[Derek McMillan]

I received this NUT press release today:

The General Teaching Council (England) has been weaned away from the Government. The council has voted for an NUT nominee to the council, Judy Moorhouse, to be its chair Ms Moorhouse is Vice President of the NUT. Nominees are unelected members of the council.

Commenting on the decision, Doug McAvoy, NUT General Secretary, said:

"The presence of the NUT in the GTC is fully endorsed by this election. The Union was success the election of 12 of its members to the council which has 25 members, and now has an officer of the Union chairing the Council. Ms Moorhouse will ensure that the NUT's policies are promoted.

When the GTC was taking our money and not doing anything in response and when it was clearly a haven for Tony's cronies, I shared the resentment expressed by a number of teachers at my school.

Perhaps things will change for the better but of course most of us will wait and see what the GTC actually does before celebrating

ful in

[Jean Walker]

What powers does the GTC have in Britain? We have a Teacher Registration Board which ensures quals for registration of teachers who cannot be employed in either public or private schools unless they are registered.

I have been reading with interest the stuff about English TAs being employed as cover teachers and now doing Home Group duties instead of teachers. Can the Council not have any inflence on that? We would have to change an act of parliament for it to be possible here.

[Jean Walker]

What do people generally think about TAs doing the work of teachers?

[Derek McMillan]

What powers does the GTC have in Britain? We have a Teacher Registration Board which ensures quals for registration of teachers who cannot be employed in either public or private schools unless they are registered.

I have been reading with interest the stuff about English TAs being employed as cover teachers and now doing Home Group duties instead of teachers. Can the Council not have any inflence on that? We would have to change an act of parliament for it to be possible here.

There is an agreement between some of the teacher unions and the government over the employment of TAs as teachers. The NUT opposed this on the grounds that it was being used as a way of getting cheap unqualified teachers.

The government wrapped this up as a reduction of workload for teachers and they have floated the idea of "schools without teachers" in which the only qualified teacher might be the head.

So far the GTC has been ineffective in dealing with this because the GTC was stuffed with government supporters , somewhat disparagingly referred to as "Tony's cronies."

Strike action in Croydon forced the council to retreat over attempts to impose widespread use of TAs in order to cut the education budget....in the end it might be the unions who are more effective in dealing with this than the GTC.

There are various references for this but I will stick to two I know about:

Martin Powell-Davies comment on the situation

NUT comment on health and education

[Guest]

I too am opposed to the idea of unqualified people taking and teaching classes. We have a scheme in my school where what are termed "cover supervisors" take classes for absent classes basically delivering a teaching resource planned by a qualified member of staff.

I oppose this on 3 grounds. Firstly it takes work away from legtimately qualified supply teachers. Secondly the pay/ conditions for "cover supervisotrs" is extremely poor and is unlikely to encourage commitment, and thirdly (and most importantly) I believe it is essential that all lessons in the State sector be taken by properly qualified and registered teachers, both for both the educational progress of the children and the coherence and unity of the profession.

Consumers are unlikely to want unqualified people to service their cars or central heating - why then should they expect the education of their children to be left in the hands of unqualified people?