All primary teaching posts are filled for September
RECRUITMENT of teachers is looking positive for the next academic year, the director of Education has said.
Nick Hynes said that all primary school roles will be filled and recruitment for secondary schools is under way, as the island, in common with the UK, battles the problem of teacher vacancies.
‘Recruitment across our primary phase is really strong, we’ve had a really strong healthy field of applicants so that all our posts for primary teachers will be filled in September, as they are now,’ he said.
‘There are teachers in place across all secondary schools, some of those are supply or agency teachers while we try and find permanent teachers to move into some of those more challenging curriculum areas such as maths and science.’
Guernsey is not immune to recruitment challenges, though staffing problems are said to be worse in other jurisdictions, such as Jersey and the Isle of Man.
Fewer teachers entering the profession in the UK has consequently had a knock-on effect in Guernsey, but the island is in a good place in comparison, he said.
‘We are working with different recruitment agencies which are giving us a pathway to different groups of teachers we didn’t have before, so we are confident that we’ll be able to make those recruitments,’ said Mr Hynes.
He said that the whole community was finding it difficult to recruit staff. In a buoyant economy, encouraging people to move around, as well as housing and accommodation challenges, the education sector was no different.
The States is launching its initial teacher training programme in September, which presents the opportunity to train teachers from within the community on-island.
Many undergraduate teachers complete their NQT year in the UK and then get used to living and working there and stay.
It is hoped the year-long course will encourage undergraduates to return to the island and provide a long-term strategy to increase the teaching workforce.
‘We can now offer a post-graduate teaching course on-island,’ said Mr Hynes.
‘It is free and also we’re offering a bursary, like with the nursing course, so people can come back to Guernsey, get paid to study, and then teach across States schools for three years.’
The scheme is planned to offer a better financial deal than in the UK, where students often have to pay for training, rather than earning while they learn.
