On These Pages Can Be Found Reports from Conference

CONFERENCE 2015

On these pages can be found reports from conference.

Teachers from across the UK gathered in Cardiff for the Annual Conference of the NASUWT, the largest teachers’ union in the UK, to debate motions for which all members from across the UK have voted.

Issues to be debated include the use of unqualified staff, the impact of financial hardship on children and young people, pupil behaviour and the mental health of teachers.

Chris Keates, General Secretary of the NASUWT, said:

“This Conference is a perfectly timed platform for key messages to be conveyed to politicians and the public just a few weeks before the electorate goes to the polls in one of the most important General Elections in a generation.

“Although the Coalition has only been in office for five years, to public service workers and millions of ordinary families who have borne the brunt of their savage austerity measures, it seems like a lifetime.

“3.7million children in the UK now live in poverty. Thousands are homeless.

“Important rights and entitlements have been removed from children and young people, including the entitlement to be taught by a qualified teacher, the entitlement to a broad-based and balanced curriculum and the entitlement to access educational experiences which promote opportunity and achievement and are not based on their parents’ ability to pay.

“Attacks on teachers’ professionalism, pay, pensions and working conditions have resulted in a teacher recruitment and retention crisis and devastatingly low teacher morale.

“Over the course of the Easter weekend we will be laying out clearly the case for a change of Government in the 2015 General Election.”

New President addresses Conference

Young people are being “diverted onto the dirt track of low-pay, zero-hours and dead-end jobs” as a result of the Coalition Government’s “narrow academic and elitist” education reforms, the new President of the NASUWT, has said.

In his Presidential Address to the NASUWT’s Annual Conference in Cardiff, NASUWT President Graham Dawson said that children and young people are being denied access to a wide range of education opportunities and a curriculum which supports them to make the most of their skills and talents as schools come under pressure to “abandon the arts, PE, music and other non-core subjects to concentrate on those subjects deemed acceptable by this Government of Gradgrinds”.

Mr Dawson, a special and additional needs teacher from Tyneside, told the Conference that “education is more than five A to Cs. Education leads to worlds of wonder and opportunity. Not a narrow corridor, confining and restricting children. It is imperative to educate the whole child. It is time that those in charge of Government policy, and some of our school leaders, also realised this as well.”

Mr Dawson hit out at the economic and social barriers erected under the current Coalition Government which are restricting the life chances of too many children and young people, citing the trebling of university tuition fees, the undermining of vocational learning, the growth of unpaid internships and rising youth unemployment.

“No country can afford the waste and human cost of casting many of its young people aside with such casual abandon”, Mr Dawson told conference representatives. “As guardians of the profession, we must speak up for all those children in our country with no voice, no hope and no future.”

Mr Dawson condemned rising levels of child poverty, highlighting that the number of families living in B&B accommodation has doubled in the last three years.

He pointed out that despite the toll which this is taking on children’s wellbeing, Government spending on children’s mental health services has fallen by 6% since the Coalition came to office, with the result that teachers and schools are being left to pick up the pieces of the impact of family breakdown, poverty and deprivation on pupils.

He said: “In our schools, we take this and create wonderful caring environments, where boundaries are set, where our young people are looked after, listened to, treated with respect and given the opportunity to thrive within a safe and loving community.

“Where caring and committed adults dedicate their working lives to the social, emotional and educational development of the next generation.For we are adults that will not let them down.”

Schools’ ability to effectively support children and young people is being undermined by the privatisation of the education service and the increasing pressure from the accountability system, Mr Dawson told the Conference.

The loosening of democratic control by the Government and a lack of accountability has led to the giving away of schools built and paid for by taxpayers to private firms, the exploitation of unqualified staff and new entrants to the profession, and attacks on teachers’ professionalism and working conditions, Mr Dawson argued.

He said: “These abuses stem from the loosening of democratic control and a lack of accountability. The present system of school governance fails to provide effective scrutiny and strategic direction. Our local authorities have been holed below the waterline, most of the crew thrown overboard, those remaining trying to do the job of ten people, desperate to keep the ship afloat. In academies, the Secretary of State is responsible for thousands of schools.

“Education is not a business, not an opportunity to line your pockets with public money, not an investment opportunity.

“Education is a vital public service. A service to the public, a service to the country, a service to the future."

Use of unqualified teachers in schools increases

The use of unqualified staff in place of qualified teachers in schools is increasing, according to a survey by the NASUWT.

More than six in ten (61%) of the over 4,600 teachers who responded to the survey said they were working alongside unqualified staff. This number rose to 70% in academies.

Most respondents (66%) said they felt the situation was deteriorating because schools were unwilling or unable to pay for qualified teachers.

65% of respondents said that unqualified staff had been employed because their school had decided to take advantage of the Coalition Government’s decision to abolish the requirement for schools to employ qualified teachers.

The latest survey found evidence of unqualified staff performing duties such as:

• regularly teaching lessons (92%). This figure was the same for teachers in academies;
• planning and preparing lessons (84%). This figure rose to 85% in academies;
• assessing and monitoring pupils’ progress (78%). This figure rose to 82% for teachers in academies.

The survey is being released as teachers at the NASUWT’s Annual Conference in Cardiff will call for the entitlement for all children to be taught by a fully qualified teacher to be restored.

Chris Keates, General Secretary of the NASUWT, said:

“The Coalition Government robbed children of a fundamental entitlement when they removed the requirement for schools to employ qualified teachers.

“Parents no longer have the certainty, when they send their child to school, that they will be taught by qualified teachers.

“These figures show that the scale of the problem is now widespread.

“This is jeopardizing the educational progress of children. It is abuse of unqualified staff who are being exploited by schools and it is denying teachers jobs.

“These are crude cost-cutting measures and have nothing to do with enhancing teaching and learning.”

Use of unqualified teachers in schools increases

The use of unqualified staff in place of qualified teachers in schools is increasing, according to a survey by the NASUWT.

More than six in ten (61%) of the over 4,600 teachers who responded to the survey said they were working alongside unqualified staff. This number rose to 70% in academies.

Most respondents (66%) said they felt the situation was deteriorating because schools were unwilling or unable to pay for qualified teachers.

65% of respondents said that unqualified staff had been employed because their school had decided to take advantage of the Coalition Government’s decision to abolish the requirement for schools to employ qualified teachers.

The latest survey found evidence of unqualified staff performing duties such as:

• regularly teaching lessons (92%). This figure was the same for teachers in academies;
• planning and preparing lessons (84%). This figure rose to 85% in academies;
• assessing and monitoring pupils’ progress (78%). This figure rose to 82% for teachers in academies.

The survey is being released as teachers at the NASUWT’s Annual Conference in Cardiff will call for the entitlement for all children to be taught by a fully qualified teacher to be restored.

Chris Keates, General Secretary of the NASUWT, said:

“The Coalition Government robbed children of a fundamental entitlement when they removed the requirement for schools to employ qualified teachers.

“Parents no longer have the certainty, when they send their child to school, that they will be taught by qualified teachers.

“These figures show that the scale of the problem is now widespread.

“This is jeopardising the educational progress of children. It is abuse of unqualified staff who are being exploited by schools and it is denying teachers jobs.

“These are crude cost-cutting measures and have nothing to do with enhancing teaching and learning.”

Teachers betrayed by ministers over workload

Representatives at the Annual Conference of the NASUWT, have today condemned the failure of ministers and employers to address the problem of excessive teacher workload, which is damaging the health and wellbeing of teachers and contributing to the growing crisis in recruitment and retention.

89% of teachers cite excessive workload as the greatest concern they have about their job.

Teachers at the Conference, which is being held in Cardiff, have called for action at national and school level to address excessive workload.

Chris Keates, General Secretary of the NASUWT, said:

“Teachers are exhausted and their health and wellbeing is deteriorating.

“Teachers are being betrayed by ministers and employers, who are well aware of the problems and do nothing to address them.

“The annual research conducted by the NASUWT demonstrates that year-on-year since 2011 workload and working hours have been rising.

“Secretary of State Nicky Morgan raised teachers’ expectations with her Workload Challenge only cruelly to dash them with a sanitised report that misinterpreted and misrepresented the evidence.

“It was perhaps not surprising that so close to the General Election the Secretary of State was compelled to bury the inconvenient truth that Coalition education policies, combined with poor management practices, were the key drivers of excessive workload.

“Excessive workload is driving talented teachers out of the profession, deterring new entrants and damaging the health and wellbeing of those who remain.

“High quality education cannot be sustained by a profession which is stressed, demoralised and exhausted.”