Schools crisis: When will we ever learn?

A teacher recruitment report published by the House of Commons Library in late 2022 drew a fairly negative image of the state of teaching in the English school system.

The number of qualified teachers is not keeping pace with the increase in student numbers, despite financial incentives at university level such as scholarships and bursaries, it said.

Recruitment in 2022/23 for secondary teachers was 41 per cent below target and for primary teachers was seven per cent below target. Certain subjects fared worse – physics teacher recruitment was 83 per cent below target, technology teachers 75 per cent and computing teachers 70 per cent.

Why is the teacher vacancy rising? Workload is increasing, to the point where 57 per cent of lower-secondary teachers and 53 per cent of primary teachers now say their work is unmanageable.

Full-time primary teachers in England, the report said, work 52.1 hours a week, more than in any other country participating in the OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey, except Japan.

Full-time secondary teachers reported working an average of 49.3 hours per week.

Finally, in the 12 months to November 2021, about 36,300 full-time equivalent teachers left the state-funded sector – 88% for reasons other than retirement or death.

More recently, the government announced discussions around Minimum Service Levels (MSLs), which would minimise the impact of strike action.

“Minimum service levels aim to balance the ability of workers to strike with the rights of the public, who expect the essential services they pay for, like schools and colleges, to be there when they need them. This would mean protections for children, young people and parents would be put in place to ensure they get the education they need and deserve,” the Government’s Education Hub said.

The National Education Union suggested, in response, a more effective way to minimise the impact of industrial action – engaging with the unions to resolve the issues that lead to action.

“Pay, workload, and the recruitment and retention crisis will remain lightning rod issues for our members until the Education Secretary brings forward positive and substantial change,” it said.

What is the way forward for schools?

Is this all recent news, or has the teacher recruitment and retention issue been on the radar for quite a while?

“The teacher retention crisis is not a recent issue and has been an ongoing concern for a time,” says Billy Wong, Professor of Education at the University of Reading.

“I remember having conversations with colleagues about this as far as 10 years ago, where the headline message was that a high proportion of teachers leave within three to five years after their qualification.”

Wong, who is also Director of Research and Evaluation, and Deputy Director of Postgraduate Research Studies at the University of Reading’s Institute of Education, identifies numerous drivers behind this failure to retain teachers.

“The most common words I hear are workload, exhaustion and feeling underappreciated, much of which I would say is underpinned by a reduction in resource, in real terms.”

“Teachers are doing more and more, with a greater and wider range of responsibilities, and are very much stretched to the point where enough is enough. For those teachers, it is a real shame that their passion to educate and teach the next generation is not very well protected.”

Is teaching a passion project?

The “passion to educate”, as Wong describes it, is an important part of the discussion.

Those who feel an attraction to teaching, who desire engagement in the education process, have a certain expectation of what the experience should be like, he says. When they begin to work, the gap between expectation and reality can be a shock.

“Most trainee teachers do enjoy their experience and find the whole process rewarding, and there is a lot to admire in teachers who continue to make real differences to the life experiences and trajectories of children,” Wong says.

“However, when trainee teachers graduate and go full-time into the profession, the additional burdens, papers and procedures that may not have been that transparent during the training stage suddenly become apparent.”

This quickly leads to a feeling of being overwhelmed, he says. It results in a sense of the work being unmanageable. And it means that many of those who wanted to be engaged in teaching end up looking for work outside of schools.

“That’s why the problem is not just attracting people into teaching,” Wong says. “The bigger problem is retaining those who are already in the profession.”

Is greater funding a solution?

The Institute for Government’s Performance Tracker 2023: Schools says per-pupil funding has increased from recent lows.

“Core schools funding increased from £46.7bn in 2010/11 to £54.9bn in 2022/23 (both in 2023/24 terms), equating to a real-terms increase of 17.5 per cent,” the report said.

“Most school revenue funding is provided on a per-pupil basis, however, so some of this increase purely reflects the fact that overall pupil numbers are higher now than in 2010. Per-pupil funding fell in real terms between 2014/15 and 2017/18 – but by 2022/23 stood at £7,156 per pupil, the highest level to date, and 3.5 per cent above 2010/11 levels.”

Schools that serve more deprived communities, the report says, receive more funding per pupil than those in less deprived areas. However, the link between funding and pupil need is weakening.

Additionally, over the past decade there has been a dramatic increase in pupils with special education needs, from 232,000 in 2014 to 389,000 in 2023.

Educator challenges aren’t exclusive to schools; they continue into the higher education sector as well.

“The main challenge for educators in English higher education is the declining unit of funding for domestic undergraduate students, which represent a high proportion of students in virtually all UK universities,” Professor Chris Millward, Professor of Practice in Education Policy at the University of Birmingham and author of Why we need a standing commission to break the deadlock in higher education, told us.

“The maximum fee was set at £9,000 in 2012 and has increased just once to £9,250 in 2017, so it has lost around a third of its value in real terms across the decade.”

And so, funding is increasing, but it’s outpaced by need. Apart from further funding increases, what other solutions are available?

“I think there needs to be a critical review of the state of teaching in schools for teachers,” Wong says. “It should be from the lens and perspective of teachers across all stages, from those in training to those in teaching, as well as those who are training the teachers.”

Such a review should also seek insights from school leaders, policymakers and governing bodies such as the department for Education and the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).

Without addressing the core issues, the quality of school performance and of learning within those schools will continue to decline, Wong says.

He identifies aspects of long-term impact: an increase in class sizes, and the removal of particular subjects or reduction in choices of subjects for students to study, particularly at A-level.

“There are early-career payments for trainee students in high-demand subjects such as physics, chemistry and mathematics, but these are only short-term solutions if the issues around workload are not properly reviewed.”

The impact of funding shortfalls in universities are similar.

“As this situation develops, it will increase uncertainty within universities, leading to greater pressures and job insecurity for staff, many of whom rely on short-term teaching contracts during the early period of their careers.

“This may make it harder to attract the highest academic achievers into academic careers, particularly in subjects where there are highly paid alternatives, such as economics and STEM. This may increase reliance on the recruitment of academic staff from other countries.”