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Promoting Quality in Teacher Education

Note of the meeting of the UCET ITE secondary forum held on-line at 10.00am on Tuesday 16 June 2020

Welcome, introductions and minutes of the previous meeting

Colleagues were welcomed to the final meeting of the 2019/20 academic year. The note of the meeting held on 10 March 2020 was agreed. On matters arising, it was reported that a number of HEIs had agreed to be ‘early adopters’ for the new Apply service.

Discussion

A range of issues was discussed, including:

An update from JNR on non-primary related issues, including PCET, the REF and developments in Northern Ireland and Wales.

Covid 19 related issues, including:

Relaxations made by DfE (following discussions with UCET) to the ITE criteria for both 2019/20 and 2020/21 covering, amongst other things: flexibilities on GCSE entry requirements and its implications for loan and bursary support; the two school requirement; consecutive age-phases; and assessing current students on the basis of QTS trajectories. It was also confirmed that flexibility already existed in terms of the number of days students spend in school, provided that programmes were designed to allow for the required number of days.

Planning for 2020/21, which was reported to be problematic as any plans might have to be changed at short notice. Specific examples included: some placements beginning later in the year, either after the October break or in January 2021; the front loading of centre-based elements, through on-line or blended delivery; developing the notion of ‘unseen observations’; maintaining existing placement plans for the time being; delivering HEI programme components through a mixture of on-line and face to face, although possibly in smaller groups; on-line engagement with school activities; applying HEI level rules on room capacity and social distancing; and pointing out to schools the benefits of having student teachers on placement given the reluctance of some schools to engage with ITE, as evidenced by the recent UCET-NASBTT survey results.

Recruitment to ITE and the results of the UCET survey on on-line recruitment activities, which can be time consuming although can improve attendance rates at interview. On current levels of application, a number of forum members reported significant increases (e.g. art & design and business studies), although some subjects were still struggling at some institutions.

Inspection and regulatory issues, including: UCET’s call for the CCF and OfSTED inspection framework to be delayed to allow ITE partnerships to focus on more immediate priorities (it was expected however that they might both be launched to existing timetables); and the importance of ITE providers being allowed to engage critically with the CCF. Forum members felt that it was not realistic to expect ITE providers and their partner schools to engage fully with the CCF and OfSTED at a time when they had more pressing priorities. The possibility of a statement from UCET advising members to (while doing what they can in regards to CCF and OfSTED) to prioritise more important activities was welcomed.

ITE recruitment and SKE issues, informed by a presentation from Mark Crowley of NTU, the slides from which would be circulated. There was general support for a science SKE and for the value of 36 week SKE programmes. Some colleagues reported delivering SKE in parallel with ITE,

The development of the new UCET strategy, building on the work of the IBTA group.

The 3-4 November on-line UCET conference.

Items for information

The Easter UCET newsletter was noted.

It was reported that Jenny Wynn had been elected Chair and Bryony Black as Vice Chair of the forum for 2020/21 onwards. Alison Winson was thanked for her excellent service as Chair and a member of the UCET Executive over the last three years.

Any other business

It was agreed that a survey would be held about the timing and format of future secondary forum symposia.

Date of next meeting

24 November 2020, via Zoom.