·
Teacher
shortage, future-proofing the workforce
Many schools
are experiencing severe problems in recruiting high quality
teachers. This is especially notable in core subjects and in
welsh-medium schools. Recruitment of Headteachers is now a
major problem with schools often having to advertise two or three
times before being able to appoint. If Wales is to implement its
vision of having world-leading educational system, it is crucial
that we are able to recruit and retain sufficient teachers of the
highest quality.
·
Education
funding shortage
Anecdotal
evidence from our members indicates that there are significant
numbers of secondary schools that are on the verge of having
deficit budgets. The only effective way to reduce spending is
to cut staff, and this has a serious impact on recruiting high
quality of teachers, the subsequent increase in workload, and their
ability to maintain the quality of their work. We fear that without
some significant investment in schools, standards will fall and the
workforce morale will seriously deteriorate.
·
Refining
of performance measures – accountability framework
Accountability
is an important part of government’s role of measuring
effectiveness of public services. However, some of the
proposed accountability measures for secondary schools seem
destined to cause major issues for schools, and a drastic fall in
success rates. We feel there is a need for the GCSE performance
measures to be carefully reviewed to ensure that measures are not
prohibitive and beyond the reach of many students.
|