Teaching Shortage
TIIE news that the new term has just started in Glasgow with a shortage of 1,300 teachers and that in Newcastle serious consideration is
being given to plans for part-time schooling as one of the few possible ways to cope with the crisis should produce a new wave of thinking about temporary solutions. Of course the crisis is accentuated this year by the introduction of the new three-year training course with the result that no new teachers this summer passed out of training college, but it should be realised that one of the main blocks to progress has become teachers' own fear§ of a lowering of standards. These fears were behind the outcry that greeted Sir David Eccles's proposals earlier this year. Hopes of total redress were not to be sullied by the acceptance of a few short-term measures. Yet with the shortage at its present size it is likely that no lowering of standards could be greater than that resulting from qualified teachers trying to cope with conditions that have 'become in places hopelessly out of control. The number of teachers leaving the profession is already signifi- cant. The possibility of introducing a number of part-time teachers, particularly in mathematics and science subjects where anyway the short- age is at its most acute, should be more care- fully explored. Local industrial firms and busi- nesses cbuld well be approached to see if they would be prepared to lend out their staff to do a few hours' teaching a week (in the matter of pro- viding even the most simple equipment they could be still more useful), and much less countenance should be given to headmasters' fears that part-time and short-term teaching has a bad effect on the rest of the staff. Another possible solution is that far more encouragement should be given to graduates, and indeed to school- leavers before going up to university, to do a short period of teaching. If two years' military service could, however grudgingly, be tolerated, how much more likely would be the success of a similar kind of educational service?
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