Following consultation on proposed changes to the ITE, the outcomes were
announced on 10 May. The series of linked documents in the following paragraphs reflect the changes which will be made to the accreditation criteria and subsequently ITE programme accreditation, coming into force from September 2024.
The Minister for Education and Welsh Language’s
statement outlining the changes, summarises the main purposes of the reforms as being to strengthen the responsibilities of schools and HEI providers, the Welsh language strategy as well as an improved induction package.
Importantly, the Minister states the following:
“
Building on the findings from stakeholders and the consultation, we will now explore with special schools, ITE Partnerships, and our middle tier partners, whether the current legislative and policy framework for school teacher qualifications is the best it can be. This will have the specific focus of supporting learners with the most profound and complex additional learning needs. I will provide further updates as this work progresses.”
We certainly welcome this statement, since training of novice teachers in this area, is a concern.
Here you will find an
outline of the delivery and programme requirements for programmes accredited before 31 August 2024 and then for those programmes commencing 1 September 2024. The latter document in the hyperlink will replace the guidance circular 01/2018 from 1 September, and among other points, states:
“Implications for schools
If schools are to be given the task of providing systematic and structured learning opportunities in relation to all the core areas of the teacher education curriculum, it is clear they need to have the training, professional development opportunities and resources to take on that responsibility. A Lead Partner School will need to have or be committed to establishing a culture where ITE is accepted as one of its core responsibilities. That culture will include an openness to examining and debating their own pedagogical and assessment practices in the light of wide range of other forms of evidence including evidence from research and from practice elsewhere”.
You will find further roles and responsibilities for partner schools in sections 4.3 and 4.4.
This short and interesting
research paper has informed some of these changes and might be worth a read.