Main mathematics in Colleges of Education

Extract

Whatever may be the future of Colleges of Education after the re-organisation indicated in the White Paper Education: a framework for expansion, the great majority of teachers will continue to be trained in these colleges. In nursery, infant and junior schools most teachers are women, and the rate of turnover due to marriage is very high. In recent years, in order to staff the schools, allowing for this ‘wastage’, nearly one-third of the teaching profession has had to be in training at any given time, and rather more than two-thirds of these have been women. Clearly there are not enough young people leaving school with good academic qualifications to meet the needs of the profession, even if they wished to teach. In general, the more academically able choose not to teach, but rather think in terms of a career which is more remunerative and a Higher Education which is allegedly more ‘respectable’.