Last week, the government released new targets for initial teacher training (ITT) recruitment.

They show a rise in targets to 5.1 per cent overall, with an approximate increase by 7.9 per cent in primary and 3.5 per cent in secondary education respectively.

This is great on paper but seems optimistic, considering that government figures released last month showed a worrying 24 per cent fall in applications to ITT in a year.  

So, while optimistic targets are all well and good, we need to focus on how we treat and support teachers after they join the profession. Unless this improves, more teachers will leave and recruitment targets will likely continue to rise.

Instead of focusing on new recruitment targets, we should focus on solving the real problem - why many teachers want to quit in the first place.

Often, this is because they feel they cannot do their jobs as effectively as they’d like to. What is more, when they are qualified, they teach too many lessons, their workload is too high and there is too much pressure from Ofsted, which inevitably leads to higher levels of stress and exhaustion. 

How can we break this loop? Throwing money at new teachers will attract more into the profession for a time but, if money is the motivator into the profession, then the likelihood of them staying is slim, especially once their student loans are paid off. 

We have to turn teaching into a profession in which people wish to stay; where they can do the job they signed up for and continue to receive high-quality ongoing training. If we can create this, we won’t need to throw money at plugging holes. 

That is not to say that pay cannot be used as a lever. Teaching is a vital job and teachers should be paid accordingly. So, why not further increase salaries for teachers who stay for longer than a minimum five years, and pay the best teachers up to £60K a year? 

Paying more to teachers at the beginning of their careers is a short-term fix. Instead, the money should be given to great teachers who choose to stay. 

However, salary is only one factor and, in truth, increasing it may not stop many teachers quitting. But there are things in the day-to-day life of a teacher that we can change. 

One is to address teacher workload - no teacher should teach more than a 70 per cent timetable; that’s roughly 18 hours of teaching a week. 

We will obviously need to recruit more teachers to enable this - and it will require money. But at least we would be spending it on tackling the issue rather than on patching it up. Until we recognise and respect that performing as a teacher for four to five hours a day is exhausting - and truly recognise the demands of the job - we’ll never solve the real issues.

Training must improve and that would benefit the entire school. For me, excellent training dignifies and professionalises teaching but, at present, we rush graduates through a nine-month course with little time to properly develop and hone their craft. As such, I think PGCE courses should last at least two years before a teacher is qualified. 

This would give us time to develop robust and comprehensive training courses that involve how to break down learning, plan lessons and make a course engaging; how to assess, coach and stretch students; how to manage a class and how to spot pastoral problems.

Just as importantly, trainee teachers would have more time to understand the psychology of how children learn - an aspect that many providers cannot give enough time to in the current set-up. 

At the National Institute of Teaching and Education, we spend as much time as possible on this area and it pays dividends in developing first-rate teachers.

It also bakes in resilience from the start, so teachers feel better equipped to withstand the challenges they will inevitably face in the classroom. 

Once qualified, teachers should be trusted to do their jobs. That’s doesn’t mean being unaccountable. It means not being beholden to an inspectorate or to your last set of results.

The government can certainly shift its targets up but that doesn’t mean to say they will be reached.

The point is, it’s another example of our broken system - too many teachers are leaving so the government needs to recruit more.

We are in a vicious cycle of replacing people rather than addressing the reasons why we have to replace them. 

I fear that this will be the case until we turn the profession into one in which good teachers want to stay, and one that attracts people who wish to stay from the outset.

Professor Geraint Jones is the executive director and associate pro vice-chancellor of the National School of Education and Teaching, Coventry University