The General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) has announced the next steps in its plan to register college lecturers.
Nearly 4,000 college lecturers - those who hold a teaching qualification in further education (TQFE) or a GTCS-recognised primary or secondary teaching qualification and have 190 days teaching experience in a college setting with adult learners - are now being asked to get ready for registration. College lecturers who are not in this group will be invited to register from April 2022 onwards, subject to new GTCS registration and standards rules.
This follows a pilot registration project, which ran from November 2020-March 2021 with nearly 400 lecturers registering with GTCS from Dundee and Angus College, Forth Valley College and Glasgow Kelvin College.
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The college lecturer registration programme is led by the College Lecturer Registration Working Group (CLRWG), which was given the task of establishing requirements for mandatory registration of college lecturers in Scotland and includes representation from Colleges Scotland, the EIS-FELA union, GTCS, the Scottish government and universities offering the TQFE.
Dr Pauline Stephen, chief executive and registrar of GTCS and chair of the CLRWG, said: “Our focus at GTC Scotland is to support individuals to become, to be and to grow as teaching professionals in Scotland. National rollout of college lecturer registration is not only a milestone in the college lecturer registration programme, but also central to our work to enhance professionalism.”
Larry Flanagan, general secretary of the Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS), said: “We welcome the national rollout of college lecturer registration, with the first tranche of lecturers registering from September 2021. College lecturers deserve the status which professional registration brings and the acknowledgement that teaching in a college requires a body of knowledge and the development of skills and experience to deliver vocational and academic qualifications to a diverse range of learners.
“We look forward to advancing the work in this area and to completing the roll-out of GTC Scotland registration for all those teaching in the college sector from April 2022 and in so doing, delivering a long-standing EIS-FELA goal.”
Shona Struthers, chief executive of Colleges Scotland, said colleges were committed to supporting lecturing staff in their professional development. “This is a historic moment as thousands of lecturers across the country begin the registration process which will support their professionalism and continued development for many years to come, and ultimately enhance the quality of provision available to our students.”
Jamie Hepburn, Scotland’s minister for higher and further education said: “We value the vital role college lecturers play in the design and delivery of high-quality and accessible learning experiences for our students, and I encourage those who are eligible to be registration ready.”
