Does anyone remember the headily optimistic days of early summer? With holidays approaching and the promise of warm weather, there was a lot to look forward to: Scotland’s men were playing in an international football tournament for the first time in decades while, equally anticipated, a new post was to be rolled out for experienced teachers that encouraged them to stay in the classroom while taking on a mentoring and resident expert role, with the reward of a higher salary.
Unfortunately, the lead teacher’s remit seems to have lasted for about as long as Scotland’s participation in the Euros, both seemingly sunk without a trace before June was out.
Although the Scottish government said the post would be introduced this August, the release of any new information since then - how many positions there will be, who can apply, when the process will begin, in fact, anything concrete at all - has been as rare as unicorn sightings on Sauchiehall Street. And like the mythical beast, experienced classroom teachers at the top of the pay scale may have considered the lead teacher role just too good to be true, especially the element which offered the opportunity to work outside of the classroom at local authority, regional or even national level.
Background: New ‘lead teacher’ posts to be introduced in August
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And yet this cohort, who make up the majority of the teaching workforce, is the one that the education authorities need to work hardest to retain rather than disappoint with false dawns. These teachers have found promotion opportunities vanishingly rare since the end of a plethora of positions from the turn of the century: chartered teacher, senior teacher and assistant principal teacher posts have all gone.
Yet, the unpromoted senior professionals generally do have spare capacity to support colleagues and take on additional departmental duties as, with greater experience, comes greater use of time efficiencies or shortcuts. But this experience could be lost to teaching completely if frustrations about being unrecognised, unrewarded and underutilised are not addressed.
It would be a shame if this idea has been kicked into the long grass because of funding differences between the Scottish government and the local councils, as has been rumoured, as the costs compared to the returns education would receive wouldn’t be too great.
Creating a number of lead teachers positions in each school might only cost each establishment about £1,000 a week, giving each lead teacher a little over an extra £100 a week to stay in the classroom. Compare this cost with the benefit of having a workforce enthused by the possibility of being promoted without going into management, as well as retaining many in the profession who otherwise would be looking elsewhere for long-term satisfaction. Cynics might suggest that just talking about the new position without actually creating any jobs is an even cheaper way of keeping teachers dangling on a classroom string.
Whoever has created the impasse needs to be convinced about the merits of the role. Not just the big difference in recruitment and teacher retention, but also in the improvement in quality of teaching, by which lead teachers would be given the time to properly mentor new colleagues beyond their probationary year in schools.
After last night, Scotland look to be on track to make it to the Qatar World Cup in 2022 - let’s not leave it until the next qualification campaign to have the lead teacher scheme up and running in Scottish classrooms.
Gordon Cairns is a forest school and English teacher who works in Scotland
