CPD Team

This recently published report into the English system is of interest as Graham Donladson begins his review into the training of teachers in Scotland.

It is a hefty piece of work;  it reaches a number of interesting conclusions, and makes some pretty radical  recommendations. For example, in terms of CPD, it finds that there is not a strong enough culture of professional development among teachers, and that “the licence to practice” requires a generous and guaranteed entitlement to professional development. The report calls for ring-fencing of minimum levels of spending on CPD by schools, ‘at earliest opportunity’ and describes the need to attend to the ‘neglected needs of supply teachers’.

Read the full report here

The team have been working to refresh our paper on CPD for Supply Teachers – first published in 2004.

The Cabinet Secretary will launch the paper later this week, along with CPDStepIn (see earlier blog post)

You can access the paper here and CPDStepin here

While attending the Orkney Learning Festival last week, Margaret Alcorn and I were fortunate enough to meet Lorena Murúa. Lorena, a teacher from Chile, has not only funded her way through additional training needed to top-up her Chilean qualifications, she also travelled from Aberdeen to Kirkwall to take advantage of the great CPD available with our colleagues in Orkney Islands Council. This is her story.

Hi, I am Lorena Murúa. I am from the Atacama Desert in the north of Chile, so you can imagine the differences in landscape and life style.  I arrived in this country over 2 years ago. I was a teacher in my country so I did the PGDE in Aberdeen University in order to learn the system and to be able to work here.  I found about the Orkney Learning Festival on CPDFind and I thought that was a fantastic opportunity to discover more about the Scottish culture and how education meets the needs of the children in a different context.  I am currently on the supply list in Aberdeen City and I am looking forward to get a more extended spell working in Scottish schools.

To support Lorena and others, and as a result of the CPD Team work on the particular CPD needs of colleagues on the supply list, we have decided to set up an online community called CPDSupply. Watch this space for more details!