Differentiation, context and teacher education: the changing profile of trainees on in-service initial teacher training programmes in the lifelong learning sector

Analysis of initial teacher training (ITT) student data relating to the University of Huddersfield part-time in-service Cert Ed/PGCE over a three-year period has revealed significant change in the make-up of trainee cohorts. There has been an increase in younger trainees and in trainees very new to teaching, although more experienced and older trainees do continue to enrol. There has also been a considerable shift in the balance of trainees away from further education (FE) college staff. These changes have implications for those who manage and deliver teacher education for the sector. It remains of key importance that the curriculum is not experienced as overly ‘FE-college centric’ and that mentoring arrangements acknowledge the needs of trainees from diverse contexts. It is clear that in the delivery of ITT for the lifelong learning sector, increasingly, one size will not comfortably fit all. Within teacher education much emphasis is placed upon the role of differentiation in regard to trainee practice. The changing trainee profile identified requires that teacher education itself unambiguously models a differentiated approach – and, in relation to teacher education for the lifelong learning sector, differentiation must address workplace context. Introduction This article draws attention to key changes in the profile of initial teacher education trainee populations in the lifelong learning sector and considers the impact of these for the teacher educator. The article summarises diversity characteristics of staff who teach in the lifelong learning sector and identifies their teaching qualification status. An aim of the article is to encourage further exploration of how we might best address the needs of, and ensure relevance for, the diverse groups of trainees identified. Government reform of initial teacher training (ITT) involves the requirement that teachers across the learning and skills sector should be appropriately qualified. A letter sent by Lifelong Learning UK (LLUK) in March (2008a) to college principals and FE sector management provides a reminder of this and draws attention to the aim of the Workforce Strategy for the Further Education Sector in England, 2007-2012 (2008b) that “all teachers, tutors and trainers are qualified or working towards a qualification” (2008a, p.2). The letter goes on to highlight research undertaken for LLUK which established that “97% of colleges asked were aware of the reforms and 93% have plans in place to make sure that their staff benefit from increasing professionalism in the workforce” (p.1). It was predictable that one consequence of ITT reform was going to be change in the profile of the in-service trainees more recently entering post-compulsory education and training (PCET) teacher-training programmes, as future trainee groups increasingly involve fewer people with significant teaching experience and a greater proportion of people very new to teaching. It is argued that in order to meet the needs of diverse trainees more effectively, questions confronting ITT providers now arise concerning the implications for the curriculum and the appropriate support that may be required. The importance of a differentiated approach is highlighted. Background The trainees to whom attention is drawn in this article were studying for the Certificate in Education (Cert Ed) and the Professional Graduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) within a consortium network of initial teacher education providers located across the North of England, including the University of Huddersfield, which provides the award. The Consortium comprises the largest network of in-service teacher education providers for the lifelong learning sector in the UK, and currently has a yearly intake of over 2000 trainees. In 2008, HUDCETT commissioned research into the changing nature of trainee profiles. This involved the collection and analysis of Consortium trainee data for the previous three years. The analysis was undertaken in part to inform a future qualitative study. Learning and skills sector staff diversity profile (England) The LLUK Market Assessment (2004) found, within the post-16 education and training workforce, an ‘age distribution skewed towards a lower proportion of younger workers’ (p.48). Work-based learning (WBL) had the youngest workforce with 22% aged 30 years or under. In FE colleges, for the year 2006-07, the average age of teaching staff was 44.8 years, with only 2.6% aged less than 25 years (LLUK, 2008c). Women have been found to predominate in teaching across the learning and skills sector (Parsons and Berry-Lound, 2004). This is still so and is most marked in adult and community learning (ACL) providers, where over 75% of teachers are female (Jones, 2007). WBL has a similar gender profile as that of FE colleges (Pye Tait, 2007). The number of disabled people teaching in the learning and skills sector is not precisely known because disclosure is so low. LLUK data analyses relate only to declared disability and, for instance, for over a tenth of FE college teachers disability status is unknown. The Commission for Disabled Staff (2008) found that reluctance to disclose relates to anxiety about discrimination. Rather more than 2% of FE teaching staff declared a disability in 2006-07 (LLUK, 2008c). The most recent Census (2001) identified almost 8% of the population of Great Britain as belonging to a non-White minority ethnic group. Across the wider learning and skills sector 7% of teachers have been identified as non-White minority ethnic (Parsons and Berry-Lound, 2004); in the most recent LLUK analyses of FE college data, for 2006-07, this figure is 8%, although there are clear regional variations. However, for almost 10% of FE college teachers, ethnicity is recorded as ‘not known/not provided’ (LLUK, 2008c). Teaching qualification status of learning and skills sector staff In 2007, LLUK commissioned two pilot studies designed to explore the scope for collecting workforce data relating to the ACL and WBL sectors. Some limited workforce data was collected through the pilots, and the findings were reported separately (Jones, 2007; Pye Tait, 2007). Both reports look at the qualifications of the respective workforces – and this includes reference to teaching qualifications. ACL data suggests that the Cert Ed was the most common teaching qualification for this sector, but it does not indicate what proportion of the workforce held a teaching qualification. Qualification data submitted reveals that ‘the vast majority’ had teaching qualifications; however qualification data was available for only 14.5% of the total sample (Jones, 2007: pp. 3-4). In addition, the low response rate to the overall ACL data collection exercise makes it difficult to draw reliable conclusions about the sector as a whole. Data provided in the WBL report shows that almost 50 per cent of the workforce had no teaching qualification. Again, this is difficult to interpret as it is unclear what proportion of the workforce was involved in the data collection. Nor is it clear whether this statistic applies to the overall WBL workforce sample, or applies only to those staff within the workforce sample with a teaching role. Information about the teaching qualification status of FE college staff is more comprehensive. LLUK data shows that in 2006-07 89.9% of full-time FE teachers were qualified or enrolled on a teaching qualification; for part-time staff the equivalent figure is 83.5% (LLUK, 2008d). It is of note that in relation to the area covered by the Consortium: ‘Of the nine English regions, the North West, the North East and Yorkshire and Humber are those in which 90% or more of full-time FE teaching staff currently hold either a PGCE, Cert Ed, BABEd/BSc with concurrent QTS, Level 3 Teaching Qualification or a Level 4 FE Teaching Qualifiation – Stage 3 in more than half of the regions institutions’ (LLUK, 2008c: p. 26). Methodology Categories of information provided on course application forms were examined and those judged appropriate selected for analysis. An SPSS datasheet was set up. Application forms for the University of Huddersfield part-time in-service Cert Ed/PGCE for the years 2005-06, 2006-07 and 2007-08 were received from Registry. Data from 2,737 application forms was entered, interpreted and analysed using the SPSS software package. Data for the majority of PGCE trainees for the year 2005-06 was unavailable. As a result most of the analyses that follow involve data relating to Cert Ed trainees for each of the three years and PGCE trainees for the latter two years only (2006-07 and 2007-08). It is possible that some application forms for the years in question were not included, and therefore data may not be fully comprehensive. However, the actual numbers of both Cert Ed and PGCE trainees involved – 1,839 and 897 respectively, do allow for a robust analysis of emerging trends in trainee profiles. Where data is clearly incomplete, this has been specified. The analysis of data – P/T in-service Cert Ed/PGCE trainees (2005-06, 2006-07 and 2007-08) Changes in the age profile In terms of age, the profile of Consortium trainees has become younger over the three-year period, with the greatest increase in trainee numbers year by year found in the 21-30 year age group. This has been mirrored by an overall decrease in numbers year by year of those aged 31 years and over. However, the majority of trainees still fall within the age band 31-50 years, and 9% of trainees who enrolled in 2007-08 were aged 51 and over, although overall numbers in this group have declined since the previous year. The proportion of trainees from FE colleges, Colleges of HE and Sixth Form Colleges aged 21-30 has increased significantly over the three-year period. Gender, disability and ethnicity Although slight variations have been identified year by year, the overall gender balance of Consortium trainees, at just less than 60% female to 40% male, matches that found in FE colleges. The number of trainees stating that they have ‘no known disability’ has increased over the three years examined. However, this is somewhat misleading, as the number of trainees declaring a disability has in fact risen from just over 5% in 2005-06 to around 6.5% in the two subsequent years. The reason for this seeming anomaly is that there has been a significant decrease in the percentage of trainees declining to provide information relating to disability status. Over 4% of trainees chose not to provide this information in 2005-06, whereas this figure had reduced to 0.7% by 2007-08 (i.e. 9 out of 1,268 trainees). Over the last three years there has been a decrease of more than 5% in the proportion of trainees whose ethnicity has been recorded as White British. This has been matched by an increase in the number of trainees from a Black and minority ethnic (BME) background. In 2007-08 the percentage of BME trainees had risen to just over 6%, from the 1% of two years earlier. There has been little change in the very small proportion of trainees whose ethnicity falls into another category (for example – other White or other ethnic background). For a small percentage of trainees, ethnicity was not declared on application forms. Classification of trainee key employers Although Colleges of FE have retained their position as the most significant trainee employer over the period 2005-06 – 2007-08, in two of these three years less than 50% of trainees classified their employer as an FE college. Overall, 50.6% of trainees worked outside FE, with the 46.7% of trainees in FE during 2007-08 the lowest proportion during these years, and a drop of 7.2% from the previous year. Figure 1 shows overall trainee representation in key employment categories (i.e. those involving 5% or more of the total trainee cohort). As some data is missing, statistics are given as valid percentages.