Ambition for All-Master's teaching workforce is at risk

In March, Huw Lewis, the minister for education in Wales, said that over time he hoped that teaching in Wales would become a fully Master’s-level profession. This was announced at the same time as several other welcome teacher training reforms, including the introduction of two-year PGCEs and the extension of undergraduate programmes from three to four years.

The benefits of teachers holding relevant Master’s-level qualifications have been understood for some time. As long ago as 2008, a detailed evaluation of the impact in England of the Postgraduate Professional Development (PPD) programme, under which subsidies were provided to help teachers to undertake classroom-focused Master’s-level study, found that the programmes had a positive impact on the confidence of teachers, their willingness to innovate, on their classroom management skills and on their retention in the profession.