Schools are beginning the new year facing a teacher shortage described by Ofsted chief inspector Mike Tomlinson as the worst he has seen in his 35-year career in education. However, an academic leading a major study on classroom assistants says that the practice of using support staff for teaching is masking the true extent of the crisis.
Dr Alan Marr of the Open University says headteachers are using support staff to 'cover over the cracks', and, further, that classroom assistants are being used instead of nursery nurses because they are paid less.
Dr Marr says, 'What is not being discussed in the context of the teacher shortage is the way in which primary school classroom assistants are covering a great deal of the shortage. The debate is all about supply teachers and teachers, particularly in secondary schools, working in specialities in which they are not qualified and the importation of foreign teachers.
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