The Academy at Shotton Hall is celebrating a record teacher training year with 62 trainees graduating as new teachers from its school-based teacher training courses.
Now entering its fourth year, Shotton Hall SCITT (which stands for school centred initial teacher training) was recently awarded an ‘outstanding’ judgment from school inspectors Ofsted, the highest accolade a teacher training organisation can receive.
Most of the newly qualified teachers from the course have already secured jobs, including at Shotton Hall itself where trainees do a significant portion of their training before training in partner schools across the north east. An impressive 92% of trainees were rated as good our outstanding in their final assessment – significantly higher than the national average.
In the past, teacher training was studied at university, but new school-based routes offer an alternative and mean that trainees are in the classroom from day one learning alongside experienced and talented teachers.
Director of the Shotton Hall Teaching School Alliance Bryan Stephenson said:
“This year has been a great year for Shotton Hall SCITT. Not only do we have a bumper cohort of bright and talented new teachers, but we had our course rubber-stamped by Ofsted and now proudly display a much coveted outstanding badge on our new training building. Our programme continues to go from strength to strength as more people choose a school-based route for their teacher training. In partnership with our alliance of over 60 schools, colleges and universities across the region, our new graduates have had access to what we believe are some of the best teacher training experiences on offer and are leaving us with a strong and lasting foundation to build their teaching careers upon.”
Each of the graduates has now been recommended to the National College of Teaching and Leadership for ‘Qualified Teacher Status’ with a final formal graduation ceremony from course partners Durham University for the PGCE element of the course in January 2017.
If you’re thinking of becoming a teacher, Shotton Hall SCITT still has places available for starts this September. Visit www.shottonhallscitt.co.uk for more information.