Where are the citizenship training places for 2011/12?
Parliamentary Year Book member Lee Jerome writes to Graham Holley of the TDA querying the apparent lack of training places for citizenship educators in 2011/12, following a letter from Michael Gove outlining the allocations for the coming year.
2nd February 2011
Re: Allocation of secondary training places for 2011-12
Dear Mr Holley
Michael Gove’s letter of 31st January raises concerns for those of us in the citizenship education community, as citizenship is the only statutory national curriculum area of study which doesn’t appear as a category in the allocation table. It appears we have been subsumed into social studies or ‘other’. The curriculum review being conducted for the DfE will consult on the nature of the years ahead curriculum and Michael Gove reassured representatives from citizenship bodies this week that the status of citizenship has not been decided and that there will be an open debate on the matter.
We’re writing now to urge you to reflect this in the allocations you make to citizenship PGCE courses for 2011-12. As a nation we have failed to train sufficient numbers of citizenship specialists since the introduction of the area of study into the national curriculum, and this has had an effect on the quality of education experienced by younger people. The recently completed evaluation of citizenship education, published by the DfE, indicates that where specialists offer discrete lessons, there’s a significant impact on learning. The absence of specialist educators in numerous schools is a source of many of the subject’s difficulties.
To reduce the numbers of trainee educators in this area of study at all, seems to threaten the quality of provision in schools. To reduce it by any more than the average of other subjects under review would seem to pre-empt the findings of the curriculum review. We consequently urge you will address citizenship allocations in a fair approach, despite the disappearance of the subject as a discrete category in the Secretary of State’s letter.
Yours sincerely,
Lee Jerome
On behalf of citizED
Programme Director, Secondary Initial Educator Education
Department of Education
London Metropolitan University
UPDATE: By digging additional we found that citizenship teacher training (pdf) has survived in some universities, though in limited numbers. While this is stronger news than we initially thought, the worry now is that universities will drop citizenship ITT becomes it doesn’t make financial sense at such small numbers. For further guidance, see the relevant UK information.
