Covering teachers’ absence should not adversely affect children’s education – says National Assembly committee

12 May 2014

Children’s education must not suffer during periods of teacher absence, says a committee of the National Assembly for Wales.

The Public Accounts Committee says it was surprised at a lack of evaluation carried out when supply teachers cover absences as it makes it difficult to determine what impact that has on education standards.

In welcoming the Welsh Government’s acknowledgment that improvements need to be made in this area, the Committee has called for more detailed information to be collected.

The Committee has also called for more support for supply staff, including professional development to ensure children receive a consistent, high-quality standard of education, even if their regular teacher isn’t there.

“No teacher walks into a class with the intention of giving a poor standard of education, but a supply teacher covering a period of absence often has to adjust at short notice to different surroundings and different learners while trying to pick up where the permanent teacher has left off,” said Darren Millar AM, Chair of the Public Accounts Committee.

“The Committee believes it is vital that children’s education should not suffer during these periods.

“It is surprising then that data on absence and cover is not routinely collected to give a detailed picture of the impact this has on education standards, and we note the Welsh Government’s acknowledgement that it must do more in this area.

“We also want to see better support for school governors, headteachers and supply teachers in covering absence, including improved access to appropriate professional development, to maintain the standards our school children should expect.”

The Committee makes 14 recommendations in its report including:

• That the Welsh Government captures and disseminates relevant and reliable data on teachers’ absence from the classroom to enable more robust monitoring of occurrences of, and the reasons for, absence.

• That the Welsh Government takes steps to ensure that School and Local Authority Continuing Professional Development be available to supply teachers, and ensures it develops an effective mechanism for communicating these opportunities to supply teachers; and,

• That the Welsh Government reviews the training (e.g. through the National Professional Qualification for Headship/first year mentoring) provided to headteachers to ensure that there is a greater emphasis on managing classroom absences. This focus on managing absence should also be incorporated into the Continuing Professional Development for headteachers.

Report: Covering Teachers' Absence

More information about the inquiry into covering teachers’ absence can be found here.