Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a veteran awareness day in schools.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The department wants all children to leave school with the knowledge, skills, and values that will enable them to understand the world around them and prepare them to be active and responsible citizens in modern Britain. This could include activities focusing on the role of the armed forces and learning from the experiences of veterans.
It is important for schools to have flexibility over the design of their curriculum to ensure that it meets the needs of their pupils and the local context. Schools are able to use this flexibility to include a veterans awareness day or to teach about British veterans and the armed forces through subjects within the national curriculum, such as citizenship, history or English literature, or as part of wider remembrance activities.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing veteran awareness training for teachers.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
A key principle behind the government's plan for education is to give teachers and school leaders the freedom to use their professional judgement to do what works best for their pupils. As such, headteachers are ultimately responsible for employment in their schools and the department trusts them to take decisions about the right mix of qualifications, skills and experience that they expect teachers in their schools to have.
The department recently reviewed the Initial Teacher Training (ITT) Core Content Framework (CCF) and Early Career Framework (ECF) alongside each other and revised the ITT CCF and the ECF into the combined and updated Initial Teacher Training and Early Career Framework (ITTECF). This now covers the first three years or more at the start of a teacher’s career, and sets out the entitlement of every trainee and early career teacher (ECT) to the core body of knowledge, skills and behaviours that define great teaching. The ITTECF is universal and designed to work for all teachers, across all phases and subjects.
Beyond this, school leaders are responsible for ensuring their workforce has appropriate training to meet the needs of all pupils, which is in line with the department’s position on school autonomy and school leaders being best placed to assess the needs of their pupils and workforce.
The government remains committed to supporting veterans with a passion for teaching to enter the profession, both in schools and the further education sector. The department is working with the Ministry of Defence to ensure veterans are aware of the range of programmes and support available through the department’s services and bursaries.
Veterans are eligible for a tax-free undergraduate bursary of £40,000 if they are:
Graduate veterans may also be eligible for a postgraduate scholarship or bursary if they are training to teach priority subjects.
More information on how the department support veterans to become teachers, including the offer of one-to-one support from a teacher training advisor, can be found here: https://getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/funding-and-support/if-youre-a-veteran.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 15 March 2024 to Question 17304 on Teachers: Veterans, how many people applied for the undergraduate veteran teaching bursary in the academic years (a) 2022-23 and (b) 2023-24; and what steps he is taking to increase the number of undergraduate veteran teachers.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
Initial teacher training (ITT) providers are responsible for the management and administration of bursary payments, including assessment of eligibility. Trainees do not need to apply for a bursary and will automatically receive this from their ITT provider if eligible.
The undergraduate veteran teaching bursary is paid over the final two years of the course, with £20,000 payable in each year. In the 2022/23 and 2023/24 academic years, five individual trainees received the undergraduate veteran teaching bursary, three of whom received a bursary in both years. Figures may be subject to change due to ongoing data collection and assurance.
The department supports veterans into teaching in primary, secondary, and further education through its broad support services and bursaries. Since the publication of its commitments in the ‘Veterans Strategy Action Plan 2022 to 2024’, the department has tailored support and communications for the veteran community including dedicated teacher training advisers, webpages, case study blogs on the ‘Get Into Teaching’ website and information in Civvy Street publications. More information from Get Into Teaching is available here: https://getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/funding-and-support/if-youre-a-veteran and here: https://getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/blog/from-the-army-to-teacher-training. More information from Civvy Street can be found here: https://civvystreetmagazine.co.uk/2023/05/bring-your-unique-perspective-to-the-classroom-get-into-teaching-2/.
Also available are bespoke webinars, and the opportunity to attend regional employer fairs with the Career Transition Partnership (CTP) and British Forces Resettlement Service (BFRS). More information about the CTP can be found here: https://www.ctp.org.uk/job-finding/directory/get-into-teaching. More information about the BFRS can be found here: https://www.bfrss.org.uk/profiles/companies/986419/.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of encouraging veterans to become school governors.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The department recognises the valuable skills, experience and perspectives that former military personnel can bring to schools and academy trusts. The department will continue to encourage schools and academy trusts, and the organisations that support them, to look for volunteers with a broad range of backgrounds, so that pupil outcomes can benefit from the best possible governance.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of employing veterans in schools to provide courses on leadership and resilience for (a) teachers and (b) students.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
A key principle behind the government's plan for education is to give teachers and school leaders the freedom to use their professional judgement to do what works best for their pupils. As such, headteachers are ultimately responsible for employment in their schools and the department trusts them to take decisions about the right mix of qualifications, skills and experience that they expect teachers in their schools to have.
The department recently reviewed the Initial Teacher Training (ITT) Core Content Framework (CCF) and Early Career Framework (ECF) alongside each other and revised the ITT CCF and the ECF into the combined and updated Initial Teacher Training and Early Career Framework (ITTECF). This now covers the first three years or more at the start of a teacher’s career, and sets out the entitlement of every trainee and early career teacher (ECT) to the core body of knowledge, skills and behaviours that define great teaching. The ITTECF is universal and designed to work for all teachers, across all phases and subjects.
Beyond this, school leaders are responsible for ensuring their workforce has appropriate training to meet the needs of all pupils, which is in line with the department’s position on school autonomy and school leaders being best placed to assess the needs of their pupils and workforce.
The government remains committed to supporting veterans with a passion for teaching to enter the profession, both in schools and the further education sector. The department is working with the Ministry of Defence to ensure veterans are aware of the range of programmes and support available through the department’s services and bursaries.
Veterans are eligible for a tax-free undergraduate bursary of £40,000 if they are:
Graduate veterans may also be eligible for a postgraduate scholarship or bursary if they are training to teach priority subjects.
More information on how the department support veterans to become teachers, including the offer of one-to-one support from a teacher training advisor, can be found here: https://getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/funding-and-support/if-youre-a-veteran.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many undergraduate veteran teachers received bursaries in 2023.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The £40,000 tax-free undergraduate veteran teaching bursary is available to veterans who have left full-time employment from the British Army, Royal Air Force, or Royal Navy and enrol on an eligible undergraduate initial teacher training (ITT) course. The bursary is paid over the final two years of the course, with £20,000 payable in each year.
In the 2022/23 and 2023/24 academic years, five individual trainees received the undergraduate veteran teaching bursary. Figures may be subject to change due to ongoing data collection and assurance.
Veterans who have a degree can undertake postgraduate ITT courses, where they can access the bursaries and scholarships of up to £30,000 available on these routes into teaching.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 26 February 2024 to Question 13227 on Veterans: Teachers, how many veterans started teacher training programmes and did not become teachers in the last year.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The department will review its approach to data capture on veterans as part of the annual planning cycle.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of employing veterans as mentors in secondary schools to help tackle (a) persistent absenteeism and (b) disruptive behaviour in classrooms.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The department recognises the valuable skills and experience that former military personnel can bring to the education sector.
The undergraduate veteran teaching bursary provides financial support to eligible veterans who are studying for a degree with qualified teacher status in secondary subjects that are in high demand, such as biology, chemistry, computing, languages, mathematics, or physics. The bursaries are worth £20,000 in each of the last two years of the course and are available to veterans who have left the armed forces within the last five years or are due to leave within the next two years.
Graduate veterans are also eligible to access generous bursaries in priority subjects via postgraduate Initial Teacher Training routes, alongside other graduates.
The department does not have plans, at this stage, to look to employ veterans as mentors to support better behaviour and attendance in school. The department is currently delivering an attendance mentoring pilot which is designed to test and evidence effective practice for improving attendance through individual support and targeted family engagement. The pilot, which is delivered by Barnardo’s, involves mentors supporting a group of persistently absent pupils and their families on a one-to-one basis to help identify and address their barriers to education. The pilot is currently being evaluated to improve the existing evidence base on the effectiveness of this style of attendance intervention. The information from this pilot will then be published to help inform both school and local authority practice.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of support available for children with allergies in pre-school nurseries in the West Midlands.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The early years foundation stage framework (EYFS) sets the standards that all registered early years providers in England must meet for the learning, development and care of children from birth to age five and includes provisions to support children with allergies. The framework is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/early-years-foundation-stage-framework--2.
The EYFS requires that before a child is admitted to the setting the provider must obtain information about any special dietary requirements, preferences and food allergies that the child has, and any special health requirements.
In addition to this, the EYFS states that at least one person who has a current paediatric first aid (PFA) certificate must be on the premises and available at all times when children are present. PFA training must include how to help a baby or child suffering from anaphylactic shock.
The EYFS also signposts to the Department of Health and Social Care document: ‘Example menus for early years settings in England’ which includes guidance on menu planning, food safety, managing food allergies and reading food labels, which staff preparing food will find helpful in ensuring that children are kept safe. The document is available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/658870/Early_years_menus_part_1_guidance.pdf.
In September 2023, the department changed the adequate supervision requirement within the EYFS to be explicit that “adequate supervision” while children are eating means that children must always be in sight and hearing of an adult, not within sight or hearing. This will help practitioners to be able to notice the signs of an allergic reaction as soon as they present and allow them to act quickly.
The new early years educator Level 3 qualification criteria will come into force in September 2024. The criteria is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/early-years-educator-level-3-qualifications-criteria/early-years-educator-level-3-qualifications-criteria-from-1-september-2024. Changes have been made to ensure that early years practitioners have an understanding of allergies and anaphylaxis.
Asked by: Steve McCabe (Labour - Birmingham, Selly Oak)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to page 4 of the Veterans’ Strategy Action Plan: 2022‑2024, published in January 2022, how many veterans have joined the teaching profession since the publication of that plan.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The department supports Veterans into teaching in primary, secondary, and further education through its broad support services and bursaries. Since the publication of its commitments in the Veterans Strategy Action Plan 2022-2024, the department has tailored support and communications for the Veteran community including dedicated teacher training advisers, webpages, case study blogs on the Get Into Teaching website and information in Civvy Street publications. More information is available at the following weblinks:
https://getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/funding-and-support/if-youre-a-veteran.
https://getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/blog/from-the-army-to-teacher-training.
Also available are bespoke webinars, and attendance at regional employer fairs with the Career Transition Partnership (CTP) and British Forces Resettlement Service (BFRS) and more information about these can be found by visiting the following weblinks:
https://www.ctp.org.uk/job-finding/directory/get-into-teaching.
https://www.bfrss.org.uk/profiles/companies/986419/.
Whilst the department collects data to assess the impact of our commitments, it does not have reportable data on the number of veterans applying to initial teacher training. The department is currently exploring what opportunities it has to improve Veteran data capture as it remains committed to promoting opportunities for service leavers and supporting their journey into teaching.