When academe and politics collide, beware cherry-picked “facts” and catchy one-liners that unfortunately tend to stick in the collective consciousness.
So it has been with recent research findings (including the Sutton Trust’s Teaching and Learning Toolkit) on teaching assistants (TAs) and some of the reporting of them, which has latched on to the idea that they make little difference to pupil progress. As a union for TAs, we are bound to be a bit cheesed off, especially when some heads have quoted the findings in redundancy notices.
Partiality aside, if TAs are not worth the paper children write on, then why are schools in England employing so many (nearly 220,000 in 2011) and spending much of the Pupil Premium on them?
Register now, read forever
Thank you for visiting SecEd and reading some of our content for professionals in secondary education. Register now for free to get unlimited access to all content.
What's included:
-
Unlimited access to news, best practice articles and podcast
-
New content and e-bulletins delivered straight to your inbox every Monday and Thursday
Already have an account? Sign in here