Teachers pay and absence levels could be published

Schools may be required to publish teachers’ salaries, qualifications and sickness rates as part of the government proposals to drive up standards.

The changes would allow parents to rate primary and secondary schools on information designed to illustrate the quality and experience of staff. Absence levels for all schools would also be published.

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers (NUT), said: “Parents are interested in a school’s ability to provide a good education for their children and there is already an abundance of measurements by which a school’s success is judged. What is important for parents and the wider public to know is that teachers are fully qualified, and that they have access to continual professional development to keep ahead of any new educational developments.

“Publishing on a school by school basis the levels of teachers’ absence cannot be of any use to a parent. In general, teachers have low levels of absence. When it does occur, head teachers and governors are responsible for ensuring that there is a suitably qualified person to cover the leave, and certainly when the cover is for anything other than a short period that person should be a qualified teacher.

“Within the national pay structure for teachers there is already a great deal of flexibility. A move away from national pay structures will simply add additional burdens onto head teachers and governors.

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“For a government that keeps asserting that it wants to reduce pointless bureaucracy in schools, this business plan looks as though it will achieve the exact opposite and have schools drowning in unnecessary and unhelpful paperwork.”

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