Government plans to spend £10 million on foreign teacher recruitment drive

The government is planning to spend around £10 million on recruiting and training hundreds of foreign physics, maths and language teachers.

This is to meet the increasing demand for new school staff in England.

According to Schools Week, a tender put out by the National College for Teaching and Leadership has unveiled proposals to employ 600 foreign teachers and train them up to the relevant teacher status.

This would allow them to secure passage into the country.

The government blames improvements in the economy, a shrinking graduate pool and greater competition in the labour market for making it “more difficult for the education system to meet the demand for additional teachers domestically”, and says overseas recruitment will be pursued as a “supplementary avenue of teacher supply”.

Around £4 million was originally allocated for the scheme which would account for £6,800 per teacher.

However, the government has since said that the project would cost around £6 - £8 million.

This would be spent on three phases: recruitment and selection, acclimatisation and development and bespoke training.