HC Deb 09 May 1968 vol 764 cc611-2
33. Mr. J. E. B. Hill

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what steps he is taking to attract a bigger proportion of student teachers to enter infant training courses.

Mrs. Shirley Williams

The colleges of education are devoting a higher proportion of their greatly expanded capacity to the training of teachers of infants. Over the last five years the colleges' annual intake of students has increased from 17,000 to 36,000 and the numbers entering courses which equip them to teach infants have risen from 5,000 to 12,000.

Mr. Hill

Is this not still well below the level needed to make up the shortage of infant teachers? Would it not be well to take a new look at the teacher courses, both at a high and a lower academic level, with a view to encouraging more places to be provided in colleges and getting more girls of different academic attainment to fill them?

Mrs. Williams

At the present time the situation is that the number of infant teachers coming out of the college is, or should soon be, adequate to meet the needs of the children, but the hon. Member will appreciate that one of the great difficulties is the very heavy wastage among young women teachers. With the number of authorities moving over to middle schools, courses which concentrate entirely on infant work for the five-to seven-year-olds may not be as suitable as infant-junior courses which enable authorities to reorganise on middle school lines.

Mrs. Renée Short

What steps are being taken to train more nursery school teachers and so to implement the Plowden Committee's Report?

Mrs. Williams

My hon. Friend will be aware that at present a nursery class requires a full-time qualified infant teacher. I understand that there has not yet been agreement in the profession on the proposals of the Plowden Committee on the rather different qualifications for some nursery school assistant teachers.