Teacher recruitment boost for north-east schools
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SCHOOLS in the north-east and across Scotland have been handed a staffing boost with the recruitment of 1250 new teachers.
They have been joined by an addition 155 support staff.
It comes after the Scottish Government pledged £80 million of support this summer to help local authorities’ recruitment for the safe re-opening of schools.
Councils across Scotland have now indicated that an estimated further 200 teachers are also in the pipeline with 100 extra support staff also expected to follow.
The news was welcomed by north-east MSPs Stewart Stevenson (Banffshire and Buchan Coast) and Gillian Martin (Aberdeenshire East)
Mr Stevenson said: “These additional teachers and support staff will not only bring much needed resilience to Scotland’s education system, but they will help compensate for the loss of learning suffered by pupils during lockdown.
“I want to express my appreciation once again for our brilliant teachers, and wider workforce, who are helping to ensure our young people continue to get the education they deserve during these tough times.”
Ms Martin added: "In the middle of a global pandemic, it’s absolutely vital that local authorities are fully supported to ensure that our schools remain safe for pupils, teachers and staff.
“Thanks to significant investment from the SNP Government this summer, we now have hundreds of extra teachers and staff in our schools to support their safe re-opening.”
Last month, figures from the independent Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) showed that the number of newly-qualified teachers going straight into employment has risen by nearly 30 per cent.
Analysis also revealed that the number of teachers in Scotland under the age of 45 has risen to 61.5 per cent of the workforce as of 2019.
This is in comparison with 2009, when most teachers were over 45.
