4.5 Newly Qualified Teachers

NQTs are often rapidly integrated into schools as normal teachers and some even receive rapid promotion. The arrangements made at school level for induction clearly vary widely, from helpful and supportive to non-existent. It is surprising that some of the things named by NQTs as useful either at school level or in zonal workshops, are things that MIITEP should have provided them with e.g. lesson planning, record keeping. A significant minority of NQTs indicate a wish to transfer schools soon after completing MIITEP. There were signs of a distance between the school and community in many of the responses of NQTs. Accommodation, feeding, transport and salary payments all figured highly as sources of problems. Though basic learning materials are available to most NQTs in their schools more generous provision seems a rarity. The college curriculum needs to recognise this reality of the professional environment of NQTs. MIITEP NQTs mostly do return to the schools they have been working in and are therefore presumably less in need of induction than those going to new schools. However, links which might smooth the transition from student teacher to qualified teacher seems tenuous. At the very least, print material extending the Handbooks into the first year of teaching might be helpful, especially if direct entry into MIITEP is contemplated as an option for the future. This could easily be integrated with the support that the MSSSP or its successors provide for school development.