Gosport MP Caroline Dinenage today called for more action to ensure that Sixth Form Colleges are equipped to provide high quality maths education during questions to the Department for Education.
Earlier this year, the Government introduced the Golden Hello scheme for new graduate maths teachers to encourage them to work in the Further Education sector. However, neither of the two post-16 education providers in the Gosport constituency are eligible to participate in this scheme as Sixth Form Colleges are excluded.
Addressing this discrepancy, Caroline asked:
"There has been a 15% increase in the number of students enrolling at Sixth Form Colleges without a GCSE in maths and yet these post-16 education providers are excluded from the £20 million Golden Hellos that are available to attract maths teachers to Further Education. With maths skills so crucial to young people's futures, what's the department doing about this?"
The Minister responsible, Nick Gibb MP responded:
"We introduced the Golden Hello scheme to support the recruitment and retention of well qualified maths teachers in publicly funded FE sector who can teach GCSE level and above. Sixth Form Colleges are not included in the scheme because along with school Sixth Forms, they are eligible for the recruitment support and incentives offered by the National College for Teaching and Leadership which are not available to FE colleges."
Caroline is a keen advocate of maths skills; earlier this year, she established a Parliamentary Group for Maths and Numeracy which is working to inform Government policy and raise awareness about numeracy in the UK.