Content area
Full Text
NASUWT says schools should be fined if they neglect new staff.
Tamsin Page, an English teacher at Hinchingbrooke School in Huntingdon, is one of the lucky ones: a newly qualified teacher who gets the support and free time to which she is entitled by law.
Yet elsewhere, NQTs are denied mentors and reduced timetables. They face the worst classes in schools which offer them no structured programme of support.
The NASUWT teachers' union has written to Jim Knight, the schools minister, to tell him what is happening in schools that don't meet their obligations to new staff.
Chris Keates, the union's general secretary, has called for fines to be imposed on offending schools.
Ms Page, 29, a teacher in Hinchingbrooke's English department, said: "I can't even imagine not having my induction and the half-day marking and preparation time. Schools are stretched, but NQTs shouldn't suffer because of that."
Di Beddow, deputy head of Hinchingbrooke, which has 14 NQTs this year, said the new staff made a vital contribution.
Since 1999,...