... and what it means for the educational ICT professional in schools and Local Authorities.A recent UK Government publication contains useful information for those involved in ICT in education in Britain.
The publication is Building Brighter Futures: Next Steps for the Children's Workforce. According to the official "blurb",
The document defines the workforce, the ambitions for it and the challenges of delivery in partnership. It also sets out the commitments for the next 3 years in relation to different parts of the workforce.
I have looked through the document and am able to bring the following to your attention:
There is an intention to provide additional funding for local authorities to invest in ICT for social workers. You may think this is nothing to do with you, but with many Local Authorities shedding ICT advisors, there may be opportunities here for getting involved in running training courses for social workers, especially if they are directly involved in education. Any proposals would have to be couched in income-generation terms to stand any chance of being accepted.
Under the theme ‘recruiting the best’ the DCSF is launching with the Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) and employers Transition to teaching to attract more science, mathematics and ICT teachers. Again, there may be opportunities here for LA advisers, but also for schools. For example, does your school promote the teaching of ICT (or these other subjects) as being attractive? That may not benefit you directly in the short-term, but it all helps. It may be worth keeping your eyes peeled to see if any funding is announced to help this along. You never know!
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