Support for our Early Career Teachers (ECTs)
At WHMAT, we are justifiably proud of the quality of support and guidance for colleagues at the start of their teaching career and we are fully committed to building on this with the introduction of the new Early Career Framework. This support will not disappear once the induction is over: our career pledges guarantee on-going support for all staff throughout their careers.
As set out in our Early Career Teacher policy, we want to go beyond the statutory requirements and provide the best possible experience for our new colleagues. So in addition to the support of your induction tutor and mentor, you will be guided to gain experience and expertise in self-evaluation. Additionally, you will have the opportunity to observe a range of practitioners to help you develop your practice and work on identified development points.
Hear from one of our ECT mentors about the support provided to colleagues who joined us as ‘NQTs’:
‘Here at Saltley Academy, we value the real importance of nurturing, developing and growing our Newly Qualified Teachers, through their first full year in teaching and throughout every year of their teaching career.
Saltley Academy has a high-quality personalised support package in place for all Early Career Teachers, which has been praised and verified by independent inspectors. Our CPD programme enables all of our ECTs, to not only pass their Induction years, but also be transformed into Saltley Academy’s next generation of outstanding teachers, TLR holders, middle leaders and senior leaders.
ECTs at Saltley Academy will be assigned a subject mentor, who is an experienced member of staff and a specialist in their area, who will mentor them throughout their induction year, in their chosen specialism and complete their termly ECT reports. Every subject mentor will meet with their ECT once a week to offer them advice, evaluate their progress and provide them with 1:1 support and coaching on agreed targeted areas for their development.
ECTs at Saltley Academy have access to a high quality in house and WHMAT wide personalised CPD programme that allows them to develop their teaching practice, network with fellow colleagues both at Saltley Academy and across the MAT, as well as enables them to develop and evolve into outstanding teachers, both inside and outside of the classroom, whilst working here at Saltley Academy.
Furthermore, ECTs also receive half termly observations from their subject mentor and/or ECT Senior Mentor, which provides them with very supportive, constructive and personalised feedback on their teaching practice, in terms of their strengths and areas for development and how they can enhance it even further. In short, Saltley Academy is a great place for ECTs to work at, as our ECTs are valued, well supported and have great amounts of time invested in them, to enable them to thrive and succeed not only in their first full year in the profession, but also beyond too.’
This reflects the quality of support for new colleagues across WHMAT.
