Professional Development
Our commitment to nurturing the professional potential of each team member is integral to the success and advancement of our Trust.
We prioritise the continuous growth of our staff through annual Professional Management Reviews (PMRs) conducted by line managers. These reviews are not pay related and focus solely on development.
Performance Manage Reviews (PMRs)
Annual reviews take place for teachers in the autumn term and support staff in the spring term. Ongoing evaluation takes place and mid-year follow up sessions monitor progress to date and adjust plans as necessary, ensuring that any professional development efforts are effective and responsive to the staff and school’s needs.
Key features of PMRs:
Developmental Dialogue: Open discussions about professional roles, aspirations, and challenges.
CPD Planning: Staff interests in Continued Professional Development (CPD) activities are captured to tailor our yearly training offerings.
Personalised Support: Each staff member receives personalised CPD throughout the year.
We will ensure that staff are able to pursue professional development without adversely impacting on their own or other peoples’ workload.
Career Pathway for teaching staff
At The Brickfields Trust we know that high quality teaching makes the biggest difference to the achievement of our pupils and our teaching team are highly valued for the work that they do. We provide support and highly effective CPD for our team throughout their career outside of the PMR process.
The Career Pathway document outlines what teachers can expect from us as they progress through their career from recently qualified early Career teachers through to experienced teaching staff and leaders.
Teachers are able to select or apply for opportunities that they feel would enhance their professional development. The Career Pathway differs from the Career Stag Expectations which outlines the trust’s expectations for teaching staff.
Our aims
To achieve the highest standards of teaching, learning, behaviour and relationships within every classroom and to make every day count for our pupils.
To identify talented colleagues to ensure that they are offered the right opportunities in their career and to retain best practice within our trust.
To use the benefits of being part of a multi academy trust to enhance the career development opportunities available and to provide more opportunities than a standalone school could.
To retain high quality teachers within our group of MAT schools and be viewed as an appealing employer to attract new talent into our schools.
To ensure career satisfaction and wellbeing in our staff.
To create a culture of continual learning, ensuring that our teachers understand that they are expected to learn and improve their practice throughout their teaching career.
Offer for ALL teaching staff
Staff meetings will be focused on school improvement priorities and are mainly training based. No unnecessary meetings are held.
Staff meetings on the same night each week and any changes to dates or length of time will be communicated early.
Clear schedules with deadlines are provided for the year to help you plan your workload.
Where possible you will not be asked to complete additional workload without plenty of time and notice to complete this.
Staff are encouraged to talk to leaders if they require release time to complete specific tasks.
Honest feedback will be provided to support you to improve your practice.
Leaders will aim to focus on small areas at a time so that staff are not overwhelmed. Improvement takes time and time is needed to embed strategies. When implementing new strategies, leaders will consider what needs to stop to enable the new practice to start.
New school improvement strategies will be based on evidence-based research.
Staff who wish to fast track through this programme can talk to leaders about specific areas of interest and possible pathways.
National Professional Qualifications (NPQ)
Through our PMR process, we identify staff members keen to enhance their skills, advance their careers, and contribute to improving school outcomes. We encourage these individuals to apply for the National Professional Qualification (NPQ) programmes.
We promote both the specialist and leadership NPQs:
Specialist:
National Professional Qualification in Leading Behaviour and Culture (NB this can be studied by non-teaching colleagues in pastoral roles in addition to teaching colleagues)
National Professional Qualification in Leading Teacher Development
National Professional Qualification in Leading Teaching
National Professional Qualification in Leading Literacy
Leadership:
National Professional Qualification in Senior Leadership National Professional Qualification in Headship National Professional Qualification in Executive Leadership
Early Career Teachers (ECTs)
The Trust is committed to ensuring that ECTs receive a 2 year package of training and support based on the early career framework (ECF). This is designed to help an ECT to build the skills and knowledge they need to feel confident and empowered in the classroom.
ECTs will receive the ECF training as part of their induction period which provides a bridge between initial teacher training (ITT) and their teaching career.
Each ECT is allocated a mentor who will:
Provide one-to-one support and feedback.
Arrange mentoring and coaching around specific subject areas.
An induction tutor will also be appointed within school who will assess the ECT against the Teachers’ Standards.
Regular progress reviews will take place with the tutor to enable professional discussions regarding progress and feedback.
Within the Trust we will ensure that all ECTs receive their entitlement of an additional 10% release time in their first year and 5% in the 2nd year.
Initial Teacher Training
At The Brickfields Trust, we support the wider Initial Teacher Training system. We don’t run a SCITT ourselves, but we host trainee teachers from a number of providers, and support our colleagues to be effective mentors for trainees. The training and development our colleagues receive as part of our universal offer of professional learning for teachers, and as part of our extended and external offers, help them to better understand the content and evidence which sits behind the ITT Core Content Framework. In addition to the regular training which they receive from their accredited ITT provider, and their regular development conversations with in-school mentors, trainee teachers are also able to access our in-school professional learning for teachers.
Applying for CPD
We really hope that as many colleagues as possible will engage with the full CPD offer from the Trust. To request any CPD opportunities in your school please contact your line manager.