Recommendations: 13, 48

Recommendation 13: We recommend that institutions of higher education begin immediately to develop or seek access to programmes for teacher training of their staff, if they do not have them, and that all institutions seek national accreditation of such programmes from the Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education.

8.1 The Government agrees with this recommendation, as noted in Chapter 3, para 3.3.

Recommendation 48: We recommend to institutions that, over the medium term, it should become the normal requirement that all new full-time academic staff with teaching responsibilities are required to achieve at least associate membership of the Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, for the successful completion of probation.

8.2 Although this is primarily a matter for the institutions providing higher education, the Government supports this recommendation and would also like to see the Institute offer a range of membership or associated membership possibilities, to which all who teach students can aspire. The Government’s long-term aim is to see all teachers in higher education carry a professional qualification, achieved by meeting demanding standards of teaching and supervisory competence through accredited training or experience. It understands that the HE representative bodies are looking at ways of extending accreditation to existing staff, which it welcomes.

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