Professional Recognition

GTC Scotland’s Professional Recognition is an award that recognises the enhanced, significant, sustained and reflective enquiry a teacher has undertaken and the development of their professional learning in a particular area. Professional Recognition aligns with the Standard for Career-Long Professional Learning. The Standard is closely aligned to the Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework (SCQF) Level 11. It describes the advanced professional knowledge and pedagogical expertise that registered teachers develop and maintain as they continue to progress in teaching and across the education profession. Registered teachers may also choose to reflect against aspects of the Standard for Middle Leadership, the Standard for Headship and, for college lecturers, the Professional Standards for Lecturers in Scotland’s Colleges.

The award is open to all registered teachers who have completed 1 year of professional practice after gaining full registration. Once awarded Professional Recognition, the registered teacher is recognised as an enhanced practitioner in that field for 5 years and this is shown on a teacher’s entry on our Register.

Data at 31 March 2024 shows 2,693 teachers holding the Professional Recognition Award (3.3% of Registrants on the Register) with a total of 2,916 awards given in the last 5 years. Data at 31 March 2023 shows 2,953 teachers holding the Professional Recognition Award (3.6% of Registrants on the Register) with a total of 3,225 awards given in the last 5 years.

There is a decrease of 8.80% in the number of registrants holding Professional Recognition over registration year 2023-24.

Standard for Headship

{{reg-report-table-15="/section-components"}}

At 31 March 2024, Table 15 shows that 3,379 teachers on the Register hold the Standard for Headship which is achieved following successful completion of the GTC Scotland accredited Into Headship qualification or an assessed equivalent qualification.

GTC Scotland gathers information from registered teachers about their employment status. This information is self-declared and is therefore dependent on individuals maintaining up to date records. Exploring this information in August 2023 confirmed that approximately 90% of registrants who hold the Standard for Headship tell us that they are employed by a local authority employer. The remaining approximately 10% who share their employment information with us tell us they are employed in:

• independent schools
• national education organisations
• higher education institutes
• grant aided schools
• further education
• GTC Scotland
• a supply teaching role
• are employed in the UK (not Scotland),or
• that they are not currently working or are working outside Scotland.

Data at 31 March 2024 shows 3,379 teachers holding the Standard for Headship compared to 3,503 teachers who held the Standard for Headship at 31 March 2023.

This is a decrease of 3.54% in the number of registrants holding the Standard for Headship over registration year 2023-24.

Professional Update

In March 2011, the Scottish Parliament approved the Public Services Reform (General Teaching Council for Scotland) Order 2011 which set out the Government’s plans for the granting of independent status to GTC Scotland from April 2012. As part of this legislation (Article 31), the Government placed GTC Scotland under a duty to introduce a scheme “setting out measures to be undertaken for the purposes of allowing it to keep itself informed about the standards of education and training of registered teachers”. Following a consultation exercise, and in discussions with national partners, GTC Scotland adopted the title Professional Update (PU) for this process.

PU is premised on the impact of a teacher’s or lecturer’s professional learning and how this contributes to the future quality of the education profession. PU confirms that teachers and lecturers have maintained high standards and helps to ensure the future quality of professional learning and teaching skills across Scotland’s schools, colleges and more widely across the education profession. Engagement in the PU process has been a legislative requirement of registration for fully registered teachers and lecturers since August 2014.

Every teacher on the Register with the status of Full Registration (General) must confirm their commitment to the standards through ongoing learning every five years. Completing PU is a requirement for maintaining Full Registration (General) status. These registrants are placed in PU confirmation group and are required to confirm as part of a 5 year rolling programme.

The 2022-23 PU group were required to sign off their PU within registration year 2023-24. PU data extracted at the deadline date for the group showed there were 12,500 teachers within this PU group. 11,851 (94.78%) confirmed their commitment to learning and the standards by this date, leaving 649 (5.19%) remaining. On average, approximately 95% of teachers confirm their PU by the deadline date each year.