Recruitment and Retention in the Post-16 Learning and Skills Sector

8.8 Issues relating to involvement in training and professional developmentraised during qualitative interviews included:• the balance between skills, confidence and competence. It isfelt that teaching skills can be acquired via working towards arecognised qualification but that confidence and competence islargely developed through experience: “training and development isimportant but it does not mean that you are a good teacher”[Further Education];• the ‘quality agenda’ acts as a driving force providing theimpetus for teachers/trainers to acquire qualifications. However,this is perceived by some in the adult and community learningsector as a largely further education policy driver which fails to takeinto account some of the unique and distinctive elements of adultcommunity learning;• in some cases, poor inspection results had been the impetus tofocus on training.8.9 Qualitative findings confirm that many members of staff identify trainingneeds through appraisals and personal development plans. However, insome cases, hourly paid staff do not have access to the full range of thissupport and sometimes do not get paid fully for their time if theyparticipate in training: “we don’t get paid to attend staff development,maybe you'll get half pay. Sessional staff don’t get appraisals”.8.10 The issue of having non-contact time set aside for CPD was raised inqualitative interviews, however, a bigger issue appeared to be havingenough time to implement new ideas and ways of doing things followingtraining.Subject Specific Training8.11 Respondents were further asked whether they had any training duringthe past year (Table 8.1). 64% of respondents reported they had subjectspecific training during the past year. 73% reported they had generaltraining concerning teaching and learning approaches, 59% had trainingrelating to subject specific teaching and learning approaches and 35%had management and leadership training. 5% of respondents reportedthey received no training during the past year.75