 Experiments are having to be cancelled, say teachers |
Time and money pressures are reducing the capacity of science teachers to do their job properly, a pressure group has warned. The Save British Science Society (SBSS) said staff had no opportunity to update their own knowledge of subjects, putting students at a disadvantage.
Practical classes had also been cancelled because of difficulties and huge costs involved in excluding disruptive pupils, who might have posed a danger to others during experiments.
SBSS director Dr Peter Cotgreave called for teachers to be consulted more on changes to the curriculum.
He added: "Teachers are pretty demoralised about the state of the profession at the moment.
'Pain in the neck'
"People are saying there are serious problems.
"It's a pain in the neck not to be able to do proper experiments because there are some problem kids you can't get rid of, because trying to exclude them is either costly or likely to fail.
"It's also a waste of time and money having to battle to win pots of funding here and there."
Academic league tables had "distorted" priorities for staff, he added.
Dr Cotgreave complained that departmental budgets could not be held over from one financial year to the next.
This led to a dash to spend smaller sums when the money would be better added up to fund larger projects.
Dr Cotgreave said: "There are serious problems that could be tackled. Some need money and some need the political will to fix them." The SBSS found science teachers were often poorly qualified for their jobs.
According to its figures, just 52% of secondary school science teachers had "a lot of confidence" in their ability to teach modern biology.
'Free-up teachers'
Meanwhile, two-thirds of GCSE physics teachers did not have a degree in the subject and one-third did not even have a relevant A-level or equivalent.
One quarter of mathematics teachers are also thought to be unqualified.
Currently, two-fifths of all unfilled teaching posts in England and Wales are in science, maths and technology.
Dr Cotgreave said: "The most serious problem we face is the recruitment and retention of the best teachers.
"If you have got a good degree in physics, the world is your oyster. If you go into teaching, you are going to be badly paid and have all these other worries.
"People are choosing to working in private industry, where they don't have these problems.
"In America teachers don't have to deal with discipline or funding. We need to do the same here. Teachers should be freed-up to teach."
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