Plan to recruit managers for nursery schools sparks legal challenge
Janaki Mahadevan
Thursday, June 7, 2012
A Scottish teaching union is seeking a judicial review over Glasgow City Council's decision to allow maintained nursery schools to be headed up by managers who are not trained as teachers.
The council is recruiting 11 nursery managers, and while each setting will still employ qualified teachers, the role of manager will not need to be filled by a teacher.
The council has said this would allow it to better meet the needs of parents who need greater flexibility from early years provision.
But the Educational Institute of Scotland union is seeking a judicial review on the plans, claiming that any head of a setting should be a teacher, to ensure quality and to meet the requirements of the new school curriculum in Scotland, which spans ages three to 18.
A Glasgow City Council spokeswoman said: "Glasgow has a variety of different pre-school provision used by parents and carers across the city.
"The past few years have seen a shift in working practices and this has resulted in early years provision changing to match demand from parents. The post of head of nursery in any future vacancies in nursery, early years and family learning centres is essential to facilitate the flexibility required by Glasgow's families.
“The role of the teacher remains important in the delivery of pre-school education and care. To this end, we have established a working group, which is providing recommendations on how the role of the teacher should be developed in order to enhance the already high-quality early years provision in Glasgow.”
