New evidence shows the extent to which teaching assistants are being asked to cover lessons and manage classes due to teacher shortages.
Survey findings (Webster, 2024) involving almost 6,000 teaching assistants in England and Wales finds that 39% are covering classes for at least five hours a week; a further 15% say they are leading full classes for at least 11 hours a week.
The study finds that 45% of the respondents are covering more classes this year than last, with many not simply supervising lessons, but delivering teaching.
National guidance states that support staff should not “actively teach” any classes they cover, but 75% of the teaching assistants said they have ended up teaching rather than supervising.
The findings have been published by UNISON in a report entitled Teaching on the cheap? The trade union is warning that support staff are not trained for these roles and only 24% of those in the report are given any extra pay for this work – although often it is a pittance compared to what supply teachers would be paid.
One teaching assistant told the study: “I only get 20p per-hour more than my basic teaching assistant pay for covering lessons. I receive a total of 74p extra for covering a whole afternoon. The additional payment for this morning is approximately £2.50 net. Supply staff would have been paid £150 for the same work.”
Another added: “A supply teacher would get sometimes in excess of £100 per day, whereas we get barely £1 an hour extra. For about 30 hours of cover a month, I earned about £40 more. It doesn’t seem fair.”
Teaching assistants in the report describe being given regular lessons, with one being asked to teach a class every Monday and another having led an afternoon class every week since November. Others describe how they are often asked to cover at the last minute, “with just minutes to spare”. Only 51% of the respondents who cover classes said that they are regularly provided with lessons plans.
The report suggests that one of the key factors behind the problems is on-going teacher shortages – 24% of the respondents said they are covering lessons due to a shortage of teachers; 26% say that their school cannot get supply teachers.
In primary schools, almost half of the teaching assistants (49%) say they rarely or never have support to help them cover classes.
At secondary level, some teaching assistants report covering GCSE classes because teachers have left the school and have not been replaced.
It means that the work normally undertaken by teaching assistants is going undone: 74% said this was the case and that pupils they normally support are suffering – especially those with SEN but also those who are missing out on catch-up sessions or literacy numeracy interventions.
Other comments in the report include:
- Special school teaching assistant: “The agency teacher in my class left so I was asked to step up and teach my class until a new teacher can be recruited. I am teaching my class on a full-term basis for the foreseeable future.”
- Secondary school higher level teaching assistant: “My role has become increasingly one of cover for absent teachers in my department. Last year about 50% of my time was spent doing this.”
- Secondary school cover supervisor: “I have been given a teaching timetable. Some was to cover maternity leave, some to fill a gap where a teacher had left and no-one had been recruited to fill the space.”
- Primary school teaching assistant: “My school cannot afford supply teachers, so more teaching assistants than ever before are having to step-in for teaching colleagues.”
- Primary school higher level teaching assistant: “I don’t think parents have any idea about how much of their children’s education is being delivered by unqualified teaching assistants.”
- Primary school teaching assistant: “I'm having to cover an average of 3 to 4.5 days a week on a regular basis. This is partly because of the lack of funds to employ the extra staff needed or a supply.”
Author of the report, Rob Webster, said: "This study reveals the hidden costs of deploying teaching assistants to plug gaps in the teacher workforce. It disrupts support for pupils who need it, and prevents teaching assistants from doing their essential work.
“The current situation is having a detrimental effect on teaching assistants’ workload and wellbeing too. Left unaddressed, it could exacerbate the existing recruitment and retention crisis facing schools.”
Head of education at UNISON, Mike Short, added: “When they’re leading full classes, teaching assistants are being diverted from what they do best and pupils who need additional support are missing out.
"Schools' budgets are so tight that, instead of getting in supply teachers to cover classes, heads are having to use teaching assistants on the cheap. Ministers are entirely responsible for the funding crisis that's putting schools in this impossible position.”
- Webster: Teaching on the cheap? UNISON, April 2024: www.unison.org.uk/content/uploads/2024/04/Teaching-on-the-cheap.pdf