The Cabinet Secretary for Education, Jenny Gilruth has announced that the Scottish Government is to set up a new centre of excellence for teaching.
This announcement was made during the Minister’s address to delegates at the SNP conference in Aberdeen on Sunday 15 October, in which she stated that the centre could help make the country a “world-leader in new approaches to learning and teaching”.
The Centre is to be developed by the Scottish Government along with teachers and professional bodies, with the next steps for its establishment to be announced after discussions have taken place with these groups.
Responding to this announcement, GTC Scotland Chief Executive and Registrar, Dr Pauline Stephen commented:
As the independent registration and regulation body for the teaching profession with almost 82,000 teachers on our register, one of our principal statutory aims is to contribute to improving the quality of teaching and learning in Scotland. We also have a responsibility to provide Ministers with expert advice about matters central to trusted teaching and to our core functions of registering and regulating teachers in the public interest. We therefore have a vital role to play in the development of these plans.
She added:
The General Teaching Council for Scotland welcomes the engagement we have had with the Cabinet Secretary since she took office. We will continue to engage collaboratively with the government, and with the profession and education bodies, on this new Centre and on the wider education reform programme.
