Excellent teachers

The Excellent Teacher Scheme (ETS), introduced as part of the school workforce reform agenda, provides a new career pathway for experienced teachers. It recognises and rewards the expertise they have built up and distinctive contribution they can make to improving teaching and learning by sharing their skills with other classroom teachers, and which go beyond what would normally be expected of all classroom teachers. It is an alternative to posts that attract Teaching and Learning Responisbility (TLR) payments, the Advanced Sklls Teacher (AST) grade or leadership group posts. Schools can create Excellent Teacher (ET) posts at any time, after appropriate consultation.

ET posts should make a significant contribution to improving pupil attainment by raising the quality of teaching across the school. Unlike ASTs, ETs do not have an outreach function. In addition to their normal class teacher role, the specific expectations of an ET should be:

participating in the induction of NQTs
participating in the professional mentoring of other teachers
sharing good practice through demonstration lessons
helping other teachers to develop their expertise in planning, preparation and assessment
helping other teachers to evaluate the impact of their teaching on pupils
undertaking classroom observations to assist and support the performance management process
helping other teachers improve their teaching practice including those on capability procedures

An ET should have substantial involvement and specific responsibilities in each of these areas. It will be for schools to decide how best to employ ETs and draw up appropriate job descriptions based on professional duties. While the ET's main focus is on teachers, it is expected that they will also have an impact on the whole school workforce.

Creating ET posts

If a school decides to create an ET post, this must be consistent with the school’s staffing structure and after appropriate consultation.

If an ET post is filled by an internal candidate, the teacher appointed will have to relinquish their current post and TLR payments attached to it.

Assessment criteria

To be appointed to an ET post, teachers must have been assessed against the standards and have been first placed on point three of the pay scale for post threshold teachers, at least two years before they take up post. Please note teachers cannot apply for assessment until a vacancy exists.

ET applications dated 1 September 2007 onward will be assessed against the revised professional ET standards on the TDA website.

Each ET candidate who has not already met the ET standards will need to be complete an ETS1 application form. This should then be passed to his or her headteacher who will: add their comments; complete the relevant declarations; and send it to the national assessment agency. They will arrange for the candidate to be assessed. In order to monitor equal opportunities issues relating to ET, applicants will also need to complete a short questionnaire and send this to the national assessment agency together with the application form.

A teacher who has not already met the ET standards is restricted to applying for ET posts in their own school. They must submit a completed ETS1 application to their headteacher.

When considering applying for assessment, teachers will need to be able to show that they have:

continued to develop themselves professionally
provided regular coaching and mentoring
evidence of work that identified and addressed the needs of a particular group or groups of pupils, involved a searching analysis, and was of sufficient substance to have a positive impact beyond their assigned pupils. (Normally from the two-year period leading up to their application)
met the standards for post threshold teachers.

Guidance aimed at headteachers, governors, teachers and local authority officials contains information about what an ET is, what being an ET involves and what benefits they can bring to their school. It also describes the purpose of the ETS and includes more details of the assessment process.

Details of pay can be found in the current School Teachers Pay and Conditions Document or from your HR adviser.