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By Graeme Paton~London Telegraph
They are being employed as teaching assistants to cover permanent staff when they are off sick, it was claimed.
The National Union of Teachers – Britain’s biggest classroom union – said schools were turning to people with no teaching experience just because they were “stern and loud”.
It comes amid growing concerns over a breakdown in school discipline with claims last week that as many as one in four teachers has been a victim of violent pupils in the last year.
A Government report being published on Wednesday will recommend that schools should make more use of “withdrawal rooms” – likened to solitary confinement ‘coolers’ by some – to control disruptive children.
At the NUT’s annual conference on Sunday it emerged that one headteacher had permanently hired two bouncers from an employment agency as “cover supervisors” to take classes when regular teachers were absent.
They were taken on by a comprehensive in north London for around £20,000 each – half the cost of fully qualified supply staff. One of the bouncers later left after disciplinary action was taken when he fell out with other teachers, it was claimed.
Speaking at the conference, Andrew Baisley, a teacher from Camden, said other schools were advertising for classroom assistants with military and police backgrounds.
“It is about crowd control and childminding,” he said. “If you are stern and loud, that’s what’s necessary to do the job.”
He added: “The problem is we need someone who’s trained with children, to be able to interact with children. If someone is away, you don’t want any teacher, you want a teacher from that particular subject so they can help them children with their work, so that the whole hour isn’t a complete waste of time.”
Mr Baisley refused to name the school involved but one employment agency in Birmingham – called Aspire People – has advertised for people who are “an ex-marine, prison officer, bouncer, policeman, fireman, sportsman [or] actor” to “get involved in a school environment and control the kids in schools throughout the Midlands”.
A state school in Tower Hamlets, east London, also hired a teacher with experience as a nightclub bouncer as its new behavioural expert.
