Fewer teacher training students drop out
Things are improving with higher vocational education courses for teachers in primary education. Fewer students drop out and the programs also attract slightly more students, according to a tour.
Since last academic year, you no longer just come to the teacher training college. Entry requirements have become stricter. Prospective teachers must plug any gaps in their knowledge and skills before they can start. That would make for better first-year students, who are less likely to give up.
And yes, it worked. Fewer first-years drop out. They also need fewer resits for the arithmetic and language tests that the courses take in the first year. Precise figures are yet to come, but the courses sound delighted.
Fright
The teacher training colleges are also attracting more students this academic year. Due to the disappearance of the basic grant, HBO attracted few students anyway last year, but the new requirements for PABO students made it even worse for those programs: there were 1.800 first-years fewer (only 3.900 first-years) and up to Minister Bussemakers was frightened mainly immigrants stayed away.
The training courses are now bouncing back a bit, according to the first sounds.
Take Stenden university of applied sciences. In previous years, almost half of all teacher training first-years dropped out there. Now that is less than thirty percent, said a proud chairman of the board Leendert Klaassen in his speech at the opening of the new academic year. The new teacher training college students are better prepared and more motivated. And the first counts of new students are also looking good: twenty percent more than last year.
Cognitively stronger
Things are also improving at Hogeschool Rotterdam. The dropout there has fluctuated around forty percent in recent years, but it has dropped to thirty percent. Even more interesting is the reason why students drop out. Sometimes they had simply made the wrong study choice or personal circumstances played a role, they say, but last year hardly anyone found the training too difficult: only five percent, against thirty percent in previous years. “From this we can conclude that we are dealing with a cognitively stronger group,” the program says.
Primary schools will probably be faced with a teacher shortage in the coming years. That is why it is unfortunate that the strict requirements and the new loan system resulted in a significant decrease in the number of teacher training students, according to various parties in the Lower House.
Unrest
Minister Bussemaker calmed the unrest about this: if the current students drop out less often, there will be little to worry about. Far fewer first-year students does not necessarily mean that far fewer teachers and masters graduate.
She was calculating too optimistic, it turned out on closer inspection. But one thing is correct: the new teacher training college students drop out less often and appear to be of a higher level than their predecessors. Other universities of applied sciences, including Avans and Inholland, also report this trend.
