Not retiring: More chances needed to switch career

Teaching is one of the professions which is suffering a huge recruitment and retention problem, with a new report showing women in their 30s are, numerically, the biggest single group leaving teaching. Older people could be part of the solution. Building on people’s desire in later life to give back and make a difference and their greater life experience, an innovative programme has been capitalising on this for years. Now Teach helps older people who want to switch from their former career to teaching. Last year saw a national 15% growth in the number of over 40s starting to train to teach and Now Teach’s support has been vital to many.

One Now Teach graduate is Sylvia Harris McCoy whose background is in engineering and who was a manager at Ford until retraining as a maths teacher. She says she was becoming a bit disheartened attempting to make the transfer to teaching until she found out about a Now Teach webinar. From Now Teach she got more than just practical support, a coach and the feeling that she was not on her own. She was told her age and experience was valuable in teaching. It gave her that extra confidence boost she needed and she starts her permanent job as a teacher in September.

Earlier this year, Now Teach’s government funding was axed. Not because of the quality of the programme, but because of generalised cuts in the Department for Education. Despite this big setback and despite the fact that axing the programme may cost the Government more money than it saves in the long run, given the teacher recruitment crisis is not abating, Now Teach has been able to raise the funding to recruit 250 teachers for next year – a boost on the 215 recruits this year – through donors including The Hg Foundation, the Rothermere Foundation and individuals such as Dr Tony Trapp. However, it makes the point that funding the scheme should not be left to philanthropists. 

Hopefully, the decision to axe its funding will be reversed by the new government, but there is a general lesson here about the need for greater support for career changers, particularly in light of the rapid technological changes which are transforming industries. Often it is left to individuals to fund coaching programmes or the like in order to make the transfer to a different sector. There’s a lot of talk about transferable skills, but it can be hard to sell these on your own. That’s where programmes like Now Teach are invaluable. Another issue is that employers need to be aware of what older workers might want if they are reaching out to this group. Of course, not everyone wants the same things, but a Work Foundation report this week shows there is a big say-do gap between what employers say about multigenerational workforces and what they actually do to encourage them in.

That includes offering flexible working. Harris McCoy asked for reduced hours in her interview and had to negotiate hard for it. Part of the reason mums are leaving the profession is also due to a lack of flexible working. It’s not enough to keep doing things the same way, whatever the pressures. In this fast-changing environment and with an ageing workforce, employers have to be willing to think imaginatively and creatively about how to recruit and retain workers, even if it may seem risky to do so. The alternative may be riskier.

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