Get a UK teacher's licence without going to the UK

[simon43]

I posted this on another forum, but I'm sure it will be of interest to teachers out there who do not have a teaching licence from their 'home' country.

 

You can get QTS (UK teaching licence) without ever teaching in the UK.

 

You don't have to be British either. It costs about 1,500 GBP in total.

 

This is not a 'scam', but a procedure that the Society for Education & Training (SET) have confirmed to me as valid.

 

These are the requirements:

- You must have a pulse
- You must have teaching experience (anywhere...) - It doesn't have to be in a 'prestigious' school
- You need to study online for the level 5 DET (Diploma in Education & Training). This course costs 1,000 GBP (no VAT if you're overseas)
- For the DET, you need to log 100 hours of in-class teaching and 8 hours of observed teaching, preferably with students aged at least 14 years.
- You complete the DET online, submit proof of your classroom teaching hours and you will awarded the DET qualification
- You also need to have a level 2 qualification (O level) in English and Maths. If you propose to apply to SET as an ESL teacher, then you'll need a level 3 qualification in English. Most accredited TEFL courses meet that last requirement.
- Then you apply to SET to register for QTLS status, which is legally equivalent to QTS and means that you have a UK teacher's licence
- You need to submit a lot of details of your teaching experience, CPD courses etc. The fee for QTLS is 485 GBP.

- If everything goes OK, you'll be awarded QTLS status.in a few months, without any requirement to teach in the UK or pass the PGCE qualification or even have a degree.

 

You can find more details on the SET website and by Googling the DET qualification (there are various online providers).

 

When you are awarded QTS, you can legally teach as a 'teacher' in UK academies and independent schools, BUT not in state schools. This is because you have not completed your NQT year of teaching practice. The award of QTS doesn't require you to work in the UK as a NQT - you only need to do that if you intend to work in a UK state school.

 

How do I know all the above? Because I am currently working towards completion of the DET qualification by mid-2017, and QTS award before the end of 2017.

 

I have numerous emails from the SET and from the DET course provider to confirm that this route to obtaining a teacher's licence is completely legal.
 

[jadee]

Very interesting, thanks for sharing. What does the 'L' in QTLS stand for? 

[simon43]

Here is a news quote which clarifies the abbreviation:

 

" The UK Department for Education has confirmed that, from 1^st April 2012, further education teachers who have been awarded Qualified Teacher Learning and Skills (QTLS) status by the Institute for Learning (IfL) and are members of the IfL will be recognised as qualified teachers in schools, without any further induction requirements and without the need to apply to the Teaching Agency for Qualified Teacher Status (QTS). "

 

The IfL morphed into SET a couple of years ago, and they took over the award of QTLS status.

[russty121]

Nice I'm sure most place around Asia let you teach with just the qualification of being from the west


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[simon43]

Nice I'm sure most place around Asia let you teach with just the qualification of being from the west 

 

Not any more.  That might have been true many years ago, but it certainly is not the case nowadays.

 

There are a few good reasons why a teacher might wish to follow the process that I've given:

 

- They are teaching overseas, and have no time (or money) to return to their home country to study for a PGCE (that's me!)

 

- They are teaching overseas, but do not have a degree level qualification.  My process enables such a teacher to get a teacher's licence from the UK, even if they do not have a degree. (Whether that teacher is eligible to legally teach in Thailand or another country might still require a degree level qualification)

 

- They are teaching overseas, and promotion or new employment opportunities requires them to have 'Qualified Teachers Status' (that's me again!)

 

Note that the popular online PGCEi qualification from Nottingham, Sunderland and Hull universities will NOT provide you with QTS, primarily because their is no in-class teaching component.  This DET qualification requires you to log 100 hours of in-class teaching, plus 8 hours of observed teaching, of which 2 hours of that are recorded on video.

[Jadam]

Sounds great, thanks for sharing!

 

Have you confirmed that this certificate will satisfy the Thai MOE, or in other words is it sufficient to get a perm. teacher's license in Thailand?

[simon43]

Have you confirmed that this certificate will satisfy the Thai MOE,

 

The DET certificate is not relevant to satisfy the Thai MOE.  You will be a fully licensed UK teacher with Qualified Teacher Status.  That means that you qualify for a permanent teacher's license in Thailand. You just provide your SET registration #

[TomCarey]

Thank you very much for posting this! I've been teaching for a number of years in International schools and have always regretted not getting my QTS while I was living in the UK. Would you mind sharing the name of the organisation through which you are doing your DET? 

 

Thanks again!

 

Tom

 

 

[Slip]

This is very interesting news.  I have been holding off doing a PGCEi as it has never been approved by Krusthepa.  Thank you Simon.  I have to go back and look again at the exact difference between this and QTC. It seems too good to be true.

 

EDIT:  The very first piece of digging I have done turns up this-  "The Diploma in Education and Training is an initial teacher training qualification, studied at QCF Level 5, for teaching in Further Education (FE)"   I am interested how it will work for us, but I haven't read much yet.

Edited January 13, 2017 by Slip

[aidenai]

11 hours ago, Slip said:

This is very interesting news.  I have been holding off doing a PGCEi as it has never been approved by Krusthepa.

I think you're misinformed. Have a look here.

 

thailandteaching.asia/threads/another-5-year-gold-card-issued-thanks-to-tt.63369/

[simon43]

I will give a lengthy answer, because this detailed information may well help teachers in Thailand, (including non-UK/EC citizens), obtain a UK teacher's licence, and hence automatic licensing by Khrusapa.

 

As Slip mentioned, the DET qualification is really intended for those who work or want to work in the FE sector.  By obtaining a DET, and then submitting evidence of in-class teaching hours and CPD study etc, the teacher can be awarded QTLS (Qualified Teacher Learning and Skills) status.

 

QTLS can be obtained by a teacher who teaches students in the 14 years+ age range.

 

How does that equate to being a QTS teacher or certified teacher?  By a stroke of luck, several years ago the (now defunct) Institute for Learning (IfL) lobbied the UK government to rule that a QTLS teacher had exactly the same legal status as a QTS teacher.

 

By 'QTS teacher', I mean a teacher who had followed a path of academic study to ultimately work in a school as a teacher of primary, secondary, kindergarten etc.

 

The UK government accepted this lobbying and made the ruling :)

 

The IfL was replaced by the Society for Education & Training (SET).  That body reconfirmed that a FE teacher who has QTLS (and who remains a member of SET), has exactly the same legal standing for teaching in a primary/secondary school as a teacher with QTS.

 

The government of the day has also confirmed this.

 

Now, to obtain QTS, I have found no path which can be followed by a teacher working overseas - he/she must return to the UK to either study for a PGCE, or if a mature teacher with many years of experience, he/she must return and teach in the UK for a while, whilst following an application for QTS via the 'application by experience' route.

 

But the bottom line is that he/she must teach in the UK for a while.  This makes it impracticable not only for Brits like me (who have a solid teaching employment overseas), but would all but make it impossible for a non-EC citizen (such as US or Canadian) to get a teaching job in the UK, due to visa restrictions etc.

 

Many years ago when the IfL existed, I corresponded with them about obtaining QTLS (and hence QTS) without visiting or teaching in the UK.  The IfL confirmed that this was possible, if I could find a DET qualification training company who would agree to my submission of in-class teaching hours from an overseas school.

 

I contacted a number of UK DET training organisations and found several who were quite happy to allow me to submit teaching evidence from overseas classes :)

 

The IfL was replaced by the SET and I again corresponded with them about this same subject.  They also re-confirmed all my previous questions and interpretations.

 

However, there is one proviso.  Although QTS and QTLS in the UK are currently one and the same thing, this might change in the future - see this link about possible changes.

 

Changes

 

The bottom line is that if you want to obtain a UK teacher's licence by this 'overseas' route, then you should do this in 2017 and not wait!

 

The above summarises a lot of the research that I've done about this.  I am currently teaching in Myanmar and working towards my DET qualification, and thereafter my QTLS/QTS registration.

 

If you are teaching in Thailand, and want to use this overseas route to registration as a licensed teacher, here are some practical issues:

 

- You really need to be teaching the age group 14 years or above. The SET told me that whilst mixed age teaching experience would be considered, teachers who only teach primary, KG etc might have a hard time convincing SET that they should be awarded QTLS status.  One suggested solution was to teach adults privately, or even free adult lessons at the weekend.

 

- The DET qualification is a level 5 qualification, and the PGCE is level 7. So the work load is definitely much less than that required to study for a PGCE.

 

- You need to be able to demonstrate a history of CPD, (both to the DET trainer and to SET).  This means studying relevant CPD courses, attending conferences or meetings, reading relevant pedagogy articles etc.  If you only teach to get the salary and have no professional interest in your job, then you're unlikely to get teacher certification.

 

I'm sure there is more advice that I can give you, but that'll do for now.

 

 

[claffey]

That's all well and good. However it might be good to remind people that the majority of Class A International schools require a PGCE,QTS and at least three years experience from the UK or in an international school. I'm not saying it's not possible but it's a long shot if you want a good teaching job with all the benefits and 100k+ a month....

[simon43]

Claffey's comments are valid.  I have described a solution if you want to obtain a UK teacher's certification, without visiting or teaching in the UK.  But that doesn't mean that a potential employer will automatically offer you a well-paid job.  It is their 'call' as to what paper qualifications and experience you need to possess.

 

Right now, I'm working towards my QTS registration.  Being based in Myanmar, I'm already receiving a 100k+ salary each month from a school that is only 'international' in name (well, there are a few Bulgarian students here...) :)  

 

But the QTS will be useful if I return to teach in Thailand.

[MRDave]

I would rather do it in the UK where I would get a student finance loan that would never be paid back: plus I would be sure that my training provider was first class.