Government seeks to overhaul TTA

The role of the Teacher Training Agency should be "redrawn", but there is no case yet for it to be abolished or privatised, the government said this week.

A quinquennial review of the TTA, conducted by the Department for Education and Employment, has concluded that the agency's remit is too wide.

A report on the conclusions, published on Wednesday, said that in future the TTA should concentrate on the two priorities it was given when it was established in 1994 - teacher supply and recruitment, and initial teacher training.

Of these, the former should be the TTA's top priority in the next phase of its work. Increasing "both the rigour and the flexibility" of initial teacher training will remain a "vital" part of its remit.

The report said ITT funding and quality - the most controversial areas of its work from the point of view of higher education - will remain "core business" for the agency.

The new General Teaching Councils, which some critics of the TTA thought should take over responsibility for ITT, will have an advisory rather than a funding role.

Headship and teacher leadership issues will eventually become the responsibility of a new National College for School Leadership proposed by the government.