Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans she has to increase the number of science graduates teaching in primary schools.

The Department for Education wants to see more science graduates in teaching, both at primary and secondary level. There are currently around 26,100 primary teachers in state schools with science-related degrees (11.5%). We promote primary teaching to science graduates through our “Get into Teaching” campaign as well as supporting 500 primary places to Teach First which recruits top graduates into teaching.

In addition to initial teacher training, we are supporting a number of initiatives to improve the science knowledge of existing primary teachers. There are 266 Specialist Leaders of Education in science who are boosting other teachers’ knowledge across the country. We are also collaborating with the Wellcome Trust who are developing a programme for primary science teachers to strengthen further their expertise. In this way, they will be able to train non-specialist teachers to excel in science, providing further capacity in this important area.