The Early Professional Development programme, funded by DfES, was one of the LEA’s biggest CPD ventures, involving over 1100 teachers over three and a half years and bringing £2 million extra funding into city schools.

Birmingham’s programme was designed to offer choice and flexibility, with a mix of longer course programmes and programmes designed and managed by teachers themselves.

Feedback from teachers and senior managers showed that this combination of choice, flexibility and autonomy was particularly successful in engaging teachers.  Significant numbers reflected that this combination of extra opportunity and some independence helped confirm in them their choice of teaching as a career.

The LEA’s own positive feedback is confirmed by a recent NFER evaluation of the national EPD programme, which rates it amongst the most successful they have monitored.  Their evaluation found many benefits for teachers, the top five being:

• enhancement of pupils’ learning

• enhanced willingness to undertake CPD

• actual teaching practice

• the contribution made to colleagues and the school

• thinking on career development.

Birmingham teachers rated all these impacts above the average for other LEAs, with CPD and career development scoring particularly highly.  Schools also reported a range of other positive impacts, including direct benefits such as disseminating learning to other colleagues, as well as more indirect effects such as changes to CPD practice and culture.