Katie Cusworth, Former Gateway Alliance Trainee 2017-2018
The complementary placement part of the course particularly tested me as I had only worked in one school up to that point, in 2 different year groups. Placements meant working with completely different age groups and with no staff I knew and this pushed me out of my comfort zone but through this I learnt so many new teaching strategies. I felt very fortunate throughout my training to have such supportive staff within my alliance as well as in my host placement school and wouldn’t have been able to get through it all without them.
I really valued the variety of training offered to us. Each and every bit of training we had was really useful, particularly the EAL training delivered by one of the partner schools. Even just attending the different partner schools on the alliance training days gave you a wealth of experience because every school is different and I came away with so many different ideas. Gateway also arranged for us to have a short placement at a SEND school which was an amazing experience and helped to give me a deeper understanding of how I could support SEND children within my own school.
I found that increasing my teaching time percentage gradually over the academic year worked really well, helping me to grow in confidence while balancing my workload and this proved excellent preparation for my NQT year. By the Summer term, my teaching percentage was the same as that of an NQT which helped me to not feel so overwhelmed as I transitioned to my NQT year. Overall I am so happy that I chose the Gateway Alliance School Direct route for my teacher training – I was supported and challenged to become the confident teacher I am today and I am now really proud to be the subject leader of Maths at our school!
Whether you’re a career changer, graduate or are currently working in a support capacity within school, we can provide you with the best possible training experience to equip you with the skills, knowledge, experience and confidence to be a fantastic teacher. Train to teach with Gateway Alliance.