Department for Education announces cuts to PGCE courses

The Department for Education has released new budgets and distributions for the coming academic year 2015, which has sent alarm bells ringing for many. The popular PGCE courses that are lead by many UK universities seem to be under threat according to the report. It revealed that they would see drastic cuts to their funding as ministers have announced that they wish to give more provision over teacher training courses to the schools themselves. Therefore, universities' role in the training program will significantly decrease with institutions soon finding out the new number of places that they will be allowed to offer to students. It is thought that there will be an increase in places at Schools Direct, which is a school-based training program initiated by Michael Gove.

This decision has proven to be controversial to many, particularly as those facing cuts could include the University of Cambridge who received an outstanding Ofsted report based on the course they provide. A source close to the Department of Education stated to the BBC that: "There's no debate in the DfE as to whether this is the rational thing to do. It's simply ideological vandalism. No other country is doing this." The decision has also divided the department itself as it has been reported that David Laws, who is Liberal Democrat schools minister, opposed these new budgets believing that university involvement should not be rocked.

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