{"id":898112,"date":"2026-09-16T16:36:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T16:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/898112\/"},"modified":"2026-09-16T16:36:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T16:36:09","slug":"chronic-and-worsening-shortage-of-physics-teachers-revealed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/898112\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Chronic and worsening’ shortage of physics teachers revealed"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n At the same time, \u201cRetaining, Recruiting, and Retraining Physics Teachers for Scotland\u2019s Future\u201d reports that recruitment to Initial Teacher Education<\/a> (ITE) has fallen to extremely low levels, with just 28 trainee physics teachers recruited in 2025, compared to a national target of 131.\n<\/p>\n

\n The IOP has said that Scotland\u2019s net zero ambitions, along with goals for economic growth, depend on a workforce with \u201cstrong physics knowledge and skills\u201d and that this development must start in schools.\n<\/p>\n

\n However, the report found that physics is particularly underrepresented not only in the teaching workforce but in schools across the country, with findings that physics teacher shortages are reducing educational opportunities and leaving schools \u201cincreasingly relying on temporary staff, multi-course teaching, out-of-specialism teaching, consortium arrangements, and other coping mechanisms to maintain provision.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Through Freedom of Information<\/a> (FOI) requests to 251 schools across 26 local authorities, the IOP revealed that six Scottish secondary schools currently have no physics teacher at all, and 18 others have less than one full-time equivalent (FTE) physics teacher on staff.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cSmall departments, particularly in rural and remote schools, face disproportionate challenges,\u201d the report found.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe departure of a single physics teacher can effectively eliminate local provision at Higher or Advanced Higher levels, with long-lasting effects on pupil progression.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

“Postcode lottery” hindering progression<\/p>\n

\n According to the report, between 2019 and 2024, the ten local authorities with the sharpest decline in physics teachers were in areas of high social deprivation.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n The report\u2019s findings also show that, among schools that responded, the top 50 performing secondary schools in Scotland average 3.1 physics teachers, while the 50 lowest-performing schools average 1.2.\n<\/p>\n

\n Writing exclusively for The Herald, Dr Iain Moore, Chair of IOP Scotland, warned that the disparities could come with long-term societal costs.\n<\/p>\n

\n “Access to specialist teaching should never depend on a pupil’s postcode. We risk creating a cohort of Scottish pupils whose education options, and therefore whose life options, will be narrowed due to a lack of teachers.”\n<\/p>\n

\n The report outlined several ways shortages negatively affect staff and pupils. Staff are left to manage multiple course levels at once, which adds to workload, \u201coften forcing pupils to work independently for substantial periods.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Read more\n<\/p>\n

\n The report warned that these setups lead to less specialist support and can particularly disadvantage pupils with additional support needs. Teacher shortages can also tend to leave pupils with fewer options for progression.\n<\/p>\n

\n In addition to the impact on pupils, the report found that physics teachers face several challenges. In rural schools, physics teachers are typically in small departments or lone specialists, with high workload demands and \u201climited opportunities for career progression\u201d. As a result, many report \u201cprofessional isolation and a lack of recognition for specialist expertise\u201d.\n<\/p>\n

Physics worst-performing subject in recruitment rates<\/p>\n

\n ITE recruitment for physics has not met its target number since 2016. From 2020 to 2025, intake fell from 70% of its target to just 21.4%. The report found that, although overall recruitment to all subjects has hovered around 50% in the last few years<\/a>, physics fares particularly poorly to other subjects.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cAlthough the physics ITE intake has been below target level for several years, in the post-COVID-19 era, it has fallen off a cliff, underperforming by more than 60% against targets since 2021.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cIn the past three years, it has underperformed by more than 70% and is the worst-performing subject for percentage intake over this period.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Between 2023 and 2025, physics was the worst-performing secondary subject in terms of ITE recruitment rates.\n<\/p>\n

\n As a result, the IOP has warned that the \u201csharp and steady decline in recruitment rates has turned the physics teacher numbers issue from a headache into a significant threat\u201d to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education.\n<\/p>\n

\n Despite the repeated failure to recruit physics teachers to the national target level, the report identified retention as the most urgent challenge facing the physics workforce.\n<\/p>\n

\n Without support to retain the existing workforce and effective efforts to train more physics teachers, the IOP said the ongoing concerns are \u201clikely to increase burnout and fatigue,\u201d which could worsen the retention problem.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cRecruiting new teachers remains essential,\u201d the report found, \u201cbut the fastest and most cost-effective way to strengthen the workforce is to keep experienced teachers in classrooms.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cEvery teacher who leaves takes with them not only subject expertise but also mentoring capacity, leadership, curriculum knowledge, and professional experience.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

10-year recovery plan proposed<\/p>\n

\n The report called for a 10-year recovery strategy focused on the \u201c3Rs\u201d (retention, recruitment, and retraining).\n<\/p>\n

\n The IOP has made a variety of recommendations, including cutting multi-course teaching in half by 2031, commissioning research into why physics undergraduates do not enter teaching, supporting career-changers financially, giving qualified teachers time to retrain in new subjects, and improving collaboration between schools, the Scottish Government<\/a> and local authorities.\n<\/p>\n

\n Keith Small, IOP Scotland lead, said the report brings \u201cinto sharp and uncomfortable focus the threat that physics teaching in our schools faces.\u201d\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cBut it also maps out the ways we can ensure this vital science thrives with well-supported specialist teachers inspiring young people who can then go on to play important roles in our economy and society,\u201d he added.\n<\/p>\n

\n “It’s vital that our policymakers heed the warnings that there are too many barriers to teaching physics and therefore too many barriers to our young people studying physics, particularly in rural areas and schools in socio-economically disadvantaged communities.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At the same time, \u201cRetaining, Recruiting, and Retraining Physics Teachers for Scotland\u2019s Future\u201d reports that recruitment to Initial…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":898113,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[49,48,314,66],"class_list":["post-898112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-physics","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-physics","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898112","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=898112"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898112\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/898113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=898112"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=898112"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=898112"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}