Re-specialisation of out-of-field teachers of mathematics and science through a formal qualification

Teaching secondary school science and mathematics by out-of-field teachers is an increasing concern in Australia and internationally. Governments have been looking to formulate a policy response to the issue, but this is difficult given teacher supply issues. This paper describes an approach to re-credentialling teachers at scale as a system-wide response involving the support of schools and teachers to undertake a part-time post-graduate qualification in science or mathematics. Two courses were designed to explicitly cater for projected teacher needs in content and pedagogy and to induct teachers into the subject cultures of the respective disciplines. We describe the design features of the courses and the experience of these for participant teachers. We draw on evidence from the design-based research underpinning the courses to describe the ways in which the course structures and pedagogies were successively refined to adjust to teacher needs regarding teaching and learning within their communities including adjusting to the demands of returning to study and operating within their own school cultures. We discuss the particular strengths and challenges of the programme for these out-of-field teachers and the implications of the findings for professional growth of these teachers at the system level.