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Scholarships available for SEN support staff

Careers & Training
From today, teachers and special educational needs staff can apply for scholarships worth thousands of pounds to develop their specialist knowledge.

The scholarships, awarded by the Department of Education’s National Scholarship Fund, are worth up to £2,000 for Special Educational Needs (SEN) support staff and up to £3,500 for teachers.

This is the third round of scholarships for SEN staff and the fourth round for teachers.

The National Scholarship Fund is administered by the National College for Teaching and Leadership.

Applications for scholarships are open now and close at midnight on the 30 May.

To date, £7 million has been made available through the fund, benefitting almost 2,000 teachers and SEN support staff.

Charlie Taylor, chief executive of the National College for Teaching and Leadership, said, ‘We believe that a teaching profession that values continual professional development is crucial to raising standards in our schools.

‘These scholarships, alongside other reforms to improve teacher recruitment and training, will help deliver our objective to raise the status of teachers.

Donna Frost Phillips,who was granted a scholarship in the third round for teachers, said, 'The fund has allowed me to undertake the specialist dyslexia training course, which I would not have been able to do without this funding.

'The school will have a specialist teacher on site, which means children and teachers will have access to specialist advice teaching, meaning they won’t have to buy in specialist support.'