About The Organisation
A child’s future is all too often written for them, children from disadvantaged backgrounds are not getting the start in life that they deserve. We know that a great education can break the cycle of poverty and help every child fulfil their potential. Teach First has built a movement intent on tackling this, united in the belief that every child has the right to a brilliant education. Our movement works within the classroom and around it to change the system and ensure that the children who start life with the least are given the opportunity to rewrite their future. In the classroom…
Teach First launched in 2002 as a visionary charity with a bold mission to end educational inequality with a new and different route into teaching. Targeting talented young people who weren’t considering the classroom as a workplace, tapping into their sense of injustice, a great education for all and relentless focus on high standards, Teach First set about attracting high potential graduates and placed them in schools that needed them most. From the outset, the charity’s mission was to build a movement of Change Makers and leaders who would drive the charity’s mission inside and beyond the classroom.
It is a movement of leaders fully committed to making sure no child’s educational success is impacted by their socio-economic background. Over twenty years on, we bring our specialism in tackling educational disadvantage to 5,500 schools across the country, with one in 5 disadvantaged schools having a Teach First ambassador on the senior leadership team. Since the charity’s inception, we have trained and supported over 26,500 teachers.
We are changing the face of the profession, with 37% of our cohort identifying as being from ethnic minority backgrounds and 28% being eligible for free school means as pupils. We equip and enable the sector with 5,000 leaders taking our National Professional Qualifications, through our 80 delivery partners. School leaders see the Charity’s impact – Co-opted Member – Finance, Risk and Audit Committee recognising our ‘Unwavering moral purpose and the commitment to levelling the playing field and addressing disadvantage’.
Over the last six years we have achieved three outstanding Ofsted inspections with the latest report recognising that ‘Leaders place disadvantage at the heart of the decisions they make about key aspects of the training’. and beyond.
Teach First Ambassadors (our alumni community) are transforming the wider social mobility agenda. They are demonstrating that change is possible and are at the forefront of that change. They have set up their own charities, supporting parents to help their children read and write better, they work with young people to help them get into university, they work across the care sector, so the most vulnerable children are supported outside of school.
They have set up breakfast clubs and after school clubs and initiatives that enrich pupils’ lives.
They lead organisations that carry out research into what makes the best teachers, they are influencing government policy and making change happen from within government. Across the corporate world,
Teach First Ambassadors raise money and support for the Charity, they champion employment opportunities for young people. Collectively they are a powerful tool in how we will achieve our vision.
We are as committed to our vision as we were in 2002, but to achieve that vision the how of our work will need to change. We have recently appointed a new CEO. James Toop was part of the inaugural cohort of Teach Firsters who started teaching in 2003.
