The Virtual School: designated teachers

Every school is required to have a designated teacher: someone in a position of influence within the school who can champion the needs of Children in Care and other vulnerable children in their school.
 

The role of the designated teacher

The designated teacher (sometimes abbreviated to DT) is a statutory role. They have a duty to help make sure the specialist support and guidance from the Virtual School has an 'on the ground' impact for the vulnerable children in their school. Designated teachers are also required to submit termly information to support a child's PEP in a timely way. They must also report on how their school has used Pupil Premium Plus funding to support the educational needs of a Child in Care.

Click here to complete the Designated Teacher's PEP submission.

Support and training for designated teachers

As a Virtual School, we offer training and support for our designated teachers, for them to feed back to their wider teams. This can include:

• new-to-role training with our Virtual School team (free)
• monthly updates from the virtual school Headteacher (free)
• termly designated teacher network training (free)
• annual designated teacher conferences (minimal cost, from Pupil Premium)

New-to-role training for designated teachers

Our training dates for the 2024 to 25 academic year are:

• Tuesday 17 September 2024 (4pm, virtual)
• Tuesday 21 January 2025 (4pm, face-to-face)
• Wednesday 30 April 2025 (12pm, virtual and 4.30pm face-to-face)
• Wednesday 9 July 2025 (12pm, virtual and 4.30pm, face-to-face)

The session covers: what the role is and what your responsibilities are; an overview of our Children in Care including some of the needs the designated teacher may need to support; the personal education planning (PEP) process; and a chance to ask questions and have further information signposted.