TeachFirst Insight Review

The insight was very insightful. It was an interesting experience and one that has helped me develop skills that I will need if I decide to have a future career as a teacher. We did a lot of activities during the insights. The best part of it was the second week.

I felt very valued because Teach First looked after everyone, including myself, really really well. In the first they provided accommodation and in the second week they provided accommodation too. In the first week breakfast was provided. In the second week you could claim back internet wifi expenses which was useful.

The first week was training so that you knew what would happen in the schools and it gave you an idea of what would occur. This, in my opinion, shows that there was guidance. You received support from other team mates, and from your university provider who gave you a call.

I developed application writing skills so this will help me write applications in the future for other jobs that I apply to. I think that my soft skills increased. I also gained a bit of a n awareness of the curriculum. I learnt about differentiation (levels in classes) and how to meet student's needs.

The insight was very well structured. We had a facebook group and a share space and emails. We had timetables and information given on these sources. My timetable for the second week had a lot of useful things on it during my time at the school. Clearly a lot of thought has been put into this internship.

The atmosphere was mostly very good. At times some people felt disappointed because teach first had said things like you wouldn't have the choice where you are placed which is very important to some people so they felt like they would be unlikely to the the leadership programme. And some people were kicked off the programme after being offered a place if they then mentioned that they had now been offered a placement year and thus were no longer graduating the following year.

The company clearly spent a lot of money on all of us in terms of accommodation, DBS, etc, and then doing things like making us have to do calls, which I don't think were entirely necessary, and could be seen as a waste of money and time. Also, although trained it's not like we got any industry recognised qualifications from the internship.

To some extent. I definitely gained greater awareness of the firm and its values and beliefs and how it would be and the programme would be in the future. I am unsure how linked with the firm you would be once based in schools, but it probably would be good.

I definitely gained greater awareness of the company and its values and beliefs. However, there were somethings I did not like about its culture. In correspondence, like their expectations, it wasn't the most friendly - it felt like we were still children at secondary school. And then how things were said like don't claim expenses as we're a charity, as if guilt tripping you.

The content in the first week had its pros and cons. In the second week it had these too but was more useful actually seeing things first hand. In the second week some things on the timetable were missed because the teachers were so busy and didn't always turn up which was disappointing. It would've been nice to learn more about the partner firms like google, the navy, and accenture and how that works, because I didn't quite understand how you do the transition from teach first to those companies.

Payment of £500 for the two weeks. Accommodation provided during the first and second week. Breakfast provided during the first week (although apparently not always the case). I had free lunch during the second week at the school (though this was by the discretion of the school). Wifi expensed during the second week. Things like travel expenses to the school or site in the first week were not expensed.

They gave presentations to us but there was not the time to talk to them 1-1 in particular to properly network with them. It would have been nice if at the start when they introduced themselves if they told us their first and second name and that we could add them on linkedin and tell us their email so we could contact them if we so wished.

Because the internship was residential this meant that we were able to meet each other in the accommodation. And because a facebook group was set up this meant that it was fairly easy to find each other on facebook. The first week they booked a pub but it just looked that an ordinary pub that we could've gone to if we so wished without them booking. In the second week they booked another pub but it would've been nicer if there had been welcome drinks or something at them to encourage people to go because being in london it was really expensive for drinks.

I do not recall if we did. The fact that I do not know this suggests that we probably were not told these things, or at least I was not told these things. Unless this question means in terms of the pub activity (bit confused about the question). They did also say after the programme we might be able to go to the teacher development conference in Leeds and a reunion in September.

I really liked the internship because it was only 2 weeks which meant you have the rest of summer. It was well paid especially in the sense of if you include the residential costs and food costs. They gave you a lot of time to think and reflect and it was well structured and well run and the people were nice.