Psychologists must supervise teacher psychometric tests
Proposals for all would-be teachers to sit a psychometric test will only work if they are overseen by Chartered Psychologists.
That is the view of Barry Cripps, an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society. He was commenting on recent media reports that all applicants for teaching qualifications will have to undergo psychometric testing to determine whether they have the right personality for a career in education.
While psychometric testing has been used successfully in business for more than half a century, it requires careful supervision and standardisation throughout the country, he argued.
Cripps added that he would concentrate on psychometric examinations that looked at verbal reasoning and emotional intelligence.
Following a successful pilot programme, the tests will be rolled out nationwide from 2012 and, according to the TES, will be used by universities to weed out students who are not cut out for teaching.
Meanwhile, in a separate study reported by the British Psychological Society, freelance Sport and Exercise Psychologists Sarah Fenwick recently concluded that using work-based personality surveys to identify the strengths and weaknesses of an individual is key to their success in an extreme physical challenge.
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