Zug, 10.05.2019

Highest ever number of students apply for places at Zug Teacher Training College

With146 students having applied to the Zug Teacher Training College (PH Zug), the highest number in the institution’s15-year history, it is clear the courses the institution offers are proving most popular.

 

 

Over recent years the number of students applying for courses there has fluctuated considerably. In 2004, only 79 students applied. Five years ago, this number had increased to 103, with 125 applying last year.

 

As Simon Bieli, the director of studies at the college explained, while 146 have expressed interest this year, this does not mean all of these will embark on a course there. In previous years up to 10 per cent have decided not to go ahead with a course, for various reasons, with some students, for example, not passing their school-leaving examination, just as those who apply through a less conventional route, i.e. older people already skilled in a different profession opting for a change in career, but who, in the end, do not meet the acceptance requirements.

 

Bieli explained that the current situation was not unlike that of 2016, when, by May of that year,145 students had applied, a result, he thought, of the new courses on offer. Out of interest, the numbers applying over the following two years amounted to 128 and 125. This year, students who embarked on these new courses will be qualifying, with Bieli putting down this new interest to word having got around about them. “Then there is the element of the security a career in teaching offers,” he said.

 

As to what the students find so enticing about the courses, Bieli explained that students can actually put the various modules on offer there together themselves. What is more, the teachers who graduate from courses at the PH Zug are qualified to teach all subjects at primary school level, which is not the case at other teacher training colleges.

 

As to the number of men applying to teach at primary school level, Bieri explained this varied between 18 and 20 per cent, though this rises to between 24 and 35 per cent in the case of those opting to become a teacher at a later age, for example those, as mentioned, who may have become disillusioned with whatever job they were doing before.

 

This article is based on one by Zoe Gwerder.