ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the structural issues and assesses the significance of the factors in providing the context within which teachers work. It describes the career conditions and the distribution of scale posts in different types of primary schools. The changes in numbers of primary teachers from the 1950s to the 1980s will be analysed and gender differences in the experience of expansion and contraction will be assessed. The chapter examines the promotion structure for primary teachers and considers the gender differences in the distribution of promotion posts. Within primary education, there are different types of school and these differences must be clarified since they have important consequences for teachers' careers. Primary schools take in children from ages five to eleven, when the children transfer to the secondary or comprehensive school, and each school will have one head and one deputy post.
