This morning a school complained on a social media site that they had advertised a senior maths teacher post, but received no applications at all. Is it right to interpret this fact to mean that there is a real crisis in teacher recruitment? Regular readers of this blog – and thank you to those that sent me comments after the 10th anniversary post last week – will know that I have highlighted the issue of shortage of entrants into the profession that eventually feeds through to create a shortage of middle leaders in some subjects in several posts. The assumption must be that this is what has happened in this instance.
However, while not decrying that analysis, there are some other questions to ask first. Why did nobody from inside the school apply? Is it because the department is full of young and inexperienced teachers that spend only a few years in the school before moving on to posts that pay more?
Was the incentive offered in line with others locally, and enough to attract incomers if the school is in a high-cost housing area?
Why did nobody from the local area apply? Is it to do with the school or the salary?
I asked TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk to look up the data for promoted posts in mathematics advertised by schools during January 2023 for the East of England region, as an example of what the school might expect. There were 27 such vacancies up to the 30th of January, and around 50 registered jobseekers targeting such posts in that part of England. On average that is less than two potential applicants per school. Assuming most applicants make more than one application, let’s assume the school might have expected up to 10 visits to the web site to look at the details of the job, and somewhere between 2-5 applications.
However, early January may just be too early in the recruitment cycle for September appointments for most teachers seeking either a promotion or their first teaching post to have commenced their job searches. January is a great month to be looking for a new headteacher, but may not be the optimal time for recruiting for other posts.
Schools also need to understand how the job board methodology works. When a school posts a new job, it will be matched that day or the next by most boards with registered users that meet the criteria for subject, job level and locality. Although the vacancy will remain on display for anyone searching the site, it is often not sent to existing users again for a period of time.
Job boards should be able to tell schools how many matches they have made with the school’s vacancies. For one Multi Academy Trust in the South East using TeachVac, the current average for all jobs is around 180 matches since September.
I would suggest that schools need to think carefully about each vacancy and plan a campaign to fill the job. A main scale history post advertised in February should be filled by just putting the job on the school’s own website, and if necessary a job board. A physics teacher post for January occurring in November needs an entirely different approach. Is it worth spending the same amount on each vacancy? And how good is your market intelligence?
Today, the tes group, now entirely shorn of it print heritage, released its accounts for 2021-22 to August 2022. The company, fronted by its UK management, is ultimately owned by Onex Partners V, part of the Canadian ONEX Group of equity investors. Their third quarter report for 2022 identifies an investment of $98 US in the Tes Global (“Tes”), an international provider of comprehensive software solutions for the education sector 18d46e0 f-a5b9-435a-a039-9849ef723683 (onex.com) page 9
So, our major teacher recruitment platform, now offering a much wider staff management service to schools, increased its UK (mainly England) turnover from £54 million to £68 million in the year to August 2022. How important both staff management and the UK are to the profit of ONEX can be determined form the following figures
Turnover 2022 2021
UK £68.2 mn £54.0 mn
Europe £ 2.9 mn £ 2.6 mn
Rest of World £ 9.0 mn £ 9.0 mn
Income
Staff
Management £61.2 mn £56.5 mn
All activities £80.2 mn £66.1 mn
TES accounts – see link above page 29
So, in the last school year the tes took £68 million pounds from UK schools, the bulk of the money for recruitment and staff management by subscriptions from schools. 84% of staff management revenue came from subscription income and, as the accounts note (page 2) this was a 26% increase in revenue, presumably as more schools and Trusts migrated to subscription packages from point of sale purchase of advertising. The profit for the operating year was £28.7 million compared with £2.3 million the previous year that was badly affected by covid.
The group values its software at £46 million. That leaves me wondering what the book value of TeachVac’s simple but effective job matching service should be? Perhaps the £3 million suggested by our advisers is a little on the mean side.
TeachVac http://www.teachvac.co.uk costs less than £150,000 a year to operate. Being generous, it might cost £500,000 if operating on a similar cost model to the tes. The DfE job site probably costs a bit more, but we don’t actually know how much. The question for schools, MATs and the education sector is ‘How much of the money you are spending with the tes is for the downstream activities on staff management and how much for the job bord and matching service, and is it value for money?
Assume only 10% is for the matching, that could be £5-6 million of the subscription income after allowing for the tes turnover on Hibernia and other activities. TeachVac was established to demonstrate to the sector the cost-effective nature of modern technology over the former print advertising methods of recruitment. Readers can make up their own minds over value for money when comparing the £500 annual subscription to TeachVac that will reduce as more schools sign-up, and the cost of a subscription to tes.
Of course, January is still early in the annual recruitment cycle, and the trend over the next couple of months will be important in determining the outcome for the year as a whole. Such improvements as there are when compared with previous years do not mean targets will be reached with this level of applications, but that if the trend were to continue this year might not be as disastrous as the present cohort of trainees in many subjects.
However, computing is an exception, registering its worst ever January number of offers and acceptances. Interestingly, history is in a similar situation, but I assume that is due to greater control over offers than a real slump in applications. Interestingly, 55% of computing applicants, compared with 52% of history applicants, are recorded as ‘unsuccessful’, so there may be some more questions to be asked about how different subjects handle knowledge levels among applicants?
Overall, applicant numbers at 17.012 are just over 2,000 more than in January 2022. This means that applications are up from the 39,000 of January 2022 to nearly 45,000 in January 2023. Assuming the increase isn’t just down to faster processing of applicants, this must be considered as a glimmer of good news for the government. Even better news for the government, is that the bulk of the additional applications are for secondary subjects. Overall applications for the secondary sector are up from 20,254 last year to 25,063 this year, whereas applications for primary phase courses are only up from 18,300 to 18,824.
The bulk of the additional applications seems to have headed towards the higher educations sector, where applications are up from 18,000 to 22,00. Apprenticeship numbers are stable at just below 1,700, and applications to SCITT courses have increased from 5,400 to 5,800. School Direct fee courses are the other area with a large gain in applications; up from 11,429 to 12,761. Applications for the salaried route barely increased, up from 2,394 to 2,639.
Interestingly, the increase in the number of male candidates in January was larger than the number of women. Male numbers increased from 4,115 in January 2022 to 5,256 January 2023 whereas female applicants only increased from 10,754 to 11,581; still many more, but worth watching to see if there is a trend?
As one might expect with the interest in secondary courses, and the increase in men applying to train as a teacher, applications rose faster from those likely to be career changers than from new graduates. Indeed, the number of applications from those age 22 actually fell, from 2,098 in January 2022 to 2,064 this January. The number of those aged 60 or over applying increased from 34 last January to 72 this January; up by more than 100%.
However, all this good news has to be qualified by the fact that the biggest increase in applicants by geography is from the ‘Rest of the world’ category – up from 1,061 to 2,676. Applications from London and the Home counties regions have fallen: less good news.
Still the overseas applicants do seem to be applying to providers in London, so that may help.
The fact that the good news in the headlines is largely supported by the increase in overseas applicants must be a matter for concern on several counts. If offered a place, will these students turn up, and how long will they stay; will the Home Office grant them visas to teach in England; will places that could be offered to new graduates later in the recruitment round have been filled by these overseas applicants, and what might be the implications for how the recruitment round is managed? All interesting questions for the sector and the government to ponder.
The staffing crisis in the NHS often receives more publicity than the festering crisis in teacher recruitment. This week, TeachVac has supplied data for articles in tes, and by the Press Association. The latter story make many local newspapers, but little impact on the broadcast media that still seems obsessed with the NHS.
Next week, TeachVac will publish its two detailed reviews: one on the labour market for school leaders and the other looking at the labour market for classroom teachers during 2022. Schools signed-up to TeachVac’s £500 recruitment deal for unlimited matches of their jobs can ask for a free copy of both reports. Copies are priced at £100 for each report to non-subscribers. www.teachvac.co.uk
Both reports comment on what is now history. January marks the start of the key recruitment round for September 2023. As part of its data collection, TeachVac, where I am chair, monitors its collected vacancies against the numbers recorded in the DfE’s annual ITT census of trainees. Of course, some of those trainees are already in the classroom on programmes that mean they will be unlikely to be job seeking for September in any large numbers. TeachVac’s index takes these numbers into account when calculating its end of week numbers.
Despite only being at the end of week 2 of 2022, I thought it might be useful to compare 2023 with 2022 at the same point. When looking at the table, it is worth recalling that in many subjects the number of trainees is lower than it was last year, so the supply side is reduced. As a result, it would take a reduction in demand for the index to improve on week 2 of 2022.
Sadly, the reduction in trainee numbers hasn’t been offset by any reduction in demand: quite the opposite. All the subjects in the table are indicating a worse position at the end of week 2 in 2023 than at the same point in 2022; even history.
Design and technology’s apparently favourable position is due more to how badly it was faring in 2022 than to any real improvement, as it still has the second lowest index score in 2023, only business studies – the DfE’s forgotten subject – is in a worse position, and will certainly register an amber warning of recruitment challenges by next Friday.
Indeed, computing and design and technology will both also almost certainly have posted amber warning by the end of week 3! Several other subjects might have amber warning in place by the end of the month.
I am sure that the worsening trend in recruitment is why schools and MATs are signing up to TeachVac’s recruitment offer. At less than £10 per week for all a schools’ vacancies to be matched to TeachVac’s database, with no extra work required by the school than doing what it already does, must be the best deal in town. Schools not signed up with TeachVac will no longer see their vacancies matched each day. The fee for primary schools is just £75.
Created eight years ago, TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk has already matched nearly 4,000 teaching posts so far in 2023 with teachers and other interested in filling these jobs.
After eight years of being a free service TeachVac now charges secondary schools less than £10 per week -£500 per year plus VAT – for matching all their teaching posts for a year with its ever growing database of new and experienced teachers and recruitment companies. Primary schools pay £75 per year and can be free to academy trusts and other groups of schools that sign-on together with at least one secondary school.
Schools can sign up on the website – use the button to start the registration process or email enquiries@teachvac.co.uk and the staff will answer any queries about the service.
As TeachVac has traditionally had more jobs that the DfE site, it is a better place for jobseekers to register to be sent the links to jobs that meet with their specifications and a few that they might not have thought about. New registrations are being added to the list of those matched with vacancies every day.
With 75% of the teaching posts in 2023 posted by schools in or around London, schools in London, the south East and East of England should be at the front of the queue in signing up to TeachVac. Can you afford to miss out on access to the jobseekers in TeachVac’s database that receive relevant new jobs every afternoon. www.teachvac.co.uk
As an example, those teachers looking for a maths teacher post in North London will have received details of 14 different vacancies over the past two days from TeachVac. If your school isn’t using TeachVac then your vacancy won’t have been one of these sent to TeachVac’s users, if you posted one.
TeachVac is looking to use the income from schools to expand into offering a similar service for non-teaching posts and if enough schools sign-up the additional cost would be minimal. In the school-term, where schools offer a visa service for overseas applicants we will be introducing that fact into the matching service shortly.
TeachVac’s users are loyal, with 75% of all registered users still receiving daily matches,. This allows teachers considering a move or looking for promotion to monitor the job market in the area where they are interested in working. Feedback tells us teachers used TeachVac to secure their job.
However, there are shortages of teachers in some subjects and TeachVac acknowledges that fact. But by not using the TeachVac platform for less than £10 per week schools can miss out on TeachVac sending their job details to those that are registered with TeachVac. Is it worth the risk for just £10 per week?
Tomorrow, TeachVac will publish an analysis of the first two weeks of 2023 compared with the same period in 2022 and compare the position with the government’s ITT census of trainees expected to be job hunting for a September 2023 post. The figures in some subjects will look extremely worrying.
For most of the past 30 years, I have spent the week between Christmas and New Year drafting annual reports on aspects of the labour market for teachers during the previous 12 months for TeachVac’s and its predecessors, and also making a prognosis of what might happen in the labour market during the year to come. The finished reports; one on classroom teachers and promoted posts, and the other on leadership scale vacancies should, this year, be completed by the middle of the month.
Headlines include the steep increase in recorded vacancies across all grades during 2022; and the fact that schools in an around London recorded more vacancies than schools elsewhere in England. The problems, although not confined to the secondary sector are worse in that sector than in the primary school sector, where pupil numbers are now falling across much of England.
Of more interest that what happened in 2022 for most readers of this blog is, no doubt, my predictions for 2023. Based upon the trainee numbers in the DfE’s ITT census as a starting point, and abstracting those trainees already in the classroom and less likely to be job hunting, at least for a teaching post, for September 2023 from the totals, the numbers must be of concern.
After factoring in non-completions; those seeking posts in Sixth Form Colleges or elsewhere in publicly funded education outside of schools; and allowing for the demand form the private school sector, especially in the south of England, where a large number of such schools are concentrated; the final numbers may be the worst this century.
If the London region is taken as an example, using 2022 vacancies as the basis for the calculations, and assuming 40% of classroom teacher vacancies are taken by new entrants to the profession, with the remainder filled by those returning to teaching or switching schools, then some subjects do not have enough trainees to meet the possible demand from London’s schools
Business Studies, religious education and computing might be the most worrying subjects for London schools seeking to fill vacancies. Of course, a school advertising in January will always fare better than one looking for an unexpected appointment for January 2024 late in the autumn, but schools should not need to be worrying about filling vacancies advertised as early as February this year.
TeachVac is increasing its registers of teachers looking to be matched to jobs, and secondary schools wanting their vacancies matched can sign up for £10 a week (£500 per year plus VAT) or miss out on this resource that aims to match 15,000 teachers this year. Sign up at www.teachvac.co.uk
Despite this week being a holiday period for most people, the DfE has published the data about ITT applications up to 19th December 2022. This is the second monthly set of data about applications for 2023 courses. While December is still too early to be certain about the outcome of the recruitment round, it is now possible to see the strength of the interest in teaching as a graduate career at the start of the recruitment round.
The headline is that as far as offers are concerned most subjects have made more offers that at this time last year, but generally fewer than in December 2020. However, some subjects such as religious education, computing, drama, history and physical education have made fewer offers than in December 2021. For history and physical education, the number of offers is probably not of concern since traditionally both these subjects over-recruit against any DfE number supplied for the Teacher Supply Model. For the other subjects, the lack of offers this early must be of some concern since they failed to reach expected levels last year, and the mountain is now looking even steep to climb during 2023.
The total number of applicants by 22nd December was 12,897 compared with 12,310 on the 20th December 2021. This year the applicants generated 33,688 applications compared with 32,016 at December 2021. It is welcome that both these numbers are up this year, but the increase is not enough to suggest that there will not be concern about meeting targets during 2023.
More worryingly, only 196 applicants have been ‘recruited’, although the number of candidates with ‘conditions pending’ is similar to the number in December 2021. Fortunately, the number of candidates that have received and offer and are yet to respond is up by several hundred on the December 2021 figure.
The total number of applications for secondary courses is up on December 2021, by around 2,000 while the number of applications for primary courses is down by nearly a thousand to 14,500. More disturbingly, the number of unsuccessful applications for secondary courses is up from 8,377 in December 2021 to 9,654 this year. Some of these applicants may still find a place though the Apply 2 route later in the recruitment round.
More than 10% of candidates this year are classified as having applied from ‘the rest of the world’. The increase in this group masks the fall in applicants from London; the South East and the East of England regions. As these three regions are the parts of England struggling most to recruit teachers, the loss of potential candidates for 2023 is a matter of concern although applications to these regions are higher than last year, possibly boosted by the increase in overseas applicants.
Applications from candidates age 22, probably recent graduates or those graduating in 2023 are slightly down, applications from most other age groups are at similar levels to last year.
Higher Education courses remain buoyant, with all other types of courses also recording more applications. Of the 196 applicants so far ‘recruited’, 181 have been recruited by higher education providers to their courses.
Two swallows don’t make a summer, and two months data may not represent the rest of the application round, but, unless there is a significant upturn in applicants to secondary courses during the first eight months of 2023, the outlook for courses in autumn 2023 will not be much better than the dismal numbers recorded in the recent DfE ITT Census for courses that started in autumn of 2022. Such an outcome would imply another challenging labour market for secondary schools in 2024 that is unless school funding for future pay awards was such as to drive down demand for teachers to cover the increased pay awards.
Earlier this autumn I was asked to prepare a lecture for Oxford Brookes University. Sadly, it was never presented for a variety of reasons. So, for any reader of this blog that would like a longer than normal post to read over the holiday period, I have published the text of the lecture below.
Best wishes for the holiday season to all my readers and thank you for the continued support of this blog.
Brookes Autumn Talk 2022
Teacher Supply in Oxfordshire – does the market model work?
Thank you for once again inviting me to talk to you about my special subject: the labour market for teachers. Last time, I started with history, this time I thought I might concentrate on geography. More specifically, the geography of Oxfordshire, its schools and their need for teachers and school leaders to staff them and what implications this might have for policy makers, were they willing to listen.
First, a bit of background. As many of you know, the government has always had a key role to play in managing the supply of teachers to schools through its grip on the teacher preparation market.
The DfE’s Teacher Supply Model tries to predict how many teachers need to be trained each year in order to ensure a sufficient supply of new teachers to provide staffing for schools across England. The Model is a national model, and does not consider regional differences.
Another drawback of the DfE’s Teacher Supply Model is that it doesn’t consider the backgrounds of entrants to ITT. Are they undergraduate; recent graduates; career changers or teachers from overseas requiring QTS to be fully accredited to teach in England?
Some of you may recall the Carter Review and its look at ITT. In my submission to that Group, I made the point that now all those considering teaching were from the same backgrounds or stages in their careers:
So, consider these individuals thinking about teaching as a career: (Blog 23rd June 2014)
Jane is a recent graduate, age 22, with an upper second degree in modern history. Since GCSE she has studied no history pre-1472. She wants to teach history in a secondary school.
Kevin is a 28-year-old policeman who is looking to change careers to work with young people in a positive way. He has a lower second-class degree in forensic science, and wonders what he might teach in the secondary sector
Helen is a 35-yearold mum with two school-age children. She has a degree in physics, and since the birth of her own children she has volunteered a day a week at a local primary school. She is interested in teaching children at Key Stage 1.
Wayne is studying for his ‘A’ levels in media studies, photography and theatre studies. He is 20 and had a chequered history as a teenager, but now wants to become a teacher and put something back into society.
Of the four all have different needs, and some are better served by the present routes than others.
Jane would have the option to select from the two School Direct routes, (assuming that the Salaried route is still operational) a higher education course, a SCITT course or Teach First. As history is a popular subject, attracting more applicants than places, she might be told by some course providers to acquire some experience of schools in a voluntary capacity before being considered. If she applied after Christmas for courses starting in September, she would probably find her options severely limited. In most cases she would find herself having to pay another set of tuition fees to study unless she was lucky enough to be accepted on either the Teach First programme or to find a School Direct salaried place.
Kevin has a degree that doesn’t fit a National Curriculum subject, so would either need to find a means of enhancing his subject knowledge or find a provider that felt he had enough science to be accepted onto a course. However, since the government split the sciences into the separate subjects of Physics, Chemistry, and Biology, the general science courses that might have accepted him have largely disappeared.
His work experience might count in his favour, especially if he had worked with young people, but his chances might depend upon when he applied. If he applied early in a recruitment round, he might fare badly as providers might expect more suitable candidates with better subject knowledge would apply later in the recruitment round.
However, if, later in the round, applications were sluggish, he might fare better, especially if he interviewed well. He would not be eligible for Teach First, but would receive some financial support if he trains to teach a physical science subject. However, he would be looking at a sizeable reduction in pay for at least a year while training even if he found a School Direct salaried place.
Helen wants to teach children at the younger end of the primary school. Although Helen has a Physics degree that isn’t likely by itself to put her near the front of the queue because currently there is no requirement for providers of primary training to consider recruiting a balance of candidates with different subject backgrounds.
Assuming Helen has the basic GCSE qualifications required much may depend upon what point in the recruitment cycle Helen applies and her three choices of provider.
Although she may not have studied any arts or humanities subjects for more than half her lifetime that probably won’t matter. She will receive basic training during her course. The time she has spent as a volunteer may help her be accepted if the head provides a good reference.
Wayne has selected ‘A’ levels that limit his chances of becoming a secondary school teacher because there are few training places to teach drama, media studies or photography, even if he achieves the required degree with a minimum of a lower second.
He could consider becoming a primary school teacher, and either enrols on an undergraduate degree leading to QTS or takes a subject degree and then competes with other graduates for one of the places, perhaps on an Apprenticeship.
He would be well advised to undertake some youth work either as a part of his degree course or as a voluntary activity as this might strengthen his chance of being accepted. It is unlikely that he would have a degree in a subject acceptable to Teach First, and there is a strong chance that he would have to pay fees and take out a loan to support his living costs through his training.
As the range of degrees available at universities becomes ever more diverse, so the link between the higher education experience and the needs of schools in terms of curriculum delivery becomes ever more decoupled. This may not seem to matter for much of the primary sector, where direct curriculum knowledge may not be required, but even at that level a need to understand the fundamentals of a subject may be important in both teaching it well and also in helping other teachers to deliver the subject as well.
Nationally, the recruitment campaigns are generic and don’t focus on any particular groups in society. Should they take these different motivations into account and should the DfE consider these issues when deciding upon the operation of the Teacher Supply Model?
I might add that the DfE has thought about issues around race, gender and disability in terms of teacher recruitment ever since 1997.
Summary of final year postgraduate trainee outcomes for the 2020/21 academic year
Percentage awarded QTS
Percentage of those awarded QTS teaching in a state school
Age
Under 25
90
72
25 and Over
86
73
Disability
Declared
81
68
None declared
88
73
Ethnic group
Asian
81
64
Black
78
65
Mixed ethnicity
86
72
Other
82
66
White
89
74
Gender
Male
84
71
Female
89
73
Source DfE
I find this table deeply disturbing in many ways, but we don’t have time today to do more than note that to belong to a minority group seems to be a challenge when finding a teaching post in a state school.
Anyway, after that digression, back to our main thesis about the labour market for teachers and the working of the Teacher Supply Model.
After taking into account flows out of teaching to other careers; to retirement or other non-work situations, such as a career break; or in a small number of cases death, the Model looks at the number of possible returners and those switching from part-time to full-time or in the other direction.
Trends in pupil numbers also need to be factored into the Model along with any possible policy changes affecting teacher numbers, such as when the Key Stage 1 maximum class size policy was introduced by David Blunkett. These days, such policy changes are rare. More challenging to predict is how schools will use their budgets, and the modelling process largely ignores this variable when considering teacher numbers and how they will change. This is an interesting area for debate, especially at the present time when schools are more financially challenged than for many years.
Because policy changes often cannot be predicted., especially as with the Key Stage 1 maximum class size rule the policy often comes after a change of government. The Teacher Supply Model must inevitably be forward looking, and even if there is no change of government, Ministers are often unwilling to flag policy changes too far in advance for party political reasons.
The Teacher Supply Model currently being discussed by the DfE will apply to the number of teacher preparation places in 2023/24 and will not impact upon the labour market for teachers until September 2024.
Because the Model is a national Model, and is created by statisticians, its role is to provide overall numbers for the primary sector and numbers by selected subjects for the secondary sector.
Herein lies another issue. What constitutes a subject? For any years, Science was a subject, as Modern Languages still is. The Model created a total for science teachers needed. The science community argued for many years that there was a need for separate totals for Biology, Chemistry and Physics with an apparent lack of concern for any other ‘science’ subject. Eventually, the DfE agreed and total for each science were created.
The unintended consequence of this move was to limit the number of biologists recruited into teaching and thus to reduce the overall number of science teachers in training. We only have to look back at Kevin with his forensic science degree to debate the wisdom of a lack of any ‘general science’ route into teaching. This is one for the science community from the Royal Society outwards to re-visit.
I think that is quite enough background on the Teacher Supply Model. Let’s now move to the real world from the abstract discussions, important though they are, about overall numbers.
Of course, if those numbers, whether called allocations, targets or by some other name, are not met then schools may find recruiting teachers more of a challenge.
Whose responsibility is it to meet that challenge?
The government
Higher education
Schools?
Without a coherent strategy to either avoid or deal with any shortfall of teachers, it will be pupils that eventually feel the consequences though curriculum change, larger groups or being taught by less than adequately equipped teachers in terms of the teacher’s knowledge and backgrounds regardless of whether they teach early years or KS5 physics.
The government can gain relief when pupil numbers reduce, usually following a sustained fall in the birth rate, as we have seen recently after the big increases of more than a decade ago.
Chart of pupil demography
Relief may also come from more returners than normal and fewer departures from the profession whether for career breaks or to other forms of employment.
For the purpose of illustration during the rest of this talk I will be concentrating upon the secondary sector. This is partly because there are fewer issues in the classroom teacher market for the primary sector, although I acknowledge that following the recent re-accreditation exercise the future is opaquer than it has been in the past.
Before looking at the current position in terms of recruitment in Oxfordshire across the secondary sector during 2022 it is worth noting that the national ITT position for this year based upon the comparison of trainee numbers with classroom teacher vacancies for a range of secondary school subjects.
Subject
1/1/22 – 30/9/2022
History
44%
PE
23%
Art
12%
Geography
-157%
Languages
-108%
English
-57%
All Sciences
-84%
RE
-108%
Mathematics
-45%
Music
-96%
Computer Studies + IT
-137%
D&T
-583%
Business Studies
-313%
The chart is created by matching the number of trainees in the DfE ITT census for 2021-22 with the number of vacancies recorded by TeachVac during the 2022 calendar year starting at 1st January. The chart records the position in terms of the remaining ITT pool at Friday 30th September. The remaining pool is arrived at by reducing the ITT number by one trainee for every two vacancies since the DfE data suggests that around a half of classroom teacher vacancies each year are filled from the trainee pool.
Negative numbers indicate more vacancies than there were trainees. There are, of course, issues with the methodology, since vacancies that are re-advertisements may legitimately be included, but repeat advertisement should not be taken into account.
Only in history, PE and art were there still positive numbers at the end of September and art is likely to turn negative before all the January 2023 vacancies are filled.
To put the data into context. Here was the ITT Census data from last December.
2013/14
2019/2020
2020/21
2021/22
Percentage of Target at census date
%
%
%
%
Mathematics
86
65
84
95
English
136
110
127
118
Modern Languages
85
64
74
71
Biology
163
189
117
Physics
42
45
22
Chemistry
67
80
105
Physical Education
138
105
135
164
Other
57
82
25
Design & Technology
45
42
75
23
History
150
115
175
199
Geography
100
118
130
86
Computing
63
75
105
69
Art & Design
136
62
132
140
Religious Education
82
94
128
99
Music
97
80
125
72
Drama
157
Business Studies
88
53
102
45
2021 ITT Census – DfE
Looking at both primary and secondary total the following picture emerges
2013/14
2019/2020
2020/21
2021/22
All Secondary
98
83
106
82
Inc TF
Inc TF
Inc TF
Primary
99
94
130
136
Inc TF
Inc TF
Inc TF
What is noticeable, is the effect of the covid pandemic on recruitment into teaching as a career. There was a significant bounce in interest about teaching as a career after the pandemic struck in March 2020 that saw an increase in applications to train as a teacher. However, it was short-lived and did not continue into the recruitment round for courses that stated in the autumn of 2021 for the secondary sector, although trainee numbers remained above target in the primary sector.
It is worth recalling that there was talk of significant failures in the economy, and teaching always attracts more applicants when the economy and the wider labour market is faring badly.
So, now let’s look at Oxfordshire and the local labour market for teachers before finally considering the relationship between local demand and supply of new teachers into the labour market.
Frist, the primary sector. This table is for vacancies for classroom teachers with No TLR attached. Basically, an entry level grade
Oxfordshire Classroom teacher vacancies January to September 2022
CLASSROOM TEACHER – NO TLR
INDEPENDENT
STATE
TOTAL
% INDEPENDENT SECTOR
PRIMARY
32
348
380
8%
I am surprised how low the percentage is, so, what about the secondary sector? For ease of comparison, TeachVac groups subjects together into a number of larger units. This partly because the range of titles used by schools when recruiting is so vast that it is unhelpful for the purpose of analysis to use the whole range when they can be reduced to a smaller number of composite groupings.
SECONDARY SCHOOL CLASSROOM TEACHER VACANCIES NO TLRS
SUBJECT GROUPS OXFORDSHIRE
Independent
State
TOTAL JANUARY TO END SEPTEMBER 2022
% INDEPENDENT SECTOR
BUSINESS STUDIES
42
9
51
82%
SEN
12
8
20
60%
SOCIAL STUDIES
35
35
70
50%
LANGUAGES
23
25
48
48%
ART
9
10
19
47%
ENGLISH
44
56
100
44%
IT/COMPUTING
21
27
48
44%
MATHEMATICS
52
76
128
41%
SCIENCE
79
116
195
41%
DANCE
7
11
18
39%
PE
11
21
32
34%
HISTORY
9
20
29
31%
GEOGRAPHY
10
25
35
29%
HUMANITIES
4
11
15
27%
MUSIC
4
18
22
18%
VOCATIONAL
1
5
6
17%
RE
3
23
26
12%
D&T
4
63
67
6%
Grand Total
370
559
929
40%
On average, across Oxfordshire, the independent sector was responsible for 40% of the vacancies for classroom teachers advertised during the first nine months of 2022. The percentages range from 82% of basic grade vacancies in business studies, to just 6% of vacancies in Design and technology. Interestingly, the independent sector percentage for Business studies reduces to 71% if you add in posts with TLRs.
The list of schools advertising for business studies is interesting
School
Independent
State
Total
Cranford House School Trust Limited
8
8
d’Overbroeck’s
4
4
Faringdon Community College
1
1
Kings Education (Oxford)
7
7
Lord Williams’s School
2
2
Magdalen College School
1
1
Matthew Arnold School
1
1
Oxford International College
3
3
Oxford Sixth Form College
6
6
Shiplake College
7
7
St Clare’s, Oxford
1
1
The Bicester School
2
2
The Oratory School
5
5
The Oxford Academy
1
1
The Warriner School
1
1
Wheatley Park School
1
1
Grand Total
42
9
51
This is for Main Grade posts. Add in TLRs and the picture changes slightly.
School
Independent
State
Total
Aureus School
3
3
Cranford House School Trust Limited
8
8
d’Overbroeck’s
6
6
Faringdon Community College
1
1
King Alfred’s
3
3
Kingham Hill School
2
2
Kings Education (Oxford)
7
7
Lord Williams’s School
2
2
Magdalen College School
1
1
Matthew Arnold School
1
1
Our Lady’s Abingdon
4
4
Oxford International College
3
3
Oxford Sixth Form College
6
6
Oxford Spires Academy
3
3
Shiplake College
7
7
St Clare’s, Oxford
1
1
St Edward’s School
1
1
The Bicester School
2
2
The Cherwell School
1
1
The Oratory School
6
6
The Oxford Academy
1
1
The Warriner School
1
1
UTC Oxfordshire
2
2
Wheatley Park School
1
1
Grand Total
52
21
73
Maybe the State sector is more alive to market conditions in this subject than some independent schools that have placed multiple advertisements to try to appoint a classroom teacher in this subject.
In passing, it is worth noting that the DfE records 41 state secondary schools in Oxfordshire and 47 schools in the independent sector, although that total does contain both special schools and sixth form colleges as well as schools serving the primary age-group of pupils. Nevertheless, the number of secondary schools in the independent sector in Oxfordshire is not far short of the number of state secondary schools, although the number of pupils is many fewer. However, that number is offset by the extra demand for teachers to staff the smaller classes normally found in the private sector schools.
One feature of the private sector schools in Oxfordshire is the number of boarding schools across the county. Boarding schools are as likely to cater for students from outside the United Kingdom and as such form an important part of the education export market by attracting foreign currency earnings. In additional to the ‘normal’ type of school, there are also tutorial colleges offering specific courses often for ‘A’ level or other pre-higher education programme that will be looking to recruit from the same pool of teachers as well as recruiting other non-teachers, such as graduate students to teach some courses.
So, there are more than 80 schools in Oxfordshire educating pupils of secondary school age, and together they have generated 929 advertisements for classroom teachers between January and the end of September. After allowing for re-advertisements and expectations for the coming three months, it seems likely that across the whole of 2022 there will have been a demand for around 1,000 secondary school classroom teachers in Oxfordshire.
As many of you know, the DfE has recently concluded a re-accreditation process for ITT. All three providers in Oxfordshire were listed by the DfE in the approved list.
The University of Oxford cites the number of places for 2023/24 as c184 on the PGCE in the following subjects
English
geography
history
mathematics
modern languages (French, German, Spanish, Mandarin)
religious education
science (biology, chemistry, physics).
The Oxfordshire Teacher Training Programme, based at the River Learning Trust does not provide data on trainee numbers. They state on their website that:
“We don’t advertise a specific number of places available for most subjects.”
The programme does cover a wider range of secondary school subjects than the University
However, I doubt that they would be able to make up the difference between the Oxford University provision and the demand from schools identified in the table I showed earlier as that might require them to train several hundred students a year.
I do not believe that Oxfordshire is unique in facing a significant deficit between the number of ITT trainees and the demand for teachers from secondary schools, but the scale of the problem may be more significant than in many other parts of the country.
One solution is the growing number of training providers that claim in their publicity, and their titles, to be ‘National’ in their training coverage. One such is the new National Institute of teaching formed, with government approval by a small number of MATs. They say in their publicity that
‘The NIoT is working with a network of Associate Colleges across the country. These successful groups of schools work with a wide variety of communities across the country’
I note that they have no presence in this part of England. However, this ‘nationalisation’ of training into fewer larger providers is a trend that will need watching.
Of course, both the independent sector and state secondary schools in Oxfordshire have the option to employ staff without Qualified Teacher Status. The term ‘teacher’ is not a reserved occupation term like ‘engineer’, ‘solicitor’ or ‘accountant’, so anyone may be called a teacher regardless of their background and qualifications.
Excess demand over supply causes other problems including a high level of spending on recruitment. There is also the issue of whether some schools either because of location or the characteristics of the school find recruitment more challenging than other schools?
There isn’t time today to delved deeply into that question, although I have written on my blog at www.johnohowson.wordpress.com about the issue of the percentage of free school meals pupils in a school and teacher recruitment.
There is no doubt that the high cost of accommodation in Oxfordshire has an effect of recruitment of teaching staff.
Can anything more be achieved to ensure schools, and especially state schools in Oxfordshire are able to recruit sufficient teachers in all subjects?
I doubt we will ever see the days again when local authorities and the Christian churches provided most of the training places for teachers and the then Ministry of Education issued an annual Circular on the number of new teachers each local authority could employ to ensure some degree of fairness at least at that level.
Indeed, it is not clear which organisation can speak on behalf of the needs of schools across the county for a dialogue about the need for sufficient teacher preparation places in Oxfordshire to meet the needs of local schools. Perhaps, the Schools Forum might take on the responsibility? I am also gratified to hear that the DfE Steering group might have a look at ‘cold spots’ in ITT. However, that raises another issue about the availability of school placements and whether those that train as teachers should be expected to work in state-funded schools? The answer to this was clear-cut when trainee’s fees were paid and there was a training grant for all. It is, perhaps, more complex now trainees bear a greater or lesser degree of the costs depending upon their subject or sector.
In conclusion, the failure to train sufficient teachers puts the system under strain. Oxfordshire, with a growing number of secondary schools and nearly as many private schools and tutorial colleges as state-funded secondary schools faces an interesting set of issues in terms of ensuring sufficient appropriately qualified teachers for all its schools.
The modified market model where places are allocated by central government, but schools and trainees compete for vacancies works better for some than others. To return to our four potential teachers, two, Jane and Wayne, can train and teach anywhere, but Kevin and Helen are more closely tied to their local area both for training and for employment. The system hasn’t taken their needs into account and I worry that following the re-accreditation process the needs of candidates have once again not been taken into account.
This lack of an overall policy towards the staffing of our schools as opposed to just predicting training numbers might matter less if sufficient trainees were recruited to fill the places on preparation courses. The fact that there has not been enough to satisfy the predictions of the Teacher Supply Model for several years, across many secondary sector subjects just make smatters worse.
I am conscious that in a university like Brookes, known for training teachers for the primary sector, I have spent most of my talk discussing the secondary school sector. That doesn’t mean that the primary sector isn’t important and monitoring its health is equally as important. However, demand for primary teaching posts at the classroom teachers level remains generally healthy, and the current tissues are mainly in the secondary sector.
I also haven’t had time today to reflect on either middle or senior leadership issues or on the issue of SEND and special school staffing. Perhaps, those could be the topic for another day.
It is time to wish the DfE Vacancy site all the best for the festive season. The DfE vacancy site is a good place to look for non-teaching posts: TeachVac doesn’t cover these vacancies at present, but is seeking to do so during 2023 using new investment funding. As of this morning, 37% of the vacancies on the DfE site were for non-teaching appointment, and a small percentage of the teaching posts were actually ‘job opportunities’ rather than stated jobs.
One non-teaching post that caught our eye, and illustrates the challenges such a site faces was posted by a selective school, although it could have been posted by any school.
Part-time – 30 hours per week, Mon-Fri, 8.30am-2.30pm, term time only (38 weeks). Some flexibility will sometimes be needed to alter hours for occasional school events.
Contract type
Permanent
Full-time equivalent salary
FTE £20623, with the opportunity to rise to £21879 depending on performance
Actual salary
£14266 (rising to £15135)
What skills and experience we’re looking for
We have an exciting opportunity to join our in-house kitchen team. You will be using your skills to prepare and serve food throughout the school day, so that we offer students a varied, wholesome and tempting balance of foods. This role makes a vital contribution to nurturing students’ life-long interest and independence in making healthy eating choices. We are looking for an individual who can bring good humour, strong communication skills, flexibility, and attention to detail to the kitchen.
The salary works out at £12.51 per working hour, and unlike most in the catering trade there presumably will be no opportunities for tips on top. With the present recruitment challenges in the hospitality area, good luck to the school that is also seeking housekeeping staff.
Eagle-eyed readers will have noticed that the limitation of the DfE site means that the job role appears under Learning support, cover supervisor or tutor – none of these classifications really fit the job description.
How does the 1,488 teaching vacancies on the DfE site compare with TeachVac today? The TeachVac counter is currently showing 3,834 teaching jobs, so more than double the DfE’s total. To be fair to the DfE they don’t include vacancies for teachers in private schools, and they may have different cut off dates for the length of time a vacancy is listed.
However, if you were a teacher job hunting which of the two free sites would you choose to register with? If you know which school you want to work in, and that school uses the DfE site, you can choose either site. However, if you have any degree of uncertainty, TeachVac has provided more opportunities.
Schools should note that in 2023 their jobs will only be matched if they register with TeachVac and pay an annual fee of £500 maximum for secondary schools, and £75 for primary schools, payable for new registrations from February 2023. Vacancies at other schools will continue to be logged, but not matched with candidates.
The staff at TeachVac, http://www.teachvac.co.uk where I remain as Chair, wish all readers the best for the festive season and we look forward to 2023; may it be a better year than the one just ending.
In a recent post I discussed the extension of QTS (Qualified Teacher Status) by the DfE to teachers from more countries. Of course, academies don’t need to employ people with QTS as ‘teachers’. However, most choose to do so as it can reassure parents and colleagues that those responsibly for teaching and learning and pastoral activities have undertaken approved training.
There is no established methodology for identifying how many additional teachers might by awarded QTS under the new scheme. The DfE provide three projections: high; central and low for a financial year. These projections are calculated by taking the most recent published data of QTS awards from currently eligible countries, and estimating the number that would be awarded from newly eligible countries. As the DfE does not hold data on the potential demand for QTS from newly eligible countries, DfE officials have derived the estimate using the relative split between ITT trainees that come from eligible and ineligible countries.
According to the DfE paper, in 2018-19, out of 28,949 total postgraduate trainees there were 1,496 final-year trainees taking ITT in England from countries that are currently eligible to apply for QTS through the TRA, and 550 from countries that are ineligible.
This means that for every one ITT trainee from a currently ineligible country, there were approximately 2.7 trainees from eligible countries. The central estimate of these projections is calculated by dividing the current baseline of Teacher Regulation Agency QTS awards by this ratio. Given the 1,684 awarded QTS in 2021-22, the additional number of QTS awards from previously ineligible countries is 619.
The DfE note in the paper that as a result of the uncertainty involved in these projections, these projections also include a high and low estimate. To calculate these different estimates, the eligible to ineligible ratio has been adjusted by increasing or decreasing the ratio by 50%.
For the low estimate, the ratio has been increased by 50%, to approximately 4.1 trainees from eligible countries to every 1 trainee from currently ineligible countries. At this value, 413 additional awards are projected.
For the high estimate, the ratio has been decreased by 50%, to approximately 1.4. At this value, 1,238 additional awards are projected.
At any estimate, these teachers would be a welcome addition to the supply of teachers in England, but there is neither a split between primary and secondary sectors nor any indication of the possible subject mix of such new teachers in the discussion about the potential new teachers. I assume that the Home Office will control the granting of visas in such a manner as to not allow more teachers in subjects where there is already sufficient supply.
However, there may well be teachers eligible for settled status due to familial ties that could result in an influx of new QTS teachers wanting to work in the primary sector in parts of the country where there are no current teacher shortages. However, these teachers will help improve the balance of teachers with QTS from different backgrounds, and that is to be welcomed. The fact that the DfE is prepared to extend the QTS scheme to more countries reveals the current state of play in the labour market for teachers in England at the start of recruitment for September 2023.
John Howson 