Tag Archives: supply

Suggestions on Savings ahead of the Spending Review

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How might the Chancellor save money on education? Apart that is from the possible pay freeze? Over the years this blog has explored a number of different possibilities for savings. Two obvious ones are in the teacher preparation market and the cost of advertising vacancies.

The DfE uses the Teacher Supply Model to identify how many places to fund for teacher preparation courses going forward. Each year, it seems to overfund the number of places in subjects such as history and physical education, so that there are always trainees looking for teaching posts at the end of the year. Should the modelling also take into account data about vacancies to match against that of the other inputs, such as pupil numbers and the proxies for vacancies currently used in the model? Possibly several millions could be saved in fees paid to universities.

The other saving championed regularly by this blog, albeit with a degree of self-interest, is the spending on recruitment advertising by schools. The DfE has made an attempt to reduce this expenditure, but it has been half-hearted at best, and lacking in understanding of how the market operates. In the spring I offered the DfE my help in making their site the ‘go to’ place for teachers seeking jobs, but was rebuffed. Fair enough, but it is worth reading my recent post of the £3 a vacancy cost for recruitment.

Supply teaching is another expensive cost to many schools, especially this year with teachers either self-isolating or off sick with covid-19. Could bringing this spending back ‘in house’ save money by removing the profit element from the cost? Worth a look given that perhaps there will be a million supply cover days this term across the country, if the estimate from one authority that I have seen is grossed up.

Procurement in general is a big area for savings, but like these other savings it challenges the assumption that market-based capitalism will regulate prices. That might be true if schools shopped around, but they don’t, and monopolistic suppliers, whether local or national, have few incentives to reduce prices and introduce new technological solutions that can cut costs for schools.

The whole area of leadership costs must be looked at. How many MAT CEOs do we need across the country? How much more does the system cost to manage than 20 years ago, and is any extra value for money as a result? May be the extra high paid jobs are an incentive for more teachers to stay in the system, rather than leave or better paid jobs elsewhere?

School need more funds, and it is worth reflecting what might happen if effective savings are not made quickly? Some small schools will close, some pupils where parents cannot afford to support the school will possibly receive a worse education than they would have do if funding had been better, and teaching will still not be a career of choice, except in a recession. Even then, it needs to be a global recession, as teachers can now find work anywhere around the world.

Talk to APPG October 2017

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Recruitment and Retention of Teachers – the current position

This paper covers three areas

  1. 2017 recruitment round and January 2018
  2. First thoughts on 2018 recruitment round
  3. DfE Vacancy Service as foreshadowed in the 2016 White Paper and the 2017 Conservative Party election manifesto
  4. 2017 recruitment round and January 2018 appointments

In the period between January 2017 and the 20th October TeachVac has recorded some 3,000 more vacancies for classroom teaching posts from secondary schools in 2017 than last year. We don’t have the resources to delve into whether there were more re-advertisements or more vacancies placed by independent schools or whether the majority of the increase were from schools in areas where school rolls have started to increase.

Apart from Religious Education, where a small fall was recorded, other subjects were all the subject of increases with art rebounding from a low level in 2016. Design and Technology, business and IT recorded relatively small below overall average increases, whereas some EBacc subjects recorded above average increases.

There is an interesting question around mathematics and the science subjects where the increase in both subjects was just under the overall average. TeachVac collects extra data in both these subjects as well as in design and technology and languages that allow further understanding of the labour market across England.

The remainder of this paper is available on request from TeachVac

TeachVac issues end of term warning

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Schools across England will find recruiting staff for unexpected vacancies in January 2018 challenging. This is the message from TeachVac, the free to use job board for teacher vacancies across all schools in England that is already saving schools large sums of money in line with the DfE policy of reducing unnecessary expenditure by schools.

TeachVac is celebrating entering its fourth year of operation. At the end of the summer term of 2017, TeachVac have rated 7 of the 13 secondary subjects it tracks as in a critical state for recruitment. This means that TeachVac is warning schools of recruitment difficulties in these subjects that might occur anywhere in the country and not just in the traditional high risk areas for recruitment.

The high risk subjects are:

English

IT/Computing

Design & Technology

Business Studies

Religious Education

Music

Geography

In the other six subjects tracked in detail by TeachVac, most schools will still find recruitment easier, although any specific demands such as subject knowledge in, for example, a specific period of history will always make recruitment more of a challenge. On the basis of current evidence, TeachVac expects schools will face the least problems in Physical Education and Art where, if anything, there is still some local over-supply against need in some parts of the country.

In Science overall, – but not in Physics and possible Chemistry – Mathematics; Modern Languages overall, but not in certain language combinations, and in History, supply should still be adequate to meet expected demand between now and January 2018.  Because most schools still advertise for teachers of languages and science and only specify within the advert the more detailed requirements it takes longer to analyse the data on vacancies in these subjects and that information is not yet fully available beyond the headline figures.

TeachVac can provide the data in a form useful to schools facing Ofsted inspection where recruitment may be an issue for the inspection team. For local authorities and others interested in the recruitment patterns over the past three years in specific locations and between different types of school such as academies and free schools, TeachVac now has a wealth of data available. TeachVac is also now looking in detail as senior staff appointments and especially leadership posts in the primary sector and the challenges some schools face in replacing a head teacher when they leave. The outcome of that research will form the basis of a further detailed report to follow the posts already written on the topic.

With recruitment to training for courses starting this September still below the level achieved last year, 2018 is also beginning to look as if it will be a challenging recruitment round, especially for schools not involved in training teachers either directly or through tie-ins with other training providers. This blog will update the situation regarding numbers offered places for September at the end of this month and again at the end of August.

 

 

Bursaries, fee remission or a training salary for all?

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Why is paying a bursary to a trainee teacher seem as potentially having a deadweight cost attached to it, but paying a salary to a trainee army or navy officer does not seem to be regarded in the same way? The Education Policy Institute, where ex-Lib Dem Minister David Laws is Chief Executive, has just published at short review paper on teacher recruitment into training and other teacher supply issues https://epi.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/EPI-Analysis-Teacher_Supply.pdf  The Review say that bursaries are not efficient because, when they are increased in amount, this extra has to be paid to everyone and not just to those extra trainees it would entice into the profession. I seem to recall a parable In Chapter 20 of St Matthew’s Gospel that deals with an analogous situation.

As might be expected by a body whose chief executive was associated with the famous Orange book, this issue of paying the same to everyone reads as if it may be troubling for the authors of the review and they discuss alternative and more efficient scenarios to bursaries, including the student fee forgiveness package promoted in the Conservative Manifesto, but presumably a casualty of yesterday’s funding announcement.

Personally, I favour the situation that brings trainee graduate teachers nearest to their colleagues in other public services, many of whom are paid during training. The EPI review doesn’t address the issue of fairness between the different routes into teaching; indeed it is very thin on a discussion of why higher education is still proving so attractive to applicants and it is the school-based routes that seem to be bearing the brunt of the fall in applications this year.

The other interesting observation in the review is that the pupil teacher ratio in secondary schools will worsen from 14.5:1 in 2016/17 to 16.0:1 by 2026/27. Much of this apparent deterioration will just be a reversal of an improvement achieved while pupil numbers were in decline in the secondary sector and some of the change can be brought about by relatively small changes in group sizes and Key Stages 4 & 5 where periods of generous funding always allow for smaller classes to be operated than in less generous periods for funding. Nevertheless, an expectation of a deteriorating pupil teacher ratio is not a great selling point for attracting new entrants into the profession or retaining those already there.

To me it reads as if the unidentified writer of the EPI review would have liked a real free market in salaries, both between schools and within schools between teachers, as if this had never been the case in the past. Within the tightly managed central control of salaries, (even though funding of schools was at the direction of local authorities), that existed in the post-war period up to the introduction of local management of schools after the great Education Reform Act of the late 1980s, there were marked differentials between promotion opportunities in the primary and secondary sectors and it was easier for teachers in some subjects to achieve additional payments if the school know that they would be difficult to replace. To that extent the market principle of supply and demand probably worked at least as effectively as they do at present.

Indeed, one interesting question is why there hasn’t been a return to the use of recruitment and retention allowances by schools, a favoured device during an earlier recruitment crisis.

 

Good news on Mathematics teaching

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Is the crisis in mathematics teaching over? According to the data in the 2016 School Workforce Census, if not over, then the problem is at least well on the way to being solved, if you use two important measures for the teaching workforce.

On the basis of the percentage of teachers with no relevant post A -Level qualification teaching the subject, the data for mathematics is the best for many years

2013 22.4%

2014 24.2%

2015 26.3%

2016 22.2%

The 2016 figure is a remarkable turnaround on the 2015 percentage and probably the largest single year change ever recorded. There are similar improvements across many other subjects, with only physics not really following the general trend.

2013 33.5%

2014 36.5%

2015 37.5%

2016 37.3%

The improvement in Physics is only a marginal 0.2% over last year and still far worse than in 2013, although the number of teachers has increased from 6,300 to 6,500, the best level for many years.

To triangulate the data it is worth also looking at the hours taught in a typical week to pupils in years 7 to 13 by teachers with no subject relevant post A-level qualification. This is the measure used last year by the Migration Advisory Committee in their seminal report. The data can be found in Table 13 of this year’s School Workforce Census.

2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
Maths 16 16 18 17 20 18 12.8
Physics 21 24 26 26 28 25 24.6
D&T 11 15 18 17 19 17 14.2
ICT 48 4 41 39 44 38 30.6
English 12 13 15 15 17 13 9.6
Geography 11 16 18 18 17 14 12.5
History 10 13 15 15 15 11 8.6
PE 9 11 12 11 11 7 4

Figures are percentages and come from Table 4.19 of the MAC Report and Table 13 of the 2016 School Workforce Census

So, apart from in Physics, not only has the percentage of teachers with minimal qualifications been reduced, but the percentage of hours taught by such teachers is also down.

However, before everyone becomes too euphoric and proclaims the end of the teacher supply crisis, it is worth noting these are for Qualified Teachers only. It is not clear what impact both the School Direct Salaried and Teach First schemes have on these numbers. The ability of schools to correctly complete the School Workforce Census must also be taken into consideration. Recruitment into training in 2016 and the job market in 2017 may have played a part in helping the improvement as may the work undertaken by the government in mathematics in upgrading the knowledge and skills base of those teaching mathematics.

Whatever the reasons, these figures show an improving trend, although one in eight hours in mathematics taught be a Qualified Teacher with not even an A-Level in the subject is still not good enough. The fact that almost a quarter of Physics lessons are taught by such teachers, let along the hours taught by unqualified and trainee teachers in the subject even after several years of generous bursaries is not a happy situation. It also raises the question of whether the government is paying generous training bursaries to teachers that end up outside of the State school system. If that is the case, a loan forgiveness scheme or even better salaries for teachers in the State system might be better alternatives.

The concern about recruitment into training in 2017 together with the rising secondary school population means that even if the 2017 School Workforce Census produces similar results to the 2016, the 2018 Census may show a return to more concerning outcomes. But, since that won’t be published until 2019 that’s a world away in politics.

 

Peak time for vacancies

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The period two weeks after Easter usually proves to be the peak of the recruitment cycle for teachers by schools seeking to be fully staffed for September. Vacancies due to promotion have been identified; school rolls for September can be calculated as admission numbers are now known; most teachers deciding to retire or leave the profession for other reasons will have made their decisions known to the leadership of the school and budgets, including Pupil Premium, can be calculated with some degree of certainty.

At TeachVac we are seeing that profile again this year. Indeed, I am somewhat surprised how resilient the job market has been after all the dire pronouncements during the teacher association annual conferences about the lack of funding for schools. However, as I wrote in an earlier post, teaching posts are often the last thing a school will cut when finances are tight. I suspect that the position would also be a lot worse if there hadn’t been such a severe restriction on the growth of the teachers’ salary bill in relation to other costs. Once the line gives way on the 1% per annum pay increase, then that is when teaching posts will come under real pressure, unless there is an injection of more funds.

At least, this year, there are more trainee teachers around than last year and probably than there will be next year, judging by the evidence discussed in a previous post based upon the UCAS data for April. As might be expected, the number of recorded vacancies for business studies teachers has exceeded both the trainee numbers and likely returners, so schools can expect to find that subject difficult to staff for the next twelve months, and probably beyond.

The pool of teachers of English not on preparation courses linked to schools is shrinking rapidly and those schools that have to trawl in the open market, especially in and around London, may increasingly find recruitment a challenge. There should be less of an issue in mathematics, based upon the absolute numbers of trainees, but, of course, there may be issues with quality and depth of knowledge of the subject. At the other end of the scale, there are still plenty of art and PE teachers along with those training to be teachers of IT. Despite the talk of reductions in the amount for time being allocated to design and technology, the supply of trainee teachers has diminished rapidly over the past few weeks, as the pool was not overly large to start with this year.

TeachVac, as the free services to schools and teachers, continues to provide matches on a daily basis to direct teachers to the vacancies, so that schools can know very quickly whether they are receiving expressions of interest. We note at this time of year schools often cut and paste vacancies when placing them on their web sites, and common issues are with out of date closing dates; wrong salary scales and even a mismatch between the headline subject and the details of the vacancy. We advise applicants to check for errors; schools should also mystery shop their vacancy web sites on a regular basis to ensure they aren’t wasting money because of mistakes in the information provided.

The price of recruitment

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At first glance the stand-off between Unilever and Tesco about the price of yeast extracts, deodorants and ice-cream would seem to have little immediate relevance for education, except perhaps for the increasingly scarce resource of business studies teachers: a subject where the government’s Teacher Supply Model seems unable to generate enough places to satisfy demand from schools.

As we know, when there is a shortage of supply price goes up if there is unmet demand. Tesco seems to be calling Unilever’s bluff by assuming customers will opt for similar products either from the Tesco brand or from other labels. We shall see. I must confess to the fact that I was once what would today be called an intern at Unilever in the late 1960s working their Rotterdam HQ looking at the grocery market in Europe as hypermarkets and giant supermarkets were first emerging and the family store was coming under pressure.

So how does all this relate to the teacher supply market? We know there is a shortage of teachers. After all, there have been innumerable conferences, seminars and workshops on the topic over the past few years. The price of advertising a vacancy remains high. Indeed, it was one reason, along with better data collection, that TeachVac www.teachvac.couk was launched as a free job site for schools, teachers and trainees more than two years ago by a group of individuals including myself.

We are firmly of the belief that too much money is being spent on recruitment advertising and that the cash should be spent instead on teaching and learning. An increasing number of schools, especially secondary schools, are using TeachVac alongside other recruitment channels and as the momentum has built over the past two years so those with leverage on the price of recruitment in education should be working like Tesco to reduce the cost of recruitment to schools. Is that happening?

The White Paper in March talked of a government initiative in the recruitment field with a portal, but in TeachVac there is one up and running already at no cost to schools, teachers and trainees. It is interesting that no teacher association, nor the governors or business managers have ever asked TeachVac to participate in a discussion over the cost of recruitment advertising and how it can be reduced. Despite it being part of the traded services of many local authorities, they have shown more interest, even though in some cases they would lose income with a switch by their schools to TeachVac. Nevertheless, they still recognise their duty to the ‘common good’.

Teachvac is now fully funded for the 2017 recruitment round and also has a product in TeachSted www.teachsted.com for secondary schools facing an Osfted inspection where they will be asked about the local job scene for teachers.

As the grocery trade has shown, prices don’t always need to go up. We need to ensure best value in education and that includes in the recruitment market. Of course, I am not an independent observer, but so what. The aim must be better use of finite public resources.

 

Last word is not the most important

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It is not often that I get the last word, but that has literally happened in the latest Report of the Teachers’ Pay Review Body that can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/318574/STRB_24th_Report_Cm_8886_web_accessible.pdf Alright, I know it is only an acknowledgement of the fact that I and the Chief Executive both provided them with a briefing. In my case, one (unpublished) on teacher supply matters.

What remains of far more importance than my evidence is the discussions of the STRB about pay and recruitment to the profession that are neatly summarised in paragraph 3.56 of the Report:

3.56 As this chapter has identified, there is clear and consistent evidence that both the starting and profession-wide pay of teachers is less competitive relative to other professional occupations in several areas of the country, and that this gap is widening. Our evidence also suggests able graduates in other professions progress more quickly in the first three to five years and have more opportunity to reach higher levels of earnings as their careers progress subsequently. This heightens the risk of those in the profession feeling under-valued and recruitment and retention suffering as a consequence.

Now that is a real warning to government about teacher supply going forward. What is curious is that despite London being thought of as the least competitive part of the country in salary terms for new teachers, applications to train in London have been increasing at faster rates than elsewhere in the country this year. I don’t think it is because would-be teachers know that school teachers in Inner London do well compared to others entering the labour market with first degrees; and so they should after an extra year of training, since they fare less well against those entering the labour market with higher degrees. May be it is because of a separate London attraction factor despite the negative high prices of housing and transport in the capital.

I think the STRB have made clear that governments in the future have a real problem in relation to teacher supply that has been articulated on this blog before; but is good to read in an official publication. Increased pupil numbers, and increased demand for graduates from the wider economy, both exert real pressure on the labour market for teachers. While it was good to see that teachers joining the profession between 1997 and 2009 had relatively high retention rates, there is no guarantee in the next economic cycle that this outcome will continue unless pay keeps pace with the private sector. Interestingly, there is clear evidence that the pay reforms of the early 2000s boosted teacher retention by a couple of percentage point overall, and probably more in certain specific subjects and areas.

The STRB Report is useful evidence for NQTs negotiating starting salaries in the new market driven world. Any teachers except those in English, PE and history, are clearly in a position to start salary bargaining at say point M3 on the old scale as a starting salary just to take account of the training year. If they don’t already do so, the professional associations should be offering advice on pay bargaining to new members, and monitoring the results. I expect to be offering schools a new service along these lines, starting with secondary trainees in the class of 2014.