The reality of the teacher recruitment crisis

Posted on April 29, 2023 by John Howson

Thanks to the DfE reopening the data files on teacher numbers and the calculations behind the need for increased targets it is now possible to ask some more interesting questions about teacher supply.

Two key ones are: what percentage of new entrants should we expect to enter the Further Education Sector and what percentage should we expect to take teaching posts in private schools and tutoring establishments? The DfE should have access to this data from the profiles of ITT providers.

However, there is some sector-wide evidence in the data associated with the Teacher Supply Model in the tables of the percentage completing ITT and percentage employed in state schools that can go some way to addressing these questions.

Subject	Completion %	Entering Employment %	2022 offers	2022 ITT Census minus TF	Census as % Offers	Entering Employment Based 2022 on census
Primary	91	68		10,582
Mathematics	89	70	2048	1,679	82%	1175
Biology	90	73	684	566	83%	413
Chemistry	89	72	849	703	83%	506
Physics	84	64	532	403	76%	258
Computing	89	62	419	329	79%	204
English	92	76	1646	1,447	88%	1100
Classics	97	59	64	58	91%	34
Modern Languages	93	62	808	657	81%	407
Geography	92	68	616	572	93%	389
History	93	71	1144	1032	90%	733
Art & Design	93	66	565	478	85%	315
Business Studies	92	63	242	186	77%	117
Design & Technology	93	74	444	428	96%	317
Drama	94	67	384	329	86%	220
Music	91	66	287	258	90%	170
Others	94	65	484	426	88%	277
Physical Education	97	63	1543	1405	91%	885
Religious Education	92	72	340	293	86%	211
Secondary total				12,356		7733

Source: DfE and TeachVac

Completion rates used by the DfE vary from just 84% in the already small cohort of physics trainees to 97% in both Classics and physical education. Percentages entering employment range from 74% of design and technology trainees to 59% of classics trainees and 62% of computing trainees. Physics, with an employment rate of 64%, has a percentage that is little better than computing.

In calculating the number of trainees in the 2022 ITT Census – minus Teach First trainees, as they are already in the classroom – I have assumed the same base level as a starting point as for completion rates as for employment rates. If the percentage entering employment were of the percentage completing, the totals for the latter would be lower.

So, where are the missing 145 physics trainees? Undoubtedly, the largest number are teaching in the private sector; some will be lecturing in Sixth Form of other Further Education colleges and some won’t have entered teaching at all. A few might have decided to work in schools outside of England.

I suspect that the influence of the private sector on these numbers is best seen in the data around classics. The Census recorded 58 trainees, with just 59% entering employment in the state sector. That’s just 34 teachers. With the target for 2023/24 cut to 25, if ITT providers stuck to the target and didn’t over-recruit, it is entirely possible that there would be no Classics trainees available for the state school sector for September 2024.

Now, many may not weep about the loss of classics as a subject, although a cogent case can be made for its retention by those that support it. Fortunately, in history and physical education, where targets have been reduced, low employment percentages may owe more to the over-recruitment against the previous targets than a warning of teacher shortages. However, the contribution of these teachers to the staffing of other subjects may cause other problems for the staff creating timetables for schools in September 2024.

Collateral damage to religious education, where the employment rate of 72% produce a total of only 293 new entrants, is one obvious likely outcome if history numbers are restricted to anywhere close to the 2023 target.

As these numbers haven’t been adjusted for either apprenticeships or the School Direct Salaried scheme, they may well still be slightly too high to represent reality in terms of the ‘open’ labour market.

How they are spread out across the country, is a whole different set of issues that perhaps the Select committee might like to delve into as part of its discussions with the Secretary of State.

High Achievers and ITT outcomes for 2023

Posted on April 28, 2023 by John Howson

In my previous post I mentioned that I didn’t know whether or not the High Achiever programme numbers were included in the ITT overall targets. By delving into the methodology section, it seems that they are.

As Teach First has had a good record of meeting its targets, I have reworked the data for April offers to add in the assumption that all High Achiever places will be filled.

Subject	offers April 23	% of target	High Achievers % of Target	with High Achievers
Art & Design	300	36%	0%	36%
Biology	487	46%	11%	58%
Business Studies	142	12%	3%	15%
Chemistry	461	39%	6%	45%
Classics	48	192%	0%	192%
Computing	232	20%	4%	24%
Design & Technology	301	14%	2%	16%
Drama	196	65%	0%	65%
English	1273	42%	11%	53%
Geography	520	35%	5%	40%
History	639	80%	8%	87%
Mathematics	1199	41%	9%	50%
Modern Languages	703	24%	5%	29%
Music	156	20%	4%	24%
Others	280	12%	0%	12%
Physical Education	1249	170%	0%	170%
Physics	361	13%	3%	16%
Religious Education	179	27%	5%	32%
Total	8726	33%	5%	39%

Source: TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk

The final column shows my assumption about the percentage of places that are currently filled based on current offers plus all High Achiever places. On this basis, assuming all of those offered a place turn up at the start of the course, and offers continue to be made at the same rate as in previous years, targets won’t be met, but there might be a slight improvement over last year.

The qualifications around the difference between ‘offers’, some of which are conditional, and outcomes, means these figures are only indicative. I will try and find time to compare the final offer total from last September with the ITT census number as that will provide an indication of ‘drop-out and no shows that could be factored into the totals.

However, it is possible to say with almost 100% certainty that targets won’t be met in many secondary subjects again this year even if target numbers hadn’t been increased.

With the addition of graduating students from degree programmes, it is likely that primary output will be more than sufficient to meet the needs of the sector. Whether these new entrants will be where they are required is another matter.

Bit late for ITT targets

Posted on April 27, 2023 by John Howson

The DfE has finally published the ITT targets for courses starting this autumn. Postgraduate initial teacher training targets: 2023 to 2024 – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) In addition, they have also supplied details of the Teacher Supply Model that allows the workings behind the calculation of the targets to be discussed. This is a welcome return to open government after a few years of limited information on the thinking behind the numbers.

Two points arise from the announcement. Firstly, it is incredibly late in the recruitment round. For most subjects that fact won’t matter because the targets aren’t going to be met. But what will happen in Classics and physical education where there are currently more offers than places in the target? Will potential trainees have their offers withdrawn? Will providers recruit over target, and will there be any consequences for doing so? Will the DfE look at overall recruitment by a provider rather than on a subject-by-subject basis?

The DfE’s decision may well influence how providers approach the business of making offers in future rounds. Historically, these targets were issued in the autumn so that providers knew their allocations before they had started to make many offers. Such an approach is much more sensible than announcing the target after Easter, more than half-way through the recruitment cycle. In the past, there were also indicative targets for future years. This helped providers manage their workforce planning.

The more alarming feature of these targets is the addition of the under-recruitment from earlier rounds. I have addressed this issue before. Schools do not start each new year sending children home because they couldn’t recruit enough teachers. They botch, by recruiting those teachers that they can, and adjusting the timetable and the underlying curriculum to fit the staff they have recruited. There are as a result not the vacancies there were in the training cycle.

Suppose there was an unexpected economic slowdown because of US bank failures and teaching suddenly recruited to these new targets? Would these additional trainees find jobs in 2024. The answer is we don’t know because the demands on school funding, especially for staff costs are not yet known, but it would seem unlikely. So, if a school has employed a biologist to teach physics and were offered a physics teacher for 2024 would they sack the biology teacher? Or let the physics teacher wait for an opening to arise?

Adding unfilled places to future targets has been tried in the past, and didn’t work. I am surprised to see it being used again this year.

As a result of the increase in targets in many secondary subjects – and it isn’t clear whether these targets include Teach First numbers or not – the April offer numbers represent only a small fraction of the DfE’s target number in many subjects, as the data in the table reveals.

Subject	Offers as a % of target
Business Studies	12
Others	12
Physics	13
Design & Technology	14
Computing	20
Music	20
Modern Languages	24
Religious Education	27
Total	33
Geography	35
Art & Design	36
Chemistry	39
Mathematics	41
English	42
Biology	46
Drama	65
History	80
Physical Education	170
Classics	192

Source: TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk

History and drama may well meet their targets, but all other subjects probably won’t. Will the DfE add any shortfall on these targets onto those for next year, making the totals even higher and harder to achieve?

Finally, how will these target numbers play out with the newly accredited providers? Are the institutions going to take the extra numbers or might the loss of some providers be a matter for regret?

Warning signs on ITT recruitment

Posted on April 24, 2023 by John Howson

The DfE is holding a webinar for teachers looking for a job this afternoon. I suspect that it may well be full or primary teachers and trainees, plus some history and PE teachers. Anyone else still looking for a teaching post for September either has only just started or may need more than a webinar to help them find a job. TeachVac www.teachvac.couk along with other services does offer one to one advice sessions.

However, based upon the applications data for 2023 postgraduate courses released today, the DfE might be better advised chasing up more applicants for next year. April can be a tricky month to assess the status of the applications round for any year because of Easter and other faith festivals. However, some trends are becoming clear.

The increase in applications, as reported previously, is being driven by an increase from those recorded as from the ‘rest of the world’. Thus, of the 2,601 recorded increase in applicants compared with April last year, some 2,014 are shown as from ‘rest of the world’.

The danger is that this increase is masking some worrying trends. The number of applicants under the age of 25 continues to be below the number recorded last year by around 400 applicants, or more than 2%.

More concerning are the nine secondary subjects where offers are at their worst level since before 2016/17. Of the other secondary subjects, most are still below the offers at April in the 2020/21 cycle. Only geography and design and technology are back to offer levels in earlier years. For geography it is the best April since 2018/19, and for design and technology, the best since 2016/17, although even at the current level the target won’t be met for this year.

The sciences and modern foreign languages are the subjects where the greatest improvements in offers can be identified. So, perhaps the bursary and scholarships are making a difference. However, there is not the data to see the extent to which these extra offers are being made to ‘home students’ or those from overseas.

The increase in applicants is significantly affecting universities, faced with nearly 8,000 more applications so far this round: a 20% increase in workload. The total number of applicants rejected has increased from 3,727 in April last year to 5,612 this April. Nearly 300 more applicants have also withdrawn their applications.

Another worrying sign is the decline in applicants domiciled in London and the South East regions where demand for teachers is always the highest.

Unless there is an increase in home applicants over the next couple of months this round is beginning to look as if the outcome will be grim for providers trying to fund courses with limited numbers of students, and for schools seeking teachers in September 2024 and January 2025.

Hopefully, the resolution, when it comes, of the pay and conditions dispute between the teaching associations and the government will include provisions to encourage more graduates to choose teaching as a career. Paying their fees might be a useful concession.

Filling a vacancy for a teacher of physics

Posted on April 19, 2023 by John Howson

Last July I wrote a post about how many teachers of physics might start work in state schools in September 2022. As that post still receives views, I thought that I would update my projection for September 2023, based upon the DfE’s ITT Census of last autumn.

The ITT Census revealed that there were 444 trainee physics teachers studying on all routes on course and programmes that commenced in the autumn of 2022. Some 59 of these are on salaried schemes. That was less than one fifth of the DfE’s target number required to staff our school system.

41 on the High Achievers programme – presumably mostly Teach First

4 on Postgraduate Apprenticeships

14 on the School Direct Salaried programme

That means there were 385 trainees on other routes into teaching, with 300 of those divided between higher education providers and SCITTs. The remainder being on the School Direct fee route.

Allowing for a non-entry rate of 5%, as a result of either not completing the course; entering teaching in an independent school or the further education sector such as in a Sixth Form College, this leaves a possible 350 physics trainees job hunting in 2023. If the non-entry to maintained schools increased to 10% of the cohort, and physics has had lower entry rates in the past than some subjects, the job seeker numbers would be reduced to 315 in total.

Up until the 18^th April from 1^st January 2023, TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk has recorded 668 specific advertisements for teachers of physics. I am sure that there will also be some other schools that have together posted the 5,384 science teacher vacancies that were really seeking a physics teacher.

This suggests that trainees will be scarce on the ground. Of course, trainees are not the only source of teachers to fill vacancies. There are returners and those switching between schools. Assuming these groups total the same as the trainee number, with the 5% reduction, this might make a total of 700 job seekers for the 668 distinct physics vacancies already advertised and the share of other vacancies where physics was a key component of the job description.

It seems likely that any school seeking a teacher of physics that attracts no interest via a job board such as TeachVac might well need to consider the worth of spending cash on using a recruitment agency. A no find: no fee approach would be the best for a school, but challenging for agencies. However, agencies can also look abroad to see whether there might be teachers overseas willing to fill the school’s vacancy. However, I would think it sensible for a school to ask for proof of success rates before engaging any high- cost agency to fill their teaching vacancy.

If filling vacancies for September will be a challenge, finding a replacement for a January 2024 vacancy for a teacher of physics might well be nigh on impossible for the vast majority of schools. Hopefully, not many schools will be faced with that situation.

Teaching not attracting new graduates

Posted on April 2, 2023 by John Howson

Might history become a ‘shortage subject’ in the teacher labour market? Such a question seems fanciful in the extreme. However, the latest batch of data about applications for 2023 postgraduate courses for ITT where the trainees will supply the 2024 labour market shows the lowest March number for ‘offers’ since before the 2013/14 recruitment round. I am sure that providers are being cautious about making offers, but there does seem to be a trend developing, with non-bursary and arts subjects faring worse than the science and other bursary subjects and the primary sector applications still continuing at a low rate.

Art, religious education, music drama, classics and ‘other’ are subjects where the offers made by the March reporting date were below the March 2022 number. Most other subjects were reporting higher offer levels than in March 2022 – a disastrous month – but below previous years. Design and technology is an exception. The recovery from the low point of March 2020 in that subject continues. However, the number of offers is not yet such as to inspire confidence that the target for 2023 will be met. Offers in art and design in March 2023 were less than half of the number in March 2020.

So, what of overall progress in attracting graduates into teacher at the half-way point in the recruitment cycle? This March, there were 25,163 candidates compared with 23,264 in March 2022. However, the overall increase of just under 2,000 more applicants is fully accounted for by the 2,600 more candidates shown as applying from outside of the United Kingdom, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. London has nearly 400 fewer candidates this March compared with March 2022 as measured by the location of the candidate’s application address, and the East of England, down from 2,213 in March 2022 to 1,955 this March.

Applications are being sustained by an increase in career changers. Candidate numbers in the age groups below 25 continue to fall, with just 4,027 candidates in the 21 or under age grouping. By contrast, this year there are already 600 candidates in the 50-54 age grouping compared with 449 in March 2022. The number of candidates recorded as over the age of 65 has increased from 12 in March 2022 to 25 this March! The bulk of the career changers seem likely to be men. The number in this group has increased from 6,525 in the March 2022 data to 8,037 this March. However, the number recruited has fallen from 562 to 419, perhaps indicating that many of these older men are in the group applying from overseas?

All the increase is in applications for secondary courses. Those applying for primary courses has fallen from 28,391 in March 2022 to 27,874 this March. By comparison the secondary applications have increased from 32,551 in March 2022 to 40,193 this March.

The increase in applications from outside of the United Kingdom may well be the reason that every route into teaching has registered an increase in unsuccessful applications compared with the figure for March 2022. It would be interesting to know whether or not Teach First has seen a similar increase in applications from outside the United Kingdom.

Once the overseas applicants have been removed, the picture for March 2023 is mixed, with bursary subjects generally doing slightly better than other subjects. However, the real concern must be the loss of interest in teaching among young home graduates. Such a decline is very worrying.

Golden Helloes for overseas nationals

Posted on March 7, 2023 by John Howson

Yet another scheme has emerged from the portals of Sanctuary Buildings to help stem this years’ teacher supply crisis. The International Relocation Payment Scheme International relocation payments – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) is designed to attract non-UK nationals to either teach or train to teach languages or physics. Up to £10,000 will be available for successful applicants and the scheme has different rules for non-salaried trainees; salaried trainees, and teachers.

Both fee-paying trainees and salaried trainees should receive the IRP around the end of their first term and teachers will also receive their payment at the same stage of employment subject to them teaching the appropriate subjects.

For teachers the rules include the following:

To be eligible, teachers must meet all 3 of the following requirements.

Firstly, you must have accepted a languages or physics teaching job in a state secondary school in England on a contract lasting at least one academic year.

Teachers of all languages (except English) offered in English state secondary schools are eligible to apply for the IRP. The language or languages can be combined with another subject, but must make up at least 50% of teaching time.

Physics can be combined with another subject, but must make up at least 50% of teaching time. Teachers of general science are also eligible to apply for the IRP if they are teaching the physics elements of general science. It can be combined with another subject, but general science must make up at least 50% of teaching time.

Secondly, any teacher must come to England on one of the following visas:

Skilled worker visa
Youth Mobility Scheme
Family visa
UK Ancestry visa
British National (Overseas) visa
High Potential Individual visa
Afghan citizens resettlement scheme
Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy
Ukraine Family Scheme visa
Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme

Thirdly, and teacher must move to England no more than 3 months before the start of the teaching job in September.

How to apply for the IRP

Any teacher applying will need to have started their teaching job in a state secondary school to make your application. Teach in England if you trained outside the UK | Get Into Teaching GOV.UK (education.gov.uk)

Applications will be open from 1 September to 31 October 2023. This is a short window for applications.

The obvious question is what happens if a recipient of the cash quits as soon as the funds have cleared their bank accounts, and returns home? I am sure that vetting will do everything to prevent such an occurrence, but the question is at least worth asking.

It is interesting that the DfE only cite their own job board as a source of vacancies despite the fact that the tes and TeachVac often have a wider range of job opportunities than the DfE site.

As usual, this new scheme ignores the really serious shortage subjects such as design and technology; business studies and computing.

The DfE will need to ensure schools understand the scheme as they will be receiving applications for these posts almost immediately. They will need to be able to ensure timetables that meet the requirements, especially in the sciences where most vacancies are advertised as for a ‘teacher of science’ and not a teacher of physics.

Will the scheme succeed? It is only for 2023-24 at present, so might be regarded as a trial. Previous schemes, have disappeared. I don’t recall the evaluation of this one from 2016 mentioned in a previous blog post. More on BREXIT | John Howson (wordpress.com)

On a similar topic of recruiting teachers from overseas, in December the DfE issued tender RFX159 – Supply of teachers qualified outside of England. This specified within the terms:

‘The Contractor must work in consultation with the Client Organisation to prepare a Business Brief, which may include, but not be exclusive to, the following: a. scoping of the work required by the business area in respect of; i) single or multiple recruitment campaigns targeting qualified maths and physics teachers primarily from Czech Republic, Germany, Poland and USA. Further high performing countries subject to agreement. Ii) Any other recruitment and supply of teachers to English schools.’

Schemes such as this one will not solve the teacher supply crisis that secondary schools have been experiencing for far too long. After all, the Select Committee was concerned enough in 2015 to mount an inquiry and the situation now is far worse than it was then. We must not fail a generation of young people.

Mixed news on ITT applications

Posted on February 27, 2023 by John Howson

At a first glance, the data on postgraduate ITT applications and acceptances for February 2023, released this morning by the DfE, looks like good news. Overall applications are up from 51,745 in February 2022 to 56,704 this February, and applicant numbers are up from 19,933 to 21,208 for the same dates in 2022 and 2023.

However, it is important to look behind these headline numbers at two other facts. Firstly, there is a sharp difference in the behaviour of candidates by age groups. There are fewer candidates under the age of 29 this year when compared with last February. The key undergraduate group of age ‘21 and under’ are shown as 3,601 this February, whereas it was 3,778 in February 2022. However, the number of candidates in the 30 to 35 age grouping is up from 2,044 last February to 2,565 in February 2023.

The second point to note is the geographic distribution of candidates. Those from the London region are down from 3,231 to 2,885, whereas those shown as from the ‘rest of the world’ have increased from 1,427 in February 2022 to 3,524 this February. The overall increase in candidates is 1,275 (from 19,933 to 21,208) but the increase from the ‘Rest of the World’ is 2,097 (from 1,427 to 3,524).

The effect of this change in the location of candidates can be seen in the total applications by phase and subject. Applications for primary phase courses have remained constant at 23,355 compared with 23,967 in February 2022. For the secondary phase, applications have increased from 27,134 to 32,014. However, not all subjects have benefitted from more applications. Art and design; Classics; drama; history; music; physical education and religious education are all showing fewer applications this February than in February 2022.

The good news is that design and technology and physics have recorded more offers than last year. In the case of design and technology, offer levels are the best for February since February 2017. Modern Languages; geography; English; chemistry, biology and business studies have also recorded better ‘offer’ levels than last February. However, numbers are not yet sufficient to be confident to be assured that overall targets will be reached by the end of the recruitment round and the high level of applicants from overseas must be a matter for consideration. A breakdown of overseas versus home applicants by subject would be helpful.

Overall, fewer candidates have been recruited, (458 against 572) and fewer have offers with conditions pending, (9,827 compared to 10,503). Both the number of candidates rejected and withdrawn are above the February 2022 numbers.

The has been an increase in applicants recorded as ‘male’ from 5,559 to 6,704, whereas applications from ‘females’ have reduced from 14,402 to 14,289.

The question is whether we are seeing a loss of young UK- based female applicants to teaching and their being replaced by older males domiciled outside the United Kingdom. Teaching is increasingly a global profession, and QTS from the DfE may be seen as a valuable qualification. However, the question must be asked whether this trend will solve the teacher supply crisis in England?

Snippets from the STRB Evidence

Posted on February 22, 2023 by John Howson

The DfE has released their evidence to the Teachers’ Pay Review Body, the STRB. The government doesn’t shy away the problems with recruitment into teaching and departures from the profession, but, as might be expected, it does put the best possible face on the data. For instance, it noted that primary pupil numbers were now falling, and that secondary pupil numbers were likely to peak soon. However, it also noted challenges with the number of new graduates likely to be entering the labour market.

Higher education institutions. long the butt of government attacks over their role in ITT might take heart from table C3 that shows them outperforming schools in the percentage of men recruited onto both primary and secondary postgraduate ITT courses. SCITTs seem to have had a poor year in 2022/23 in that respect. High Potential ITT (Teach First to the rest of us) had a good year in 2022/23, after three poor years of recruiting men to their programme. However, their overall recruitment fell from 1,661 in 2019/2020 to 1,393 in 2022/23, although that was not as dramatic a fall as for the School Direct Salaried programme; down from 2,492 to 661 during the same period.

Salaried schemes accounted for 10% of entrants in 2019/2020, but only 6% in 2022/23. This is despite the growth in apprenticeships for graduate entrants.

Despite the anxiety about the departure of heads, leaver rates fell between 2016 and 2020 across England, from 10.6% to 8.9%. However, I expect the 2021 figure to show an upturn to reflect the fact that many heads stayed in post in 2020, to see their schools through the worst of the pandemic.

The teaching force in England is one of the youngest in the OECD, with a quarter of classroom teachers, and a third of unqualified teachers under the age of 30 in November 2021. There are still disproportionally more men in senior positions than there are women. However, at the classroom teacher level, three out of four of all teachers were women, across all sectors covered by the STRB.

The number of newly qualified entrants fell from 26,780 in 2015 to 20,435 in 2020, presumably due to a combination of factors including the pressure on school funding; the start of the decline in primary school rolls and the problems with recruitment onto ITT courses in some secondary subjects, leaving schools having to make other arrangements.

Perhaps the most worrying figure in the DfE evidence is the fact that 8% of teachers in special schools in 2021 were unqualified. This compares with 2% in primary and 3% in secondary schools. Although the actual number is only a little over 2,000 people, compared with the 6,100 working in secondary schools, this is a disappointing situation for a sector where research earlier this week also showed teaching conditions to be poor.

Surprisingly, only 1,753 schools were using recruitment payments in 2021, although they were concentrated, as might be expected, in London and the South East. However, one wonders why the 66 schools in the North East needed to use such payments, and whether it might be a coding error in the Workforce Census? Maybe, they were all trying to recruit physics teacher or design and technology staff?

It will be interesting to see what the STRB makes of this evidence and how the current pay dispute is settled.

False Market

Posted on February 13, 2023 by John Howson

Last year, 2022, saw a large increase in recorded vacancies for teachers. That increase has continued in the first six weeks of 2023. TeachVac has recorded a 31% increase for the period from the start of January up to 10^th February 2023. Recorded vacancies for the secondary sector increased from 8,617 to 11,304 with increases in most subjects except; classics, economic, sociology and Engineering. Increases in music were in the order of 50%, and 59% in geography.

Although the increase in computing vacancies was only 41%, such was the lack of recruitment into training for courses that started last September that there will shortly have been sufficient advertised vacancies to provide a post for every trainee likely to be available for September. Design and technology, as a subject, is in a similar situation, even though a few more trainees were recruited in 2022 than in the previous year.

Business studies has already recorded enough vacancies for every trainee to have been able to find a job. Schools now recruiting for that subject will find the task ever more of a challenge as the year progresses.

For those of us that regularly watch the labour market for teachers, the question must now be; how accurate a reflection of reality is the current market data? Indeed, is measuring vacancies any longer a worthwhile exercise? Are schools just re-advertising vacancies that they cannot fill or advertising posts they expect to have to fill to try and capture the small number of candidates actually looking for vacancies?

Normally, I would not expect new entrants to the profession to have started job hunting this early in the year, except in subjects such as history and physical education where the supply of candidates regularly exceeds the number of vacancies on offer and it makes sense to start job hunting early.

In a ‘normal’ year there might be around 60,000 vacancies across both the primary and secondary sectors in England and including both state and private schools. The 100,000+ of 2022, and the increase early in 2023, suggests that there must be a considerable amount of either repeat advertising or re-advertising, depending upon how those terms are defined.

This blog has long championed the need for a unique vacancy number to follow a post from creation to its being filled. The current market makes that concept even more pressing. Schools do not need to wait for the DfE to create an elaborate structure, but could start using their URN followed by 2301 so the first vacancy would be xxxxxx/2301 and their tenth xxxxxx/2310. If included somewhere on the advertisement such reference number would be easy for followers of the labour market to handle and would provide a much clear picture of the actual labour market rather than having to wait until the June following the start of the school year and the publication of the data from the School Workforce Census.

Maybe, the government doesn’t want real-time information on the labour market, but without out it schools are at risk of having to rely upon signals from a false market that does not accurately show the real level of demand for teachers.

John Howson

Education and the numbers that affect what happens

Tag Archives: teacher preparation