Special Offer from TeachVac: £400 for all teaching jobs

Posted on June 1, 2023 by John Howson

TeachVac http://www.teachvac.co.uk has launched its early bird rate card for 2023/24. Subscribing schools pay one fee for all their vacancies to be listed on TeachVac from June 2023 to the end of August 2024. Sign up your school today.

TeachVac is offering 15 months of matching all vacancies for one fee of just £500 for a secondary phase school, discounted to just £400 for early payment.

Primary schools pay £75, or just £50 for the one yearly payment if made now.

Nine years of experience and extensive use of AI allows TeachVac to offer all schools; both independent and state schools this offer which is substantially cheaper than other recruitment routes.

For groups of schools and agencies there are special rates.

Schools using agencies can benefit from the agency rate if their agency is registered with TeachVac.

Why use TeachVac?

As the leading monitor of the labour market for teachers – NfER used TeachVac data in their 2023 annual survey of the labour market for teachers and both tes and SchoolsWeek also consult TeachVac when they want information about the labour market for teachers – TeachVac has unrivaled data on the job market.

Schools that use TeachVac’s vacancy matching service can access information that enables them to assess the state of the market for new entrants including monthly updates on this blog.

Recruitment for both the January and September 2024 rounds are going to be challenging, parlty because of a shortage of new entrants into the profession in a wide range of secondary sector subjects.

If you need more information or would just like to chat about the offer from TeachVac then email the team at enquiries@teachvac.co.uk or telephone 01983 550408

Why TeachVac is important

Posted on December 20, 2022 by John Howson

Earlier this month I posted about the ITT Census of trainees published by the DfE. I noted in one post that it was necessary to remove from the ITT census those trainees not likely to be looking for a teaching post because they are already in a school on salaried schemes.

From the reduced total also needs to be removed a percentage for in-course wastage and a desire by some teachers to work outside of the state school system in either private schools or Sixth Form/further education colleges.

What is left is the free pool that might look for a teaching post anywhere.

Subject	Open Market
Mathematics	1,467
Physical Education	1,295
English	1,214
History	950
Chemistry	644
Modern Languages	600
Geography	523
Biology	495
Art & Design	440
Other	387
Design & Technology	372
Physics	366
Computing	304
Drama	304
Religious Education	249
Music	228
Business Studies	164
Classics	52
Total secondary	10,054

From the list it seems clear that there are unlikely to be enough new entrants to satisfy the demand for teachers by schools in 2023 unless there is a substantial pay rise for teachers or other demands upon funding dampen demand below the level seen in 2022. To some extent demand will be affected by the actions of teachers already in the workforce. Early retirement, plus income from tutoring and some ‘supply’ teacher work might look attractive to some teachers in the latter stages of their career and with enough pension rights to feel confident about leaving full time teaching.

At TeachVac www.teachvac. We help match teachers to vacancies that meet their needs. Price at just £500 per year for secondary schools and just £75 for primary schools TeachVac has made 2 million matches in 2022 from over 100,000 vacancies listed and our pool of teacher sis growing rapidly at the present time as teachers start to think about where and what they want to teach in September.

Schools signing up to TeachVac now, won’t be invoiced until February and thus need not pay until early March. By then, they may well have already received more than 500 matches that covers the annual fee making all further matches effectively cost free.

Will you find a teaching post in 2021?

Posted on January 19, 2021 by John Howson

How easy will trainees find job hunting in 2021? The following predictions are based upon an analysis of vacancies for teaching posts recorded by TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk over the past four years. The raw vacancy data is then linked to the ITT census of trainee numbers produced by the DfE and based upon returns from providers.

As noted in another post on this blog, there are fewer trainees on classroom-based courses than a few years ago. This pushes up demand for trainees and returners to fill posts these trainees would have occupied. Assuming similar completion rates for trainees as in the past, and that with rising rolls in the secondary sector, if total vacancies are no worse than in 2020, and hopefully closer to the 2019 total it is possible to estimate the shape of the labour market in different subjects during 2021. However, much will depend upon how many teachers retire or leave the classroom for other jobs. If teacher stay put in larger numbers than usual, vacancies will be lower than in the past.

So, before I list some my predictions it is worth reminding those looking for teaching posts to register with the platform that provides the best opportunity for them to be pointed towards possible vacancies. I am, of course biased in favour of TeachVac, but there is the DfE site that also contains non-teaching posts, and the TES, as well as local authority job boards. Candidates might want to register with agencies and let them take the strain, but it is worth asking about their success in the geographical area where you are likely to be looking for a job.

So what might the picture for 2021 look like? Physics, design and technology and business studies teachers should still have little problem find a teaching post either during 2021 or for January 2022.

On the other hand, history and PE teachers will continue to find that there are more candidates than there are vacancies across much of England. The ability to offer a second subject might be worth thinking about in any application. Teachers of geography will also likely to find job hunting challenging later in the year.

This year, teachers of art may struggle to find teaching posts, especially as the year progresses, as there are considerably more trainees than in recent years. Teachers of RE and biology may also face similar challenges in job hunting as 2021 progresses towards the start of the new school term in September.

The outlook for teachers of sciences, other than physics, is likely to be similar to the situation in 2020, with teachers of biology unable to offer other sciences at most risk of finding a teaching post challenging as the progresses.

Mathematics and IT/Computing teachers should find plenty of choice of jobs early in the year, but possibly not as much choice as in recent years.

It is difficult to predict the market for teachers of languages other than English in Britain’s new post-EU membership world. At present, it looks as if across England there is a good balance between supply and demand, but there may be regional shortages if vacancy levels increase. On the other hand, if vacancies decline, there could be a surplus of teachers of some languages, notably Spanish.

Teachers of music are likely to find enough vacancies for trainees unless there is an inflow of ‘returners’ from outside of the profession as a result of changes in the wider labour market for those with music qualifications and a teaching background.

Each month TeachVac updates information about overall vacancies in the monthly newsletter. Details can be found at: https://www.teachvac.co.uk/our_services.php

Teacher Recruitment: How much should it cost to advertise a vacancy?

Posted on August 29, 2020 by John Howson

As someone that chairs a private limited company operating in the field of teacher recruitment, I always read the annual accounts published by the owners of the TES Group with interest. The latest, just released, provide details for the year up to the 31^st August 2019, so aren’t all that recent. Normally, the annual accounts for the previous year appear on the Companies House website sometime in the following May. However, the accounts for the year up to the 31^st August 2019 have only recently appeared.

The Group now files its overall Group accounts under the name of Tes Topco, for anyone interested in reading what has happened since the group was sold by one American Group to another.

I can sympathise with the directors. The bottom line for 2018-19 was a loss across the business, after everything, including finance costs, were taken into account, of some £67,000,000. That’s a chunky loss on revenue of less than £100 million, and was generated well before covid-19 affected the teacher recruitment market.

The ‘Attract’ part of the business – basically the on-line recruitment part of the Group, and once the jewel in the crown – registered a decline in turnover compared with the previous year, to around some £61,000,000. It isn’t possible to work out how much of this revenue came from schools in England, how much from schools elsewhere in the United Kingdom and how much for overseas.

However, let’s say schools in England paid upwards of £40,000,000 for what they could obtain for free from either TeachVac or the DfE vacancy website. Interestingly, as far as the TES was concerned, point of sale advertising revenue continued to decline in favour of subscriptions by schools.

This part of the business is supported by the large pool of teachers visiting the site to hunt for a job. Now that teachers are not a scare commodity, will schools want to renew their subscriptions? What happens if jobseekers divert in large numbers to either the DfE site or TeachVac? Is they do, why would schools continue to use the services of the TES job board?

An interesting question is whether the loss per teacher incurred by Tes Topco is anywhere near the level incurred by TeachVac? At present, TeachVac costs less than £3 per vacancy advertised to operate. You can do the maths for the Tes on say £40 million in revenue and possibly, being generous, 70,000 vacancies advertised by schools in England in 2018-19.

Looking forward to the effects of covid-19 on schools, the accompanying report estimates a loss on the vacancy and supply teacher part of the business of some £8 million. This assumes, as at present is the case that schools return for the autumn term, and there is no more lockdown across the board. The latest announcements for the autumn about what might happen do try to protect schools, but I am not sure that these measures will encourage schools to enter the teacher recruitment market unless absolutely necessary.

If TeachVac costs £3 per vacancy, and the DfE can spend anything it likes to keep its vacancy site alive, what future is there for an expensive paid site in England, regardless of whether schools pay for each vacancy advertised or take out a subscription?

I wonder if there is now more value now in the other parts of Tes Topco’s business than in the ‘attract’ part, even though it still dominates the revenue stream for the business.

Teaching Vacancies: and where to find them

Posted on February 9, 2020 by John Howson

Schools Week has published an interesting article about the DfE’s vacancy site.

DfE’s teacher job website carries only half of available positions

https://schoolsweek.co.uk/dfes-teacher-job-website-carries-only-half-of-available-positions/

Of course, Schools Week also carries job adverts for teachers and other education positions.

TeachVac http://www.teachvac.co.uk is the main challenger to the TES, as this blog revealed last November.

Regular readers will know that I am also chair of TeachVac that provides a free services and is funded from the data it can supply to the sector, but is now seeking to widen its scope having built a stable platform.

Part-time Vacancies for teachers

Posted on February 6, 2020 by John Howson

Part-time vacancies for teachers differ by subject

Research by TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk where I am chair, show teachers wanting part-time work may find it easier in some subjects than others.

Based on vacancies listed since 1st January 2020 TeachVac has recorded the following percentages of part-time work being mentioned in the vacancy in a range of key secondary subjects. In some cases the vacancy is part-time, and in other circumstances schools will consider applications from those looking for part-time work as well as candidates seeking full-time work.

Science 11%
Mathematics 7%
English 12%
Languages 16%
Design & Technology 12%

There may also be regional differences as well.

Is the teacher job market changing?

Posted on October 12, 2019 by John Howson

Earlier this week Will Hazell, the relatively new education reporter for the i newspaper and a former TES journalist, produced a piece about agencies charging schools a ‘recruitment fee’ after signing up teachers looking for jobs. Since governments of all complexions have been happy to leave teacher recruitment as a free market activity, why wouldn’t commercial organisations aim to help schools solve a recruitment issues for a price. After all, schools have been paying local authorities, the TES and other newspapers to place job adverts for many years. Indeed, even search agencies are also not a new phenomenon in the marketplace. In addition, there are other new approaches to recruitment as schools seek direct marketing and MATs use central recruitment pages for all their schools.

However, what might be acceptable as a fringe activity affecting only a small number of schools can become a matter of public concern if a greater number of schools are involved and the sums being made reach significant amounts.

As I have written before on this blog, why wouldn’t busy teachers and trainees take the bait offered by agencies if it makes their life easier? Selling yourself on every application form you complete takes far more time compared with filling out just one registration form per agency you register with and is a no brainer, especially with the amount of work teachers and trainees face during term-times.

Even where jobs are easy to find, because the supply exceeds demand, teachers can benefit from a system that reduces their need to complete a series of application forms on the off chance they might come second in an interview. But all this costs schools money. Even so, advertising hasn’t traditionally be free, and can take up more time an effort if there either isn’t much interest and either a re-advertisement is necessary or there are lots of applications and time has to be spent by a group of staff short-listing candidates for interview. These costs need to be set against any finders fee.

In the past, I have pointed out that knowing the state of the job market helps schools to choose the most cost-effective path to recruitment. Want a business studies teacher in London or the Home Counties, then paying an agency on a ‘no find, no fee’ basis might be cost effective from the end of February onwards. Want a PE teacher or a historian at the same time of year, and agencies might still be cost effective in saving staff time sorting through lots of applications, especially with the risk of ensuring there is no discrimination in your short-listing process.

So, should there be a public sector registration point where candidates must register if they want a teaching post, and that can manage supply and demand more effectively than the market?

TeachVac already knows where the bulk of the jobs are and can offer schools a service telling them how many potential applicants have been match with a vacancy. TeachVac can also tell candidates how many jobs in a selected area meet their parameters in a given time period, and also advise when a candidate’s search area is not wide enough for them to expect to have a good chance of securing a teaching post. This data changes as the school-year progresses.

At present, TeachVac offers its service free to both schools and those seeking teaching jobs. Providing the data about jobs to both schools and teachers has a cost, but it wouldn’t be very high; perhaps £5 per search. Let me know what you think?

DfE backs free vacancy sites

Posted on April 8, 2019 by John Howson

The Secretary of State has provided a big push for the DfE’s vacancy site and other free job sites such as TeachVac https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-teacher-recruitment-service-set-to-save-schools-millions

It is always interesting to see a Conservative government trying to stifle legitimate competition by using its millions to drive TeachVac out of business www.teachvac.co.uk However, the government won’t succeed. As the DfE notice acknowledges, only 38% of schools have signed up to the DfE service after nine months of testing. They only cite Cambridgeshire as an authority where all schools have signed up to their service.

As I have written before, the DfE would have saved money, something they urge schools to do, by either working with existing job boards or taking a feed from TeachVac at a much lower cost that designing their own service.

The DfE site has one flaw for teachers looking for posts in a particular area and not bothered whether they work in the private or public sectors: the DfE site only contains state funded schools. TeachVac contain details of vacancies in both sectors.

Will the DfE now instruct local authorities to abandon their own local job boards on the basis that this duplication of service is wasting taxpayer’s money? The DfE could provide a feed for all schools with vacancies in the local authority area, as TeachVac can do. If the DfE doesn’t do this, one must ask why not?

I assume that ASCL and NAHT along with the NGA will come out in support of the DfE’s site, something that haven’t felt able to do with TeachVac, despite it being free for schools and teachers.

Education Secretary Damian Hinds said:

With every school in the country now having access to this completely free site, I am calling on schools to ditch platforms that charge a fee. Why spend £1,000 on a service you can get for free?

Why indeed, and why go to the trouble of placing your vacancy on the DfE web site when TeachVac will collect it from your own web site for free, saving schools even more time and money.

So, will this be bad news for the TES and its new American owners? Much will depend upon how much in the way of resources the DfE is prepared to put into creating a state run monopoly? The vacancy part of the acquisition and its income stream certainly looks more risky this morning than it did on Friday. Will it be worth the £195 million that they seem to have paid for it?

Had I not helped invent TeachVac nearly six years ago, I would no doubt be more enthusiastic about the DfE’s attempt to drive down costs for schools. For now, we shall see what happens, and how schools, MATs and local authorities respond to today’s announcement.

For the sake of interest, I have compiled a table showing the DfE’s vacancy numbers – including non-teaching posts – as a percentage of TeachVac’s numbers. However, TeachVac includes independent secondary schools, but the DfE site sometimes contains non-teaching posts..

04/01/2019	11.26
11/01/2019	13.22
18/01/2019	17.57
25/01/2019	17.69
01/02/2019	21.44
08/02/2019	22.72
15/02/2019	24.46
22/02/2019	11.71
01/03/2019	31.25
08/03/2019	25.11
15/03/2019	25.20
22/03/2019	25.10
29/03/2019	28.20
05/04/2019	29.10

John Howson

Education and the numbers that affect what happens

Tag Archives: teaching jobs