Teacher recruitment: how can we prevent a crisis?

Jo Faragher

With so many changes to the education system as governments have changed and politicians have tried to put their stamp on things, it’s hardly surprising that schools struggle to recruit good staff.

The latest TES Teacher Recruitment Index shows just how bad the situation has become, with certain subjects such as maths or physics only receiving a few applications for each post.

Schools in different regions face different challenges, too. Those in London, the South East and West Midlands face the most difficulty with teacher recruitment. Some teachers told the TES that the shortage of good candidates has led to many headteachers looking overseas.

This is a trend we have already seen to some extend in the health service. A number of NHS Trusts have been known to stage “recruitment trips” to Europe to sign up whole teams of skilled nurses. There is of course an upfront cost, but having access to the right skills to give patients the right care is considered a worthy investment – and it’s easy to see why this might work in teaching, too.

At the same time, many teachers have become disillusioned with the profession and have decided to leave, meaning there are even more recruitment gaps to fill. This requires schools coming up with ever more creative approaches to finding dedicated teachers who will stick around and offer pupils some stability.

The Government has invested a lot in advertising the profession as an attractive one, and has pitched salaries higher to make teaching more attractive to graduates who may otherwise consider higher earning professions such as banking. But horror stories remain of teachers working long evenings and weekends to complete lesson preparation, often because of the paperwork they’re forced to do to comply with the ever-changing rules set by politicians.

Recruiters in the education sector must be working harder than ever to come up with good candidates for schools, or supporting them with supply staff, but arguably there needs to be a more long-term approach.

Of course there are still thousands of teachers who treat teaching as their beloved vocation, but they’re getting fewer as they’re asked to give ever more of themselves for their job. If there is some way to re-engage teachers in a happy balance of job satisfaction, good pay and less stress, it may be possible to prevent these current teaching shortages from reaching true crisis levels.