There are many possible causes for education’s current recruitment crisis, but the thing that unites them all is that not enough people want to be a teacher.
This has manifested in some shocking statistics this week. A report from SchoolDash, the Gatsby Foundation and TeacherTapp revealed that advertised vacancies had increased by 14 per cent compared with three years ago (pre-pandemic levels), 15 per cent of secondary schools advertising for posts had not filled their vacancy, and more than 50 per cent of leaders said application numbers were below normal levels.
This new data is backed by overwhelming anecdotal evidence: multiple threads from leaders on social media lamenting the dire recruitment situations they are facing.
And it also comes after the recent workforce census revealed the five-year retention rate was dropping and, according to the Education Policy Institute, new entrants to the profession are down this year, while pupil-teacher ratios in secondary schools continue to rise.
Tes columnist and TeacherTapp founder Laura McInerney published a great thread on Twitter outlining some of the underlying causes of the problems, including some fascinating analysis around population numbers. This is important analysis, but as I mentioned above, the basic problem remains that there are not enough people who want to be a teacher, and not enough people doing the job want to stick with it.
So why don’t people want to be teachers? Jack Worth of the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) makes a compelling argument around pay in a recent Tes piece - teacher pay is simply not competitive with other professions. Hence, some may be tempted elsewhere.
But it’s about the conditions of the job, too. We need to ask ourselves: what we are offering in a teaching career? What is the dream we are selling to a young graduate, a teacher five years into their journey, a teacher 10-15 years in? What are the conditions that make this a great job? What ambitions and hopes are we fulfilling through teaching?
For too many, the reality is mocksteads, punitive accountability, eroding autonomy, public shaming, high workload, high stress, unfair responsibility for aspects outside of a school’s control, filling the gaps in public service, and being constantly told that what you are doing is failing the next generation of kids by multiple people who haven’t been in a school in years.
If we are to tackle recruitment and retention, these elements have to be tackled from the government level downwards. They need to be weeded out, and teachers need to be protected.
Only then can we start talking about the boundless opportunities for joy in teaching. Only then can we talk about the small wins every day that add up to enormous job satisfaction. Only then can we talk about the fact that this job can be the best in the world.
Many make it that despite the challenges, but we need the conditions to ensure every teacher and every young person looking for a career can fully appreciate the joy of teaching. If we don’t, the future recruitment and retention troubles will inevitably worsen.
