does it really take six months+ to recruit a new headteacher? why?

[hatwoman]

Our head has announced his retirement at the end of the school year. for reasons I don;t understand an acting head has been appoionted, to start in September,and a permanent recruitment is to be made in the school year 2010-11. does anyone know what reasons there might be for not recruiting permanently now? I know all the public sector stuff about advertising widely, equal ops, etc (I work in a similar sector myself) but surely 6 months is enough time? happy to strand corrected

iirc, headteachers have to give 4 months notice, so to leave by the end of August they would have to give notice by the end of April, which doesn't give a lot of time for a proper appointment process.

Out of the 5 different schools my children have attended, three of them have had acting heads after the previous head left, at two of them it was for the whole year because they didn't want too much change.

Rusty is right, they have to give a term's notice at their present school, and if you add on top the time taken advertising the post, shortlisting and interviewing, then it's easy to see why it takes so long.

thanks - yes that does make sense.

Also you need to bear in mind that there is a national shortage of head teachers so it's very common for schools to not recruit in the first run.

Many schools will let their heads go with shorter notice, but given the time scale it would be most appropriate to employ an acting head to ensure that something is in place in the event a replacement cannot be found in time.

Yes, any head starting in Sept would have to give notice by end of April so it is practically impossible to get someone in place for September. I am a school governor and we are currently recruiting for a headteacher, we recently advertised and had NO applications at all. Our situation is exacerbated by the fact that as a faith school our pool of applicants is even smaller but we have been reassured that it is by no means unusual not to have any applicants. We are currently going through the process of re-advertising and tweaking the advert but have realistically also had to start work on contingency planning for September without a head in place.

also better to get an acting head in now for sept than panic and appoint seomone unsuitable because you are desperate.

In the private sector it is 18 months

Our Head gave notice last week. I am not enjoying the rush to get the ball rolling to get another.

annh - you're not the school advertising in the Catholic Times for a head at a salary of £160,000 are you?

RustyBear, no we're not! But maybe that is why we can't get any applicants for our post which is offering considerably less than that amount Seriously, if that is the kind of competition we are up against we might as well forget tweaking the ad and fretting about whether we could move up another point on the salary scale!

Actually I was remembering it wrongly - it was only £130,000

Still rather a lot though....

It's very hard to find a HT just now hatwoman.

An Ofsted outstanding infant school in this town advertised for a head and got - how many applicants? Zero. That's right.

You do well to get 3-4 applicants worth interviewing tbh; no-one wants to do the job.

So this may be one reason. And actually there's not much time- HT has to give a term's notice.

Also the school may be wanting to assess any changes needed etc before appointing. It's really vital to make the right choice.

Oh I see others have posted all this!

Our jnr school head left last summer and gave a good deal of notice; school still had acting HT until January this year, when new HT started.

Why is it so hard to recruit a head-teacher?

I always imagined teachers would be trying to work their way up to being a HT?

Maybe teacher's actually like teaching rather than having an office/managerial job all about paperwork and budgets?

DD's school's Headteacher is leaving in 2 weeks and the school are "hoping" to have a new head in place for Sept.

Yes why is there a shortage of teachers wanting to be head out of interest?

Because lots of us went into teaching to work with children in a classroom. And certainly in secondary schools most Head Teachers do no teaching at all. It's a desk job and a very stressful, demanding one, especially if you are doing it well!

My mum worked at a school where it took in excess of a year and three rounds to get a new head.
The first women who was offered a job was then rejected by the governers for being a divorcee - a catholic school but I can't believe they get away with that.

Since I became a governor I have an even greater respect for Headteachers than I had before. It is a very very difficult job to do well and requires you to work almost constantly. The paperwork and "meetings" are horrendous. Dealing with the madness of LA budgeting and funding rules is also another one of it's "joys". I can clearly see why very few people would want to do it.

gawd - you lot aren't exactly instilling reassuring me! I wonder whether tiny rural primaries find it harder or easier to attract someone....hmmm

we had 3 runs at our infant school (small, "outstanding" CoE school) before they found someone they figured was suitable.

There were lotsof rumblings from some parents "oh surely there was someone in the first/second lot)......but many (I included) didn't mind the temporary head teacher while they found someone they were happy with.

He's been here 2yrs now and is excellent am very very glad they didn't just take someone from the first lot of interviews "just to have someone"

The Junior school (also outstanding Ofsted) and fabulous headteacher has resigned.........he's going to a much bigger school closer to his home (he drives 1 1/2hrs to work every day at the moment!), so they're going to be starting the recruitment process as well

"I wonder whether tiny rural primaries find it harder or easier to attract someone....hmmm "

I doubt it - the paperwork would be exactly the same as a larger school, but there would be even less people to delegate it to!

Our smallish rural primary had FOUR applicants. It's my children, you see, people just can't wait to come and work wit them

hatwoman, sorry but often tiny schools find it hard because the salary is proportionately lower on account of the number of pupils.

OTOH a HT of a very small primary may well teach - which may be an attraction for some.

The thing is ambitious potential HT won't want a school that is already outstanding. They will want one that isn't doing so well to prove how good they are when they turn it around.

Oh and most teachers don't want to be a HT as it is a difficult job and mainly office based.

sounds a bit like a male (childless) friend of mine who has a polciy of never picking up peaceful babies. he'll only pick up the ones who are hollering. that way his input can only be positive