Would you consider me for an interview?

[SilverBirch33]

Reposted from Secondary topic.
My DC are now both in primary and I was thinking of going back to secondary. I am:
Late forties, secondary MFL specialist with 8 years' experience, not worked in a school for nearly a decade except as a volunteer (academic- related not eg lunch supervisor). However I have done a lot of private tuition in that near-decade.
Would I be advised to volunteer in a secondary school MFL team to get recent experience first?
Any advice welcome.

As they can’t recruit fast enough I think you’d be fine. I’d show you were up to date with the new GCSE though. Exam marking?

Supply teaching would get your experience up too

Make sure there are no gaps on your cv and every period of time is accounted for. For safeguarding reasons, we often don’t shortlist people who have a gap of time which isn’t explained.

There’s a teaching shortage-round here you would be snapped up.

Sign up with a couple of agencies and do a bit of supply teaching - that will give you all the experience you need - that's what I did after my career break. I had no intention of doing supply long term, I purely did it to get a recent reference on my CV and to dip my toe back in the water - I just did a couple of days a week for a term and then started applying for permanent jobs. There's a shortage of MFL teachers, so once you've done that, you'll get a job somewhere.

My school is over-subscribed, Ofsted outstanding and top 100. We struggle to get many MFL candidates whenever we advertise at all, let alone people worth interviewing. If we find it hard to recruit, I think you’d get interviews no problem! Go for it.

You’d get an interview in a flash in my school!
Make sure you are aware of the new spec GCSE.

Crying out for you up in many LA's in Scotland too Op! Some good advice upthread about maybe dipping your par in through supply. All the best!

Oar*

If your language experience means you could also teach English, emphasise that. Almost every school I know is advertising for English teachers at the moment.

Anecdotally, I have seen lots of schools (even outstanding ones with better working conditions) really struggle to recruit good MFL teachers. I think you would definitely get at least an interview. Why not make contact now with a couple of schools that you particularly like and say that you are looking to move back into teaching and would they be happy to ‘host’ you as a classroom helper/volunteer for a couple of days to help you dip your toe back into the water. Be super helpful and proactive while you are there and I bet they would think of you as soon as a vacancy became available. Good luck!

There is an MFL recruitment group on Facebook.