Good schools that have regular vacancies

[suk44]

I noticed that nearly every year some schools in my region seem to have at least one job advertised in a particular subject. These aren't challenging schools where you'd expect higher turnover, but in schools with very good reputations and in some cases well known private schools.

Would this put you off at all from applying? I would've thought such schools would retain staff for much longer, although the subject I'm looking at is a core subject where I guess they have more options to move elsewhere.

It depends why they are leaving. We regularly have vacancies and it's often because people have done their time and been promoted elsewhere, or because the school is nice and people have gone part time so there's space in the department/have taken a career break after maternity leave.

Well, in schools that are good to work in you find people stay in post longer so there can be less opportunity for promotion. That might be it.

Some schools can become teacher “hothouses” where teachers go, are trained up and leave relatively quickly for promotion.

It also depends how big their departments are. If you’ve got 12 maths teachers then you will have more frequent vacancies than if you’ve only got 2.

Is it maths?!

Or it could be a good school for kids but treat staff like slaves?

@monkeysox I def knew a few like that! Worked in one last year, horrible.

@monkeysox yup

There are a couple of schools near me where the HoD for my subject comes up every year like clockwork. (Small dept, would imagine one or two teachers max). On paper they’re good schools but I wouldn’t touch with a barge pole. There must be a reason why they’re readvertising every single year.

PotteringAlong I agree. Our core departments usually have a vacancy every year, but they are big teams, lots maternity leaves, part timers and some promotions.

I worked in supposedly the best comprehensive in the country. Amazing reputation for results, outstanding OFSTED. Etc etc.
It was hell.
Worst teaching year of my life.
I’ve been teaching 14 years but this was horrific. I lasted a year; and every year I see 4-6 vacancies for this same school.

Oh the stuff that went on there was beyond anything I’ve experienced at other schools.

We've had lots of vacancies this year. It's mainly because the staff have been here so long they're all retiring (although it's true most have gone early)

Oh please do elaborate @shadowboy!
I work in a school where 5 new teachers started this year.. it is quite challenging :( I'm not sure why this didn't have alarm bells ringing for me immediately.

Ok so we had 3 hour long lessons... even with year 7. Poor kids lost concentration after 45 min.
We were not allowed to be part of a union (major alarm bells!)
There was no staff room as it “bred discontent”
If a student was off sick/ill etc but completed an additional lesson after school (that you hosted) they could have the register changed to present - obviously this is how the school got amazing attendance rates!

We had to eat at the same table as the students.... so no real break.

All trips and visits were done in the holidays- so I used to lose all my half terms...

One of my students disappeared I.e. was expelled for writing with tip-ex on a table. (Extreme!)

One of my colleagues lost her father. They rang her and told her if she had more than 2 days off she would forfeit 5% of her salary (this was written into the contracts - no more than 2 days off per term)

I could go on...

We were not allowed to be part of a union (major alarm bells!)

Isn't that illegal?!

In UK? How can they forbid union membership?

@shadowboy was it Holland Park?

They simply told me when I arrived that being part of a union was unnecessary and they didn’t recognise union action.

They told me no one was a member. I quietly remained with the union.

It wasn’t Holland Park, no.

I work at a school like this. It is a good school, both for the kids and mostly for the staff ( we have some rubbish stuff but not too much) but our staff turnover is high. Often for good reasons and partly I think folk think the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. We get quite a lot of staff returning having gone off to work elsewhere!

Depends on the size of the school. I work in a big school. There are always vacancies because people move out of London, have babies, go for promotion elsewhere, want to try a different type of school (e.g. private), etc. Nothing sinister. I would say once a school is a certain size then a certain number of staff leaving each year is inevitable.

If it’s geography it’s because it’s a shortage subject. My local school advertises for a hod every year.

In my kids' school it's mostly because they recruit very young teachers who get a really good teaching experience of a truly comprehensive school and then move on for promotion. And also because where we live teachers can't actually afford to rent or buy property, so the young ones live in houseshares, but when they want to move to the next stage of life they can't afford to stay.

Yes, we lose a lot of young teachers who move to where they can earn the same salary but buy much more affordable housing once they start thinking about settling down.

I think there can be a high turnover in London schools, possibly because of property prices: young teachers start off by renting, then meet someone and want to buy together, but quickly realise they have to move 50 miles away from their school for anything affordable. So they leave!

One school I worked in used to recruit NQTs exclusively for any non-TLR posts. They would all be on a one year contract and the head would decide if any were worthy of a permanent contract the following year. Most of the NQTs were doomed to failure as he thought that if they weren’t already the finished product by October half term they were no good. So many potentially great teachers had their confidence knocked after a year at that school.