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Whether you're a permanent teacher, supply teacher or student teacher, you'll find others in the same situation on our Staffroom forum.

Original poster

Supply teacher shortage?

29 replies

Rainbowunicorn76 · 14/11/2021 09:23

Hi! Just curious really. I teach in a school that has had a real run of bad luck recently in terms of losing staff or staff going off sick. We've been told that everything has to be covered internally because there are no supply staff to be found.
We've managed to get one teacher until the end of term, she had retired from the agency then the manager of her agency basically begged her to do "one last stint" for decent money. Apart from that..... nothing.
We're in the North West (Near Manchester if relevant)
Has anybody else found the same thing and if so, where have they gone?

OP posts:
echt · 14/11/2021 09:37

Is the LA running out of overseas teachers because of Covid?

This has happened in Victoria, as travel restrictions have meant the overseas teacher supply has dried up. An additional "drain" has been the government-funded Covid catch-up scheme that has taken up loads of supply staff into contracts.

thebookeatinggirl · 14/11/2021 10:11

We've had real trouble getting supply for our small Primary over the past two weeks. There have been a few days where we have had to have the Head covering when he doesn't have meetings, and a mixture of HLTAs and goodwill etc.

Homez · 14/11/2021 11:26

Same here - and we are South East. Am relatively new to the Education sector, having previously worked in a corporate environment, and am really surprised at the general air of tired negativity that seeks to prevail. A lot of sick leave, and long periods of time off for various personal reasons. Some genuine of course, others seem OTT. A heavy reliance on supply staff, so little certainty on staffing from one week to the next. And a lot of permanent staff looking to jump ship, as they are tired of having to cover so many extras..and feel the grass must be greener elsewhere. It’s a vicious circle it seems.

Beachhuts90 · 14/11/2021 11:35

I know a couple of people who were doing supply before covid. When covid hit their agencies didn't furlough them or anything so they had to find other jobs and income. Neither of them have gone back now. Anecdotal but I wonder if being treated like that in lockdown was really hard for a lot of them and they didn't want to return again after.

AttaGirrrrl · 14/11/2021 11:59

Yep. Same here. North West.

I assume it is three fold:

  1. older/CEV staff resigning
  2. more teacher absences
  3. fewer supply teachers (because of lack of income over covid so finding new jobs; not wanting to be in school now; going full time to replace staff who’ve left due to covid, etc)
Meandmini3 · 14/11/2021 12:18

Supply staff have been treated badly so this is hardly a surprise. Poorly paid with schools largely preferring to use internal cover by TAs. Being offered TA pay instead of teacher pay. And no furlough during Covid.

Howshouldibehave · 14/11/2021 12:39

We have really struggled to get any supply-we had some good ones a few years that the head always requested but they were doing supply due to health reasons (which made teaching on a perm contract unattractive) and have just quit completely due to covid.

We had spent our supply budget for the year by October half term so it doesn’t really matter to us now that we can’t find supply-we couldn’t afford it even if it was out there!

We are using TAs (who have actually mostly done no TA qualifications, let alone hlta ones!) to cover teacher absence at the moment-I’ve never known it this bad.

Favourites · 14/11/2021 13:11

*I assume it is three fold:

  1. older/CEV staff resigning
  2. more teacher absences
  3. fewer supply teachers (because of lack of income over covid so finding new jobs; not wanting to be in school now; going full time to replace staff who’ve left due to covid, etc)*

I think you are right about this.
I am a supply teacher and I know the agency have been struggling to fill requirements some days. I think there is currently a huge demand due to illness.

Original poster
Rainbowunicorn76 · 14/11/2021 13:52

Gosh quite a big problem then!
I wonder how long it'll take to resolve.
It's awful that a lot of supplies were treated so badly re furlough, I know our school and ds' school both took their main "go to" supply teacher into the payroll when Covid hit so I hope this happened a lot and helped a few people anyway.

OP posts:
spanieleyes · 14/11/2021 14:00

We have had days where there have been NO primary supply teachers in the whole county, despite calling every agency going! The most recent one had a 60 mile journey to make to get to us. When we have needed 3 or 4 teachers at a time, it is just impossible.

13luckyblackcats · 14/11/2021 15:09

SEN here, we have a lot of staff relative to pupil numbers, and a lot of illness recently. Quite a few times we've been told there is no cover available, and have been told they've called 6 or more agencies. The preference is to cover internally for continuity (and lower cost, obv) which means that things like SaLT and interventions aren't getting done as the staff are all in classrooms. I had a key member of my team off for a week, no cover, which was difficult.

Original poster
Rainbowunicorn76 · 14/11/2021 17:14

@13luckyblackcats

SEN here, we have a lot of staff relative to pupil numbers, and a lot of illness recently. Quite a few times we've been told there is no cover available, and have been told they've called 6 or more agencies. The preference is to cover internally for continuity (and lower cost, obv) which means that things like SaLT and interventions aren't getting done as the staff are all in classrooms. I had a key member of my team off for a week, no cover, which was difficult.
I can imagine! It's stressful isn't it because it makes everybody worried about the consequences of they're sick.
OP posts:
Treaclepie19 · 14/11/2021 17:45

Gosh! This makes for an interesting read. I hadn't realised things were so bad and selfishly now wondering whether my son's school would like to take me on as their go to supply 😂🙈

AttaGirrrrl · 14/11/2021 17:50

That’s not selfish @Treaclepie19. They’d probably bite your hand off (especially if they could pay you direct instead of via an agency)

My mum considered offering herself for supply at my school. Then I reminded her about covid rates and she changed her mind!

Howshouldibehave · 14/11/2021 17:57

They’d probably bite your hand off (especially if they could pay you direct instead of via an agency)

Heads round here prefer to pay for supply through an agency as it works out cheaper for them to pay a flat rate than paying the teacher directly to scale where they have to pay pension/overheads etc

PumpkinPie2016 · 18/11/2021 19:51

Same at my school. Large secondary in the North West.

Days where we simply cannot get supply staff for love nor money Confused

RuleWithAWoodenFoot · 18/11/2021 21:43

Yep, we need 3 supplies tomorrow, can't get any. Will do class combining, TA cover and DH covering a few hours.

Thing is, when the class is slowly going down with covid, the numbers we need to cover for are reducing... but that means we don't want to put those children in other classes in case it spreads the plague.

JaffavsCookie · 18/11/2021 22:01

North east here, we have a huge COVID problem in both staff and students and are really struggling to get cover staff ( and we have internal cover supervisors already)
Twice in recent weeks staff have been asked to do rarely cover, and it has been a genuine request

PingleO · 19/11/2021 04:57

https://www.tes.com/news/staff-absences-why-cover-teachers-are-short-supply?amp

This says it all really.

Chr1stmasCarole · 19/11/2021 06:01

@PingleO

https://www.tes.com/news/staff-absences-why-cover-teachers-are-short-supply?amp

This says it all really.

Good article, thanks!
DinkyDaisy · 20/11/2021 08:14

Supply TAs short as well.
Puts an awful lot of pressure on remaining staff.

Howshouldibehave · 20/11/2021 08:21

@DinkyDaisy

Supply TAs short as well. Puts an awful lot of pressure on remaining staff.
But it’s ‘business as normal’ as far as Ofsted is concerned!

Who cares if you’re on 50% of staff, children are off left right and centre and you have parents and other members of your school community in hospital with covid-it’s time for a PE deep dive… let’s see your curriculum intent!

Sowhatifiam · 20/11/2021 08:29

I last did supply 5 years ago. I am receiving more and more emails every day about positions available locally. I had one agency send me quite an abrupt second email, demanding to know my availability from January because I hadn’t responded to the first. And a text at 9:30 at night asking me my availability from an agency I had never even registered with, just had an initial conversation but realised they had very little work locally so it was pointless - first contact in 8 years! There is very much an air of desperation at the moment.

Howshouldibehave · 20/11/2021 08:45

@PingleO

[[https://www.tes.com/news/staff-absences-why-cover-teachers-are-short-supply?amp]]

This says it all really.

The ‘ideas for the future’ section is interesting. Supply teachers directly employed and shared across schools? We could group schools together by location and call them local authorities-and they could do the payroll for the supply teachers with no need for agencies. Why has nobody thought of that?!
monkeysox · 20/11/2021 09:31

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4405334--to-think-my-daughters-class-has-a-right-to-a-qualified-teacher?pg=7

It's the same everywhere. We nearly had to send a year group home as couldn't get enough supply