Supply teachers are an essential resource and in high demand, especially in times of teacher shortages, staff absences, and unforeseen vacancies.
Finding and hiring good supply teachers can be challenging, expensive, and time-consuming. Which is why building a reliable pool of supply teachers is crucial for maintaining the quality of education, minimising disruption in schools, and ensuring students continue to receive high-quality instruction.
With a pool of available supply teachers, you can fill staffing gaps at short notice and reduce disruptions to teaching and the timetables of your students. There are different ways to build a supply pool for your school, which fully depends on your needs and preferences.
Here are some strategies to help develop a dependable supply teacher pool.
Understand the current landscape
Before focusing your efforts on creating a pool of supply teachers, it's essential to understand the education landscape and the needs of your school, both now and in the future. The UK has experienced significant teacher shortages in recent times, brought to the fore by increased pupil numbers and teachers leaving the profession.
Schools often rely on recruitment agencies, like the Lancashire Teaching Agency (LTA), to provide supply teachers, but to ensure your requirements can be met effort needs to be given to creating a structured approach to supply.
Establish a centralised system
A centralised system can streamline the recruitment and deployment of supply teachers.
Local authorities or multi-academy trusts (MATs) can play a pivotal role in managing this system, which utilises a database that includes qualified and vetted supply teachers to ensure schools have quick and easy access to suitable candidates.
This system can also track the availability, specialisations, and performance of supply teachers – ensuring your school isn’t affected by teacher shortages.
Attract qualified teachers
To build a robust talent pool, it's essential to attract qualified teachers and those who can step up when needed. This can be achieved in various ways:
Competitive pay and benefits: offering competitive pay rates and benefits to supply teachers can make your school more attractive. It’s also worth showcasing the perks of your school, be it location, the curriculum, or your facilities.
Flexibility: many teachers choose supply work for its flexibility. Highlighting the ability to choose assignments that fit their schedule can be a significant draw.
Support and professional development: offering support and opportunities for professional development can attract high-quality teachers. Providing induction training and ongoing CPD (continuing professional development) ensures supply teachers are well-prepared and feel valued.
Create a vetting process
As employers, schools need to place more emphasis on ensuring that candidates have a positive experience in the screening process, or risk hindering talent attraction and retention.
Ensuring the quality of supply teachers is paramount and one sure-fire way of doing that is by creating a strong vetting process. An effective process should include:
Background checks: comprehensive background checks, including DBS (Disclosure and Barring Service) checks, are essential.
Reference checks: checking references from previous employers can provide insight into a candidate's reliability and teaching performance.
Interview and assessment: conducting interviews and teaching assessments can help gauge a candidate's suitability for the role and for your school.
Build a diverse pool
Lack of diversity in the teaching workforce is a persistent issue in the UK education system. A diverse pool of teachers can cater to the varied needs of different schools, while bringing different perspectives to the classroom and enriching the education experience of students. This includes teachers with specialisations in subjects like STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics), languages, and special education.
The absence of diverse educators, even in a supply capacity, can make success feel less attainable to pupils from minority groups and could ultimately lead to unconscious biases that are difficult to shift.
Utilise technology
Technology can significantly enhance the management of your supply teachers. Digital platforms and apps used by recruitment agencies can help facilitate:
Real-time matching: matching available teachers with school needs in real-time.
Availability tracking: keeping track of teacher availability and preferences. Modern technology can be an asset, with many applicant tracking systems (ATS) and software solutions now available for schools.
Feedback and ratings: allowing schools to provide feedback and rate supply teachers, which can help maintain high standards.
The technology itself can be quick to set up but the recruitment and maintenance of local supply pools will require schools, recruitment agencies and local authorities to work together. Teacher shortages shouldn’t be something you have to tackle on your own.
Provide continuous support
The support required doesn’t end with recruitment. Continuous support for supply teachers is crucial for retention and performance.
To ensure supply teachers can grow with your school, be sure to keep them informed about any changes in school policies, expectations, and values. It may also be worth pairing new supply teachers with experienced mentors who can provide guidance and support, allowing them to get up to speed as quickly as possible.
Our very own LTA supply service provides supply teachers with access to teaching resources and materials to help them deliver quality lessons and grow as education professionals.
Be open to agency collaboration
You can develop your own pool of skilled, flexible supply teachers, however, this can be time consuming and limit you to a small fraction of teaching talent. It’s significantly more efficient to partner with an agency with extensive geographic reach and a large talent bank to call upon when you might need it.
With Reed, you will have access to a pool of qualified teachers and a team that can find your school suitable teachers when the need arises. All teaching and support staff have been screened and vetted, so you can be sure all supply teachers meet the necessary qualifications and background checks set by the Department for Education.
Monitor and evaluate
When it comes to maintaining your supply pool, it’s in your best interest to regularly monitor and evaluate your teachers to uphold high standards of quality. This includes:
Performance reviews: conducting regular performance reviews and providing constructive feedback to supply teachers to help them grow and develop.
Feedback from schools: gathering feedback from schools about their experiences with supply teachers can identify areas for improvement while identifying your need for supply.
Adjusting strategies: being flexible and willing to adjust strategies based on feedback and changing needs will not only help attract new supply but retain the services of those already on your books.
Promote the role of supply teachers
Finally, promoting the importance and value of supply teachers can help build a positive image. Recognising and celebrating their contributions to education can enhance their job satisfaction and encourage more teachers to consider supply roles.
By working with the same pool of supply teachers regularly, schools can build trust and rapport with them. This helps create a sense of community within the school, which is beneficial for pupils and teachers.
If you are looking to hire teaching staff, get in touch with our specialist education recruiters today.
