More than nine in 10 schools are finding it difficult to recruit, according to a new survey, with heads warning that educational standards may be “at risk”.
The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) surveyed 766 state-sector school and college headteachers and found that 95% were experiencing difficulties when recruiting staff while 43% said the problem was “severe”.
Seven in 10 (72%) heads said they were using supply staff to cover vacancies, with 69% reporting that they were using teachers who were not subject specialists in classes, while 31% reported increasing class sizes to cope with the problem.
Heads cited physics most often as a difficult subject to recruit for, followed by maths, design and technology, chemistry and computing.
Schools also reported that teacher retention was an issue, with nearly two-thirds (65%) of heads saying they were having difficulty keeping staff.
