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Recruitment and retention

 
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School leaders are driven by an ambition to provide opportunities for young people to reach their full potential. To fulfil that ambition, teaching must attract and retain a high-quality, well-trained and properly rewarded workforce. 

Through our work with members, NAHT is documenting and communicating the unfolding recruitment and retention crisis taking place in our schools to policymakers at the highest levels. 

NAHT is campaigning to:

Ensure all schools can recruit and retain excellent teachers and leaders

  • Lobby for change and reform of key macro issues affecting recruitment and retention: pay, accountability, funding and workload and identify key actions to be taken to improve these
  • Press for the development of a range of flexible leadership and non-leadership pathways to support recruitment and retention, including new opportunities that will retain the experience and expertise of mid to late career leaders
  • Build on the opportunities offered by the Early Career Framework to press for similar support for new heads, deputies and assistants, and school business leaders
  • Maintain a watching brief on the impact of Brexit on teacher supply
  • Lobby the DfE for practical measures to address the workload of school leaders, including protection of strategic leadership time
  • Campaign for a staged real term, restorative pay award for teachers and school leaders
  • Develop a position on the role of CEOs and other posts outside the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document (STPCD) including a position on which roles should have a requirement for Qualified Teacher Status (QTS)
  • Lobby for a review of the pay system, including the STPCD
  • Press government to maintain and enhance the teacher's pension scheme and/or Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
  • Support work to ensure the profession represents a diverse workforce, including those with protected characteristics
  • Support effective partnerships between school leaders and governors with clarity of roles and responsibilities across different school structures.

Create a safe working environment for school leaders and their staff

  • Lobby the DfE to take concrete steps to tackle verbal and physical abuse and aggression against school staff, including harassment online and through social media.  

Ensure professional recognition of school business leaders (SBLs)

  • Lobby the DfE for SBLs to be included within a new national framework of terms and conditions for school staff
  • Promote the professional standards framework for all SBLs
  • Raise the profile and understanding of the SBL role across the school sector, including with governors.  

 

Read our latest report on the school leader retention crisis (December 2022)
 
Read the latest updates in our pay hub
 
Read the latest updates in our pensions hub
 
Find out more about our campaign to Restore Pay in Education
 
Find out more about NAHT's work for school business leaders
 

Covid-19 pandemic guidance – Burgundy Book notice periods for teachers and school leaders

​Jointly agreed statement between ASCL, LGA, NAHT, NASUWT NEU and NGA

The Easter period and thereafter is typically a very busy time for school recruitment. In light of the current school closures, there may well be disruption to the recruitment and resignation processes for those schools governed by or using the Burgundy Book provisions; in particular the requirement for teachers to provide written notice by 31 May of their intention to leave a school's employment by 31 August of any year. (For head teachers the deadline to provide written notice is by 30 April of their intention to leave a school's employment by 31 August of any year).

The extent of the impact will vary from school to school and therefore we do not believe that there should be any changes to the notice periods. In this difficult period, there will need to be an element of flexibility all round. We would encourage schools to have a flexible response, if it appears that teachers and leaders are impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic and submit a resignation outside of the normal time-frame. For those employees that are looking to resign and/or retire themselves, we would encourage you to provide your governing boards and/or senior leadership team with as much notice as possible and stay within the standard notice period dates as far as is possible, as you would do in normal circumstances. It may also be helpful to direct boards to NGA's current guidance on managing the head teacher recruitment process in the current situation.

In terms of recruitment, schools may wish to consider managing applications and interviews virtually while the advice from the government is to remain at home or choose to delay advertising vacancies until later in the year. Schools should not be conducting face to face interviews or encouraging applicants to visit schools during this period. 

We are raising the potential impact of any disruption with the Department for Education (DfE), asking for further guidance and support for schools to ensure that there is not a deficit of teachers and/or leaders, who have been unable to move around the system, ready for the Autumn term. 

First published 30 March 2020

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