Building on our campaign to access fair pay for all supply teachers and school support staff we are today delighted to announce our accreditation as a Living Wage Employer by the Living Wage Foundation. The Living Wage campaign has a basic fairness at its heart: all workers should be paid enough to live [...]
Since March the education sector, like many others, has faced a once in a generation challenge due to the coronavirus pandemic. Whilst schools have done a fantastic job in tackling the situation head on, we can anticipate that a new set of challenges, particularly around recruitment and workforce, will emerge when the school year [...]
This is how Local Authorities, Multi Academy Trusts and other school groups in England are running cost-effective and ethical supply pools, today. Over the last twenty years, the supply teaching sector has become a fragmented wild west where it’s all too common for schools to be fleeced and supply teachers exploited. It’s time [...]
You may have heard that thousands of supply teachers across the country have been struggling to receive financial support during the coronavirus pandemic. Many agencies and the umbrella companies which agency teachers work through have either not yet furloughed their teachers or have only been able to offer them furlough at 80% of the [...]
Many supply teachers have been ‘left in limbo’ amid uncertainty of eligibility for furlough payments. The reason for this is that there are several employment and payment mechanisms which are used across the sector, and Government guidance has not yet explicitly addressed furlough eligibility for every scenario. Below we break down how these mechanisms [...]
We’re currently helping supply teachers to earn up to 25% more than via a typical agency/umbrella company arrangement at no extra cost to their regular school(s). We have found that Employer’s NI contributions, admin fees and other deductions are routinely being taken from supply teachers’ agreed rate of pay. Those teachers thought they had [...]
Every year, over £0.5bn is spent on recruitment agency fees in public sector schools alone. That’s a staggering £30,000 per school! Whether it’s agency fees for temporary staff or permanent staff (including temporary to permanent fees), online job advertising or other indirect recruitment costs like admin and consultancy fees, this much-needed money is being diverted [...]
Our recent exposé on agency fees charged to schools generated much heated debate from schools, agencies and teachers. Now it's the teachers' turn. Here we’ll shine a light on the other side of the coin -- agency supply teacher pay, and the often indecipherable fees, deductions and accruals that appear each week on the payslips of agency [...]
How a London Primary school now saves thousands on agency fees The Background Primary School in Inner London, 420 pupils Since October 2018, the school has engaged a KS2 teacher, Claire*, via a traditional supply agency. Claire was speculatively marketed to the school via an email. Coincidentally the school had a sudden need [...]
With both pupil numbers and demand for teachers set to rise in the near future, it will become increasingly important for school leaders not just to recruit, but to retain good staff. New models for better retention are required. The number of teachers joining the profession has roughly counterbalanced the number leaving it in recent [...]
