I would use TES rather than Facebook. I would also look to see if the local authority has a jobs board or service. if it’s a small school it’s probable that someone reasonably locally will get the role / apply

Hi Elizabeth... what does the school usually do to recruit teachers. Not a lot different.

In reply to Steve Bridger:

Most of the teachers have been there for donkeys year so I don't know.

Hi Elizabeth, following on from your post on the CIPD member group, I had a peek at the Worcestershire County Council website and most schools in the area advertise on the eteach website (the LEA actually link to it) www.eteach.com/teaching-jobs-worcestershire I'm not whether you will need to open an account or the whether LEA's schools HR service can do it for you? Normally. only the current Head Teacher and Chair of Governors are involved in the recruitment (at least that is what happens at my school), asides from the interview, any prospective candidate will need to give a presentation on how to improve the schools Ofsted rating with a view to tackling areas where the school is weak, what you would be looking for could be something simple as like as an example, changing the layout of the EYFS classroom so the children are more focussed in their development activities.

In reply to Paul:

Tha ks, Paul. As I u dersyand the current headtea her would not be involved in recruiting a new one so the interview panel will be the chair and two other governors. It is an outstanding school so they can't really improve the Ofsted. I think we are just concerned that there aren't many great candidates out there and as a small school the salary isn't as large as other schools can offer.

In reply to Elizabeth:

Hi Elizabeth

As it's unlikely to appeal to those who are presently head teachers, all the more reason to pitch the vacancy notice effectively to *aspirant* head teachers: eg '..... an invaluable first headship opportunity for a talented and ambitious deputy head teacher....blah blah.....'

And if it's already an outstanding school, the Governors (and any new Head) should be only too aware that when you're already at the top of the ladder there's a very grave future risk of slithering down to the bottom via one of those many lurking snakes. Ofsted have a mission actively to discourage 'coasting' schools and it's usually as big if not bigger a challenge to keep an outstanding school that way upon re-inspection than it is to improve upon a less than outstanding grading.

Many schools learn this lesson the hard way.

In reply to David:

We definitely aren't resting on our laurels. The school has a very innovative curriculum, with other teachers visiting to learn how the school operates. You are right though, we will be appealing to current deputies I think. I am a bit concerned the draft advert makes too much mention of the schools 'Christian Ethos' as it is a c of E school. I don't want to put people off applying if they are of different or no faith.

In reply to Elizabeth:

In that case, I would follow similar advice to David, however, what I would say is a headteacher is a leader, not a manager so what I would do is perhaps look at bringing in a local HR Consultant who is trained to do Psychometric Tests and see if your candidates fit.

But you still need the presentation as well, I would be asking what are they going to be doing as a way of objectives? Someone on the panel should have done the Governors training for performance management of the headteacher as well as the safer recruitment course.

In reply to Paul:

Thank you. That is very helpful.

Hi Elizabeth
Are you a local authority school or an academy? In either case you should be getting support and guidance from your parent body - the governors shouldn't be having to do this all by themselves. When I recruited a headteacher two years ago, we started the process as a local authority school and finished it as an academy as we were academising right in the middle of the recruitment timeline. ;-) However the local authority and the academy group sorted out drafting the recruitment pack and placing the advert and collating the applications. Myself and the Chair of Governors shortlisted and interviewed (with one of the academy leaders) and sat in on the pupils Q&A but the academy arranged the interview schedule and other activities.

If it helps, we advertised in the TES, on LinkedIn, through the academy group and on the Local Authority website.

Our interview process was for the candidates to deliver an assembly to the children (assessed by the academy leaders), a Q and A with the school council representatives (which we sat in on but the children gave their verdict) and an interview. The candidates also had lunch with the pupils and had time to chat with the staff in the staff room.

Kind regards

Jackie

In reply to Jacqueline:

Thank you, Jackie. Broadly my experience, too.

Hi

If you are a CofE school then your Diocese consultant will be involved and a collective worship will most likely be part of the assessment process. They attend a lot of Headteacher interviews so will be a good source of advice. The other place to look is your LA/external consultant as they will also be involved.

In our recent process we had an assembly, meeting with school council, a lesson, learning walk and book scrutiny followed by a presentation on their observations and next steps and of course an interview. (There was a buffet lunch with all the staff but this did not form part of the assessment!).

If you have access to resources such as The Key there are checklists and reminders about bias etc.

I hope that helps.
Melissa

I was recently (August 2019) involved in the recruitment of our new Head Teacher in a local authority school in Scotland so I suspect our procedures may be slightly different as we don't work with Boards of Governors. All local/public authority jobs in Scotland are advertised via the authority website and "My Jobs Scotland" although our education authority also regularly use social media to further advertise the vacancy links to the website. Our recruitment process for a HT role is that the applicants who are selected for interview are subject to a 4 part recruitment process - an assessment centre day, a focus group involving the existing school staff, a focus group involving current school pupils and then the final element is the formal interview with a panel comprising of the Deputy Chief Executive for Education and Head of Education from the local authority, a locally elected councillor, an existing HT within the authority and then 2 parent representatives from the parent council. Results from all elements of the process were involved in reaching a final decision.

At the formal interview, each candidate had to present a 10 minute presentation on a given subject (on this occasion it was the candidates vision for the future of the school in 5 years) followed by an agreed set of questions which were asked of each candidate.

Happy for you to contact me privately if you want someone to bounce things off.

In reply to Jacqueline:

Thanks, Jackie. We are a maintained school but not sure how much help we are getting from the LA. Everything has to be paid for out of school budget. I will make a note of your advice about the interview process. Thank you.

I do a lot of teacher recruitment in my school, and without doubt the majority of applications come from advertising in the TES and e-Teach. We use both, and if I could only use one I'd go with the TES (although their leadership advertising packages are not cheap!) I'd certainly skip the print version, and go just online - anyone who is interested in your role will be looking there.

Timing is also key. At a conference I was at a couple of years ago, a rep from the TES informed us that the single busiest day on their recruitment pages is 1st January, every year. So depending on when you're planning to start the recruitment process, don't wait until January to run your advert - run it in December and through the holidays if you can. I'd imagine the same principles apply to a lesser extent with other holiday periods, so try to advertise over a period which includes a holiday.

Good luck.