The end of the second week in January is usually a bit early to be making predictions about the state of the teacher labour market for September. However, in the case of design and technology, the signs of a really difficult job market for schools have been there for some time, and certainly since the publication of the DfE’s Census of Trainees in December 2021. Those signs are now backed up by early data on jobs being advertised.
Using exclusive data from TeachVac, based upon an analysis of recorded job adverts in the first two weeks of January 2022, there are sign of an early increase in demand for such teachers.
Date | jobs 2015 | jobs 2016 | jobs 2017 | jobs 2018 | jobs 2019 | jobs 2020 | jobs 2021 | jobs 2022 |
Week 1 | 10 | 25 | 19 | 16 | 7 | 9 | 29 | 58 |
Week 2 | 20 | 52 | 50 | 47 | 41 | 71 | 67 | 164 |
Week 3 | 20 | 87 | 77 | 87 | 103 | 156 | 123 | |
Week 4 | 40 | 110 | 120 | 105 | 183 | 244 | 183 |
Source: TeachVac
Now, this may just be prudence on the part of schools in bringing forward vacancies, rather than a growth in real demand for such teachers. We won’t know the answer to that question until at least the end of January, and possibly not until even the end of February.
However, with this level of vacancies it is possible to demonstrate by matching vacancy levels to the potential supply of new entrants into the profession for September 2022 that schools may have to rely upon sources of supply other than new entrants much earlier in the recruitment round for September than they might either expect to or like the idea of doing.
TeachVac’s exclusive formula suggest that the ‘free’ pool of new entrants is already lower than at any point at the end of Week 2 of the year since at least 2015.
Date | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
Week 1 | 368 | 412.5 | 371 | 217 | 219 | 343 | 580 | 231 |
Week 2 | 363 | 399 | 356 | 201 | 202 | 312 | 561 | 178 |
Week 3 | 363 | 381.5 | 342 | 181 | 191 | 270 | 533 | |
Week 4 | 353 | 370 | 321 | 172 | 131 | 226 | 503 |
Source: TeachVac
The data also shows that compared with 2020 and 2021 the pool is lower than at the end of January by last Friday and week 2. Should the end of January 2022 number be lower than the end of 2019 number, then the remaining recruitment round may be grim for schools looking to recruit a design and technology teacher of any description. January 2023 vacancies don’t even bear thinking about.
Schools that have signed up for TeachVac’s new matching service at TeachVac Reports – The National Vacancy Service for Teachers and Schools can have access to this type of data for a range of subjects.
What are the implications for schools unable to recruit qualified design and technology teachers? Staffing the curriculum is the obvious problem. What are the longer-term effects of young people not studying this subject? That’s for others to say, and the DfE to act as it sees fit.