Schools across England face unprecedented struggle to hire English teachers as recruitment crisis grows

Schools in England are struggling to recruit English teachers, with hundreds still trying to fill vacancies in time for September, as headteachers warn they have reached crisis point.

Secondary heads say they have become used to adverts for maths, science, computer science and design technology teachers failing to attract any suitable applicants. But many have been shocked to find that it is now a similar battle to find teachers for English – traditionally a subject that buoyed recruitment numbers.

They warn that if the government does not tackle low pay, overwork and the pressure of inspections by Ofsted, growing teacher shortages will mean spiralling class sizes and children falling behind because they do not have the right specialist subject knowledge.

The national executive of the National Education Union agreed this weekend to stage two further days of strike action over conditions and pay. These will take place on 5 and 7 July. The action will affect state schools and sixth form colleges. Members are calling for an above-inflation pay rise and assurances that money will not come from existing school budgets.

Dr Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the NEU, called on education secretary Gillian Keegan to meet the union urgently, saying it was “in her hands” to avert the action. “There have been no meetings since before Easter. It’s remarkable,” she said. “We’re always willing to come in and talk to the secretary of state but she has chosen to just not engage. It’s a terrible way to treat the profession.”

Last year, almost 40,000 working-age teachers left the profession, the highest level since records began in 2010, according to new school workforce data released by the Department for Education this month.

“Recruiting science and maths teachers has been bad for years, but now subjects which weren’t a problem like English have become shortage areas,” said Jonny Uttley, chief executive of the Education Alliance academy trust, which runs eight schools in Hull and the East Riding of Yorkshire. “It is a crisis, and I don’t use that word lightly.”

This weekend, more than 900 schools were advertising English teaching jobs for an immediate or September start, despite the fact that teachers who are already working in schools have to give a term’s notice, so they have missed the transfer window.

A senior leader in a large multi-academy trust, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “For the first time I can remember, we are struggling to recruit English teachers as so many are leaving for other sectors and not being replaced.”

This year, his trust had spent £50,000 it could not afford on recruitment fees including using agencies to help it fill important staff gaps. “You can’t find a bad teacher, let alone a good one, in some parts of the country,” he added.

Like many headteachers, he was enraged to see Rishi Sunak and education secretary Gillian Keegan celebrating a “record number of teachers” in English schools last week, but neglecting to mention that the 6% rise in the number of teachers since 2010 did not keep pace with an 11% rise in the number of students over the same period.

“Their boasting is such a sickening example of gaslighting that it genuinely makes me want to quit,” the trust leader said. “Vacancies have nearly doubled, and schools are having to promote staff who they would not have considered previously.”

Lee Elliot Major, professor of social mobility at Exeter University, said that the lack of qualified English teachers would hit the poorest children hardest. “English is absolutely critical not just because of the subject itself, but because reading and writing skills open up the whole rest of the curriculum,” he said.

Dr Rachel Roberts, who leads the postgraduate teacher training course in English at Reading University, said: “We’re down on applications. Generally, courses training English teachers are down by about a third across the country.”

Roberts, who was formerly chair of the National Association for the Teaching of English (NATE), is angry at prime minister Rishi Sunak for proclaiming that all pupils should study maths until 18 – a policy which many teachers declared unworkable due to the failure to attract enough maths teachers to teach it even up to age 16.

“The prime minister promoting maths hasn’t helped at all,” she said. “Maths isn’t the only subject that counts. English is just as important but the government isn’t supporting it as though it is [as important].”

NATE believes the decline in recruits training to teach English is being caused in part by a slump in the number of students choosing to study English at A-level. This summer, about 54,000 students are sitting an A-level in English, down 40% from just under 90,000 in 2012.

In turn, this has driven a major fall in the number of students taking a degree in English, with admissions service Ucas reporting a downturn in applications of a third in 10 years.

Bousted, who used to run a training course for English teachers herself, said: “English used to be a subject that buoyed up the rest of the figures on recruitment. Now it’s a shortage subject too.”

Bousted will give evidence on Tuesday to an inquiry by the education select committee on the crisis in teacher recruitment and retention. She added that nearly 20% of children were now being taught English by someone without a relevant qualification.

The department for education said: “The department offers a range of recruitment and retention initiatives to attract the best candidates into teaching, including the reintroduction of a £15,000 bursary, which will be available for prospective English teachers training this autumn.”