SLOUGH has been found to be the one of the hardest hit areas in England by the teacher vacancies crisis, new data has revealed.

With only 43.8 potential teachers available to fill each of its 45 teacher vacancies, it featured ninth in the list of the hardest hit areas of England by the teacher shortage.

The report, collated by education software specialist, The Access Group, analysed 2022 Census data on the number of teachers and compared this with the number of current teaching vacancies, to find out which of England’s 50 biggest towns and cities had the least number of teachers available per vacancy.

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Watford was found to have the biggest teacher shortages, with only 16.6 potential teachers per vacancy, while Milton Keynes followed in second (23.4 teachers per vacancy) and Luton placed third (23.6 teachers per vacancy).

Reading, also in Berkshire, was also on the list with only 24.5 potential teachers available to fill each of its 62 teaching vacancies, it featured fourth in a list of the hardest hit areas of England by the teacher shortage.

Out of the top 10 areas with the biggest teacher shortages, eight were located in the South of England, implying this is the region where the teacher vacancies crisis is felt the most.

The findings follow the news that teacher vacancies in England alone have nearly doubled since before Covid, according to a report by the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER).

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Ex-teacher and digital content manager at Access Education Richard Newsome commented: 

“The rising number of teacher vacancies is continuing to cause concern in the education sector, with headteachers warning that the UK is now facing a ‘dangerous’ teacher shortage as the recruitment crisis deepens.

“We’re seeing this ring true in schools up and down the UK - even in areas which have the least shortages in comparison to others.

In turn, school leaders have been increasingly forced to use non-specialist teachers, which threatens to drive down pupil attainment and impacts on the quality of students’ learning. 

“Various solutions have been proposed, ranging from incentives like labour’s proposal to give teachers £2,400 in the early stages of their career, to a greater management of staff, facilitated by technologies like school HR software.

“The way forward must be a multi-faceted approach, which tackles the problem from every angle.”

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On the other end of the scale, Telford, a town in Shropshire, held the fewest teacher shortages, with 934 teachers available per vacancy - over 56 times higher than Watford.