THE first Scottish-based teacher employment agency is about to fill its first supply posts in independent schools. By next year it intends offering its services to local authorities as well.
Tony Thornton, founder of the Teacher Employment Agency (Scotland), says inadequacies in the system of temporary posts led him to give up his job as a principal teacher of biology to set up a database of teachers seeking work.
Having advertised in The TES Scotland and daily newspapers, he is now interviewing more than 40 applicants with a view to sending the first of them to independent schools early next month.
A former Army officer who taught at Cleveden Secondary in Glasgow, Mr Thornton says: “I was a supply teacher myself for 18 months and have depended on them as a principal teacher.”
Initially, independent schools will pay a commission for each day’s work.
Judith Sischy, director of the Scottish Council of Independent Schools, said: “This is a service we very much want to see provided for our schools, and we hope we can work together.”
