During my probation year, I was successful in the local authority’s probationer pool interview, yet I was never allocated a teaching position. Shortly after, I applied for the only permanent ASN teaching post advertised in [council removed].
Out of 44 applicants, I was shortlisted as one of just five candidates selected for an interview. Despite demonstrating strong specialist knowledge, I was ultimately unsuccessful due to a perceived lack of relative experience, with the post going to an established teacher who was already in full employment.
This experience highlights a glaring structural flaw in teacher recruitment: early career teachers are validated by central panels as interview-ready, only to be left without placements and forced to compete for scarce open posts against experienced staff who already hold contract security. It creates an impossible catch-22 for post-probationers, who are deemed fully qualified by the council on paper, but blocked from gaining the very long-term experience required to secure a stable job.
This is answer 48 of the 269 written answers that teachers let us quote anonymously in the Scottish Teacher Employment Survey 2026. It answers the survey’s last question: what do the people who make decisions about teacher employment need to know?
We have corrected spelling, added paragraph breaks and removed details that could identify anyone. Words in square brackets are ours.