Advertising for a headteacher vacancy: requirements

If you're in the process of recruiting a headteacher, get an overview of what you need to do.

Understand your requirements

Maintained schools

You must advertise any headteacher vacancy in whatever way you consider to be appropriate, unless you have a good reason not to (find examples of possible “good reasons” at the bottom of the page).

See regulations 15 and 27 of the School Staffing (England) Regulations 2009) and page 9 of the Department for Education’s (DfE’s) guidance. 

Academies

The regulations outlined above don’t apply to you.

Instead, double check your articles of association and funding agreement just in case they outline any requirements around how your school should advertise vacancies.

It's good practice to advertise as widely as possible

This is so that you can select the best applicants for each position. The DfE told us this.

You can advertise exclusively