This guidance is intended to assist with the completion of your application for employment. You should ensure that all the information you provide is accurate and in sufficient detail to allow the Academy to get a full picture of your skills, knowledge and qualifications. Please ensure you complete all the sections of the application form or mark them as not applicable appropriately. Apart from having the correct details for you, the information is relevant to establishing your identity and will help with the appointment and the enhanced disclosure we will take up.

Please do re-read your application form and check for basic errors or omissions before submitting it. Make sure you check your spelling and punctuation ! You should be aware that your spell check won’t pick out words which are correctly spelled in a particular context, but are nonetheless incorrect in that particular place. Also be mindful of how you punctuate your information – especially if you are applying for a teaching role, we do expect that you can use the hanging apostrophe correctly, for example !

Your education and employment history

For teaching applications, we have separated out the information on your teacher training, and qualifications to make it easier for you, and for us to follow your training and career to date. For non-teaching applications we ask that you provide your education and employment history in order, from when you left secondary school. You should ensure you account for your time since then, to the present day, including periods of study or unemployment, for example. If you need to explain any gaps, please use the section after your education and employment history to do so.

Your personal statement

This is your chance to tell us why you should be employed within the Academy. As a general piece of advice, please don’t say “I can do this” without providing some examples of what you can do, when you have done it, etc. If you have illustrated how you meet the criteria, we are more likely to be persuaded that you can do it.

• Please ensure your personal statement addresses the identified qualities on the person specification, as these are the qualities we are looking for. It is helpful if you address the points(in whatever order), rather than just writing your autobiography : providing this focus helps us ensure that we don’t miss any vital points.
• We value transferrable skills, including those gained outside the teaching profession. This may include work in other sectors or professions and, equally, non- work based skills you may have. If you have been a volunteer with any organisation, or have spent time bringing up a family, please tell us about this as well.

Your references

Any appointment we make will be subject to receiving references which are satisfactory to us. You should ensure that you provide details for two referees who can tell us about your qualities and suitability to work with children and young people. Where we consider it relevant and necessary, we may seek references from any of your other employers. For successful candidates, we verify the reference by speaking to the referee to ensure the information is genuine.

Recruitment Monitoring

Providing this information allows us to look at our processes and see if there are any unintended barriers to recruitment amongst any groups who may wish to work at the Academy.  In relation to Disability, we ask if you consider if your disability has prevented meeting any of the  requirements on the person specification : we do this in order to seek to discount any disability or impairment from the decision making process. We guarantee Candidates with Disabilities an interview if they meet the essential criteria. If you do not tell us about any disability, we cannot guarantee to do this.

Relationships to senior staff within the Academy

If you are related to, or have any relationship, with a senior member of staff or member of the Directors or Governing Body of the Academy, please ensure you complete this declaration. False or incorrect information provided here may result in an offer of employment being withdrawn or, if you are in post, dismissal. Equally, direct or indirect canvassing of these people may result in your disqualification of your application.

Declaration

If you submit your application electronically, we will ask you to sign your form, if we call you for interview.  In submitting your application as complete, you are confirming that the information you are providing in all sections is accurate.

Various

Adding further information

If you find you run out of space in any section, please provide it on a word processed document. Where you do add extra information, please ensure you indicate clearly which section the information belongs to.

Data Protection

Just a word about Data Protection. We will only use your application form for the purposes of recruitment selection and, if you are successful, as the basis of the information we use in order to establish a contract with you.  We securely dispose of unsuccessful applications in line with our records management policy.  Information on privacy, in relation to recruitment, can be found here, and our full fair processing notice can be found here.

Interview

If we ask you to come for interview, we will ask you to bring your original qualification certificates and some photo ID with you.  It is now at this stage that we ask for a declaration over any criminal records (etc.) from you, as well as ask for information about social media you use.  We are now required to undertake an online search, to ensure that any material you post or is publicly available is not incompatible with working in a school. For teaching posts we will always ask you to undertake a short teaching activity, the details of which we will provide to you when we invite you to interview. This is so we can see you interact with the children you may teach, if successful, and see how you are at communicating and dealing with different situations.

Any queries ?

If you have any further queries regarding this post, or working at Harton, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. You can

• Ring the Academy- on (0191) 427 4050 and ask to speak to Human Resources or the Head of Department where the vacancy is, if you want to find out about the department
• E – mail us – on recruitment@hartonacademy.co.uk and we’ll find the best person to get back to you, or
• Visit us – though contacting us first to make an appointment may be more productive

Good luck – and thank you for your interest in Harton Academy !