Bryan Slater Director of Education	Distribution
	Headteachers of all Norfolk Schools

This document needs your action as detailed below:

ACTION	Title	Collection of Unfilled Vacancy Data
	Summary of contents	Collection of Staff Vacancy Statistics
	Associated documents	Letter from Dr Bryan Slater, Director of Education
	Date	January 2004
	Summary of action required	Complete returns on line, by accessing the proforma on the School Administration section of the School Management Resources site. Your figures should be based as at the first day of the Spring Term. If you are unable to respond on line, please contact Sarah Barker for a hard copy.
	To be completed by	Friday 16^th January
	LEA Contact	Gillian Boon Sarah Barker	(	01603 222901
	E-mail address	sarah.barker@norfolk.gov.uk
	Norfolk Self Review reference	1. How high are standards?
	Document reference	MI 01-04

Dear Headteacher

Collection of Unfilled Vacancy Data - Please respond by Friday 16^th January

Thank you for your past support in providing data on unfilled vacancies and temporary appointments. Significant extra funding has been drawn to the county as a result of this information.

To substantiate the case for continued extra funding to the Eastern Region, all LEAs in our region collect identical vacancy data on the first day of each term. It is vital that we have accurate figures on the teacher vacancies because national funding is dependent upon this data. In order to correlate regional data it is absolutely essential that we receive your replies by Friday 16^th January 2004 at the latest.

Since undertaking this termly gathering of statistics, we have found that almost half of Norfolk schools fail to respond by this deadline. This causes a delay in Norfolk sending it's the overall results for correlation, which reflects badly on us as an LEA. I appreciate that the beginning of term is a busy time, but this form must be completed by the deadline given.

As in the previous terms, schools are asked to respond on line, by completing a proforma, which is located on the Esinet site. Please take the following steps to access the proforma.

From the main Esinet site (www.norfolkesinet.org.uk) :-

· Click on School Management & Governance

· Click on School Management Resources

· Enter your school DfES number & password - this is your standard password, if you don't know what it is, call the ICT Solutions helpdesk on 0845 3033003 and explain why you need it.

· Click on School Administration

· Click on Collection of Unfilled Vacancy Data

Please ensure you read the instructions carefully before completing the proforma.

The information required covers your teacher vacancies, number of trainee teachers, NQT's (as at the first day of the spring term) and also how many Recruitment & Retention points your school awards. Where it asks for the numbers of Graduate Teacher Programme trainees, this only refers to trainees currently employed as instructors by you and undertaking training in your school.

A vacancy is defined as a post for which no permanent, suitably qualified teacher has been appointed, and for which any temporary appointment is for not more than three terms. A nil return is required where no vacancies occur. If you respond on line the collation of data can be immediate.

If it is not possible to respond on-line, paper proformas can be supplied. Please contact Sarah Barker on 01603 22 2901.

Thank you for your support.

Yours sincerely,

Bryan Slater

Director of Education