It's been an exciting journey for us. We set out two years ago with a bold plan to make a change within Education recruitment. We've made some big strides in helping schools save money in London, but there is still a long way to go.

Education recruitment is broken

The current system is set-up around an inherent conflict of interest between agencies and the education system. Recruiters are completely driven by their commission. The more they charge schools and the less they pay teachers, the more they take home. This creates a market that fails to do right by the education system. More worryingly, it also introduces the temptation for unsavoury business practices that are exacerbated by the lack of qualifications required to be an education recruiter or the lack of regulation required to run an agency.

It's time for a change

15 years ago it would have been unheard of to book a restaurant or hotel online, today it is rare to book either of those two by phone. Arranging cover for schools will follow this trend shortly.

The use of an online platform allows for a level of transparency and efficiency that revolutionises the system — schools can see the pool of available supply teachers by proximity and skills instantly at the click of a button, instead of seeing only a limited group of teachers found via many inefficient and time-consuming phone calls in the morning.

"We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten" — Bill Gates

The teaching recruitment solution Manchester deserves

As experienced technology entrepreneurs with a passion for improving education we started Zen Educate to lead the wave of interventions that the education system deserves. Schools spend over £1.3bn a year on agency staff. Over £300m per year of that is wasted as fees that go straight to the recruitment agencies. That's money that could be going back to schools.

Over the last year alone we helped schools in London save over £300,000 on recruitment fees. We are incredibly proud of what we've achieved and the schools we've developed great partnerships with, but we know there are more areas in the UK that need a new solution. This year our sights are set on helping schools across Greater Manchester.

We've been working tirelessly over the last two months to start growing our teacher and teaching assistant pool to support you. This will continue to grow every week as we throw all our efforts towards working with high quality candidates in your area.

Join us in taking a stance against the old, inefficient way of recruiting and help us in our mission to save schools money and pay teachers more.