Access Education People
Why your team deserves a purpose built ATS for schools
Hiring in education isn't like hiring anywhere else. Whether you're trying to fill a classroom teacher vacancy at short notice or attract a new head of department, your HR team faces unique challenges that most recruitment tools simply weren't built to handle.
The truth is, most Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) were designed for corporate hiring - where job roles are standard, compliance is basic, and candidates are plentiful. That's not the case in schools, academies, and trusts.
And that's exactly why your HR team deserves an ATS for schools that understands what it takes to recruit right, hire smarter, and educate better.
What are the unique challenges of education recruitment?
Education hiring comes with its own set of challenges
If you've ever felt like you're recruiting in the dark, with underwhelming results and a shrinking talent pool, you're not alone.
School HR teams deal with
- A wider variety of roles than most sectors - from midday supervisors to senior leaders, and hard-to-fill positions like science or maths teachers
- Tight deadlines due to term schedules
- Complex compliance needs like safeguarding and DBS checks
- A competitive talent market where great educators are often not actively job hunting
- External competition from other sectors and big brands offering alternative career paths
- Reputational pressure, where a poor candidate experience can damage your school's brand image
- A lack of visibility and consistency across Trust HR teams, affecting process and brand
Despite all this, many schools are still relying on manual processes or outdated school recruitment software. Or worse – catch-all recruitment software that was never built with schools in mind.
Access Education People now integrates with SchoolRecruiter
What a school-specific ATS should do
The best education applicant tracking system needs to do more than just post jobs and process applications.
It should be your hiring co-pilot, built for the realities of school recruitment.
Here's what that looks like:
Save you time
You're not just recruiting - you're juggling payroll, policies, absence management, and a dozen other things.
An ATS for schools should help you fill roles faster with:
- Talent pipelines and centralised tracking
- Smart automation and scheduling
- Effortless collaboration across hiring teams
Reduce your costs
With budgets stretched more than ever, recruitment needs to be efficient and measurable.
Great school recruitment software will:
- Combine job advertising, applicant tracking and reporting into one platform
- Let you track ROI and channel performance
- Reduce time-to-hire (and therefore cost-per-hireStay
Keep you compliant
With safeguarding at the heart of everything, compliance isn't optional.
Your education applicant tracking system should:
- Be GDPR and KCSIE-compliant as standard
- Support tracking of Right to Work, references, DBS checks and expiry alerts
- Provide a full, auditable trail
Attract the right talent
The best educators aren't always browsing job boards - but they are online.
An ATS for schools will help you:
- Build Talent Pools for long-term staffing needs
- Use matched talent algorithms to identify ideal candidates
- Reach both active and passive candidates
The power of multichannel recruitment (and why you need it)
Here's a stat that might surprise you:
- Only 27% of education professionals are actively searching for a new role.
- That means if you're only using job boards, you're missing out on 73% of potential hires.
- Multichannel recruitment which is enabled by SchoolRecruiter - helps you:
- Promote roles across free and paid channels
- Target both active and passive candidates
- Use smart data to identify which platforms actually bring results
- Build a more diverse, future-ready talent pipeline
Think of it this way: your future staff could be on LinkedIn, checking emails, browsing school websites - even scrolling social media. You need to be everywhere they are.
Insights that actually matter
A key frustration for many HR teams is the lack of visibility into how well their hiring efforts are working.
With the right education applicant tracking system, you'll gain:
- A complete view of every job ad, applicant, and outcome
- Insights into time-to-fill, source of hire, candidate drop-off, and more
- Custom dashboards that help you refine and improve your recruitment strategy
No more guessing. Just better decisions.
Why SchoolRecruiter + Access Education People makes sense
That's why Access Education now includes full integration with SchoolRecruiter - education’s no.1 ATS for schools and trusts.
Together, they give you:
- A joined-up approach to recruitment, HR, and payroll
- Powerful multichannel advertising and talent-matching tools
- Compliance support and reporting all in one place
- A better experience for your candidates, your hiring team - and ultimately, your school
Want to improve your recruitment?
If your HR team is under pressure to fill vacancies faster, reduce admin, and build a stronger school workforce, this might be the time to rethink your approach to recruitment.
You don't need to recruit harder. You just need tools that are built to work harder for you.
Book a chat with our team - and together we'll explore how Access Education and SchoolRecruiter could support your school's future hiring strategy.
FAQs about education recruitment
What makes SchoolRecruiter different from other Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS)?
Unlike many corporate-focused systems, SchoolRecruiter is built specifically for the education sector. It understands the unique hiring challenges schools face - from safeguarding checks and short-term contracts to multichannel advertising and compliance with KCSIE.
It also offers education-specific job advert templates that auto-populate based on role and subject, saving time and ensuring consistency. Online Application Forms streamline the candidate experience while still capturing all the essential information schools need to make informed hiring decisions.
Can SchoolRecruiter be used across multi-academy trusts?
Yes - it’s ideal for MATs. You can manage recruitment centrally or by individual school, while still sharing candidate pipelines and insights across the trust. SchoolRecruiter supports multi-account vacancy management, giving multiple team members shared access to group vacancies.
This allows hiring teams to dip in and out as needed, easing workloads and simplifying communication across schools.
How does the integration with Access Education People work?
The integration allows you to handle recruitment, HR, and payroll from one place. That means no more switching between systems or re-entering data - everything from job ads to onboarding flows naturally into your people platform.
Will this help us reach more (and better) candidates?
Absolutely. SchoolRecruiter uses a multichannel strategy to attract both active and passive candidates. It connects your vacancies to the UK’s largest pool of education jobseekers and uses smart algorithms to match the right people to your roles.
Is the system compliant with safeguarding and data protection regulations?
Yes - compliance is built in. SchoolRecruiter is fully GDPR and KCSIE-compliant. It helps you manage references, DBS checks, Right to Work documentation, and more - giving you peace of mind at every step.
Do applicants find the process easy to use?
They do. In fact, many schools have seen application completion rates increase because the platform offers a mobile-friendly, smooth candidate experience. That’s important when great candidates have lots of choice.
How quickly can we get up and running?
Most schools can be live within a few weeks. Our team will guide you through setup, branding your careers site, and training your HR and hiring teams so you’re confident from day one.
What kind of support is available?
You’ll have access to a dedicated support team who understand school recruitment - not just tech. Whether you need help with a feature, advice on posting a vacancy, or assistance with compliance, we’re here when you need us.
