Before You Hit Apply: Scoring a TA Vacancy Against Your Real Life
Photo: UK teaching assistant walking into primary school entrance morning, via c8.alamy.com
Most teaching assistant adverts are written to attract you, not to inform you. They'll tell you the school is "vibrant" and the children are "enthusiastic", but they'll quietly leave out the fact that the role starts at 8am with a breakfast club, breaks for three hours, then restarts at 3.30pm for after-school club. You find that out in week two, when your childcare plan is already in bits.
So before you write another supporting statement, try this instead: score the job against your actual life. Not your CV, not your ambitions (those matter too, but they're a different exercise), but the ordinary business of getting through a Tuesday.
Why the person specification isn't the whole picture
A person spec tells you what the school wants from you. It rarely tells you what the job will ask of your household. Two TA posts at the same pay band, twenty minutes apart, can produce completely different weeks: one finishes at 3.15pm and lets you collect your own children, the other runs until 5.45pm and swallows your evening.
That's not a reason to avoid the second job. It's a reason to know what you're saying yes to.
The ten-point scoring method
Print the advert. Read it twice. Then score each line from 0 to 2, where 0 means "this doesn't work for me", 1 means "workable with effort" and 2 means "this genuinely suits us".
| # | What you're scoring | What to look for |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Door-to-door commute | Time it at the actual school run hour, not on a Sunday afternoon |
| 2 | Start and finish times | Compare with your own drop-off and pick-up |
| 3 | Split shifts | Are there unpaid gaps in the middle of the day? |
| 4 | Wraparound duties | Breakfast club, after-school club, holiday clubs |
| 5 | Contracted hours | Full-time, part-time, or "hours to be discussed" |
| 6 | Term-time only status | Check whether INSET days and holiday pay are included |
| 7 | Flexibility on offer | Any mention of flexible working or job share |
| 8 | Classroom culture clues | Language in the advert about teamwork and behaviour |
| 9 | Development offer | CPD, mentoring, progression language |
| 10 | Gut feeling about the school | Website, Ofsted report, staff turnover, what locals say |
Eighteen or above and it's worth a serious application. Twelve to seventeen is a conversation to have at interview. Below twelve, be honest with yourself about why you're still tempted.
The hidden timetable: hours, holidays and unpaid gaps
Two phrases deserve particular scrutiny in 2026 adverts. The first is "hours to be agreed". That can mean genuine flexibility, or it can mean you'll be asked to cover until 5pm at short notice. Ask, in writing, what a typical week looks like.
The second is anything involving a lunchtime gap. Some schools advertise a 32.5-hour post that's actually split across a long break. It's legal and it's common, but if the gap means an extra commute or a paid childcare hour, it's a real cost. Do the maths on the gap before you fall for the headline hours figure.
Holiday pay is the other one. Term-time-only contracts are brilliant for parents, but the pay is usually spread across twelve months. Check whether your monthly figure includes the holiday entitlement or whether August will arrive with a nasty surprise.
Culture clues you can pick up without stepping inside
You can learn a lot before the visit. Look at how the advert talks about behaviour: "supportive" and "consistent" suggest a school with systems. "Resilient" and "able to work under pressure" repeated three times might be telling you something else.
Check the staff section of the school website and see how many faces you recognise from last year. Look at the most recent Ofsted report, but read the section on staff wellbeing and leadership rather than just the headline grade. And if you know anyone who has worked there, ask them one question: would you go back?
Do this before the closing date
Score the job. Then sleep on it. Then, if the score is decent, ring the school and ask the two questions the advert didn't answer: what are the exact hours, and what does the first term look like for a new TA?
The answers will tell you more than any supporting statement. A school that gives you a straight, friendly reply is usually a school that treats its staff like adults. And that, more than any Ofsted grade, is what makes a TA post sustainable past the first half-term.
