By STACEY BODGER and BEN RUSSELL
An international shortage of maths teachers is hurting schools in New Zealand and around the world.
British schools are desperately advertising for maths teachers in New Zealand, even as the Ministry of Education advertises in Britain for teachers.
A British school made headlines this week when it revealed it had been forced to train its own maths teachers after a worldwide search failed to find any suitable staff.
John Atkins, head of Kemnal Technology College in Bromley, southeast London, has complained to the Government.
He said the only applicants were so poor "I wouldn't let them walk my dog."
He had advertised five times in Britain, Australia and New Zealand to fill two vacancies but with no success.
In New Zealand, the Ministry of Education has confirmed that it is short of maths teachers.
TeachNZ, the ministry's teacher recruitment campaign, is offering 30 scholarships worth up to $10,000 to combat the shortage in secondary schools.
While Britain's schools struggle to find maths teachers, New Zealand's national manager of TeachNZ, Irene Lynch, is in Britain trying to recruit teachers, and could not be reached for comment.
But a Post Primary Teachers' Association advisory officer, Rob Willetts, said the shortage in New Zealand and overseas had being growing since the early 1990s.
"The problem is that schools are vying for maths teachers from an increasingly shallow pool in many countries," he said.
"It would be a real problem if they wanted to steal our mathematicians because New Zealand is having trouble replacing them as current staff leave."
In Britain, Kemnal Technology's John Atkins said advertising for maths teachers in New Zealand had failed and a teacher was in Australia trying to find recruits.
In the meantime, he had trained two non-teaching support staff to fill the gaps.
"Recruitment is very, very difficult at the moment," he said.
"I know from all my colleagues that they are having trouble recruiting new staff."
In Croydon, south London, schools said last month that they had sent recruiters to Australia to look for new teachers.
Maths teachers in short supply
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