Questions to Ask a School During an Interview
Questions for teaching and support staff candidates interviewing at a school, covering timetable and class sizes, planning time, behaviour policy, marking load, staff turnover and how leadership handles complaints. Ask a handful of these when the panel turns the conversation over to you.
The questions
Open any question for the note
Why is this position open?
Why ask it
A retirement, a growing intake and a mid-year resignation are three different situations. If the post has turned over twice recently, ask what has changed since, because you will inherit whatever made the last two people leave.
What would my timetable look like, including how many classes and separate subjects I would prepare?
Why ask it
Two sections of the same course is a different job from five preps across three year groups, even at identical contact hours. Preparation load, not teaching load, is what decides whether your evenings are your own.
What is a typical class size here, and what is the largest?
Why ask it
Averages hide the outlier group that will define your week. Ask specifically about the biggest class in the department and who currently teaches it.
What curriculum am I expected to follow, and how much of it can I shape?
Why ask it
Schools sit anywhere from a shared scheme with mandated pacing to near-total autonomy. Neither is bad, but arriving expecting one and finding the other is a common reason new staff feel undermined in their first term.
What does the first month look like for a new teacher, and who do they go to with questions?
Why ask it
A named mentor with scheduled time is very different from being told the door is always open. If nobody owns your induction, small problems, logins, seating plans, where the photocopier codes live, become your problem alone.
How is planning and marking time protected in the timetable?
Why ask it
Ask whether that time is regularly taken for cover or meetings. Schools with a formal protection policy will say so quickly, and schools where it evaporates will answer in terms of flexibility.
What is the behaviour policy, and what actually happens when I send a student out of the room?
Why ask it
The written policy and the practice can differ sharply. The useful question is who receives the student, whether there is follow-up with the family, and whether the student is back the next lesson with nothing said.
How much of the marking, data entry and reporting sits with teachers here?
Why ask it
Ask how many formal data drops there are a year and what each one requires. This is the workload most candidates never ask about and the one that most often decides whether the job is sustainable.
What support is available for students who need it, and how long does a referral usually take?
Why ask it
Every school will say it has support. Response time is the honest measure, and a wait of a term for an assessment tells you how much of that work will land in your classroom in the meantime.
How are teaching assistants or support staff assigned to classes?
Why ask it
Reveals both the resourcing level and how much say teachers have. Assistants allocated by need and briefed in advance work well, assistants who rotate weekly with no handover mostly create extra coordination.
How is teaching observed and evaluated, and who does it?
Why ask it
Look for frequency, whether observations are graded, and whether feedback comes as a conversation or a form. Frequent ungraded drop-ins with a follow-up chat is a developmental culture, an annual graded observation tied to pay is a different one.
What professional development did staff take part in last year?
Why ask it
Asking about last year rather than what is offered separates real provision from the prospectus. A specific answer, a course someone completed, a subject network the department joined, means there is a budget and released time.
How much staff turnover has this department had in the last three years?
Why ask it
A number here is worth more than any answer about culture. Watch how the answer is framed too, because leaders who attribute all departures to relocation and family reasons have usually not asked.
How does leadership handle a parent complaint about a teacher?
Why ask it
The key detail is whether the teacher is told first and included, or informed after a decision. This one answer predicts how supported you will feel in your hardest week of the year.
What does the budget picture look like over the next couple of years?
Why ask it
Falling rolls, expiring grants or a planned rebuild all affect staffing. You are unlikely to get figures, but you will learn whether the school is planning to grow, hold steady or consolidate.
What communication with families is expected of me, and when?
Why ask it
Ask about response times and out-of-hours expectations directly. Schools with a published window will tell you, and schools where parents email teachers at ten at night usually answer with something about being responsive.
What is the main thing the school is trying to improve this year?
Why ask it
You want a single clear priority, not a list. If the answer covers six areas, staff are probably being pulled in six directions, and any initiative you are asked to lead will compete with five others.
How do teachers get involved in decisions about timetable, curriculum or spending?
Why ask it
Listen for a mechanism, a department meeting with a budget line, staff representation on a committee. Consultation with no decision attached is common and staff notice the difference quickly.
What do staff who leave tend to say about why they left?
Why ask it
Phrased this way it is harder to deflect than a question about morale. Honest leaders will name a real pressure: workload, commute, the pull of promotion elsewhere. Silence or surprise is itself informative.
If I joined and found the first year hard, what would that most likely be about?
Why ask it
Save this for last. The answer is usually the genuine difficulty of the post: a demanding cohort, an unfinished curriculum rebuild, a department still short-staffed. A panel that cannot name anything is selling the school rather than filling the role.
Interviewing a school as a candidate
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Before the interview
Read the inspection report and the last two years of results
Both are usually public. They tell you what pressure the school is under, which is the context behind every answer you will get. It also stops you asking about attainment, which the panel will assume you have already looked up.
Ask for a tour with a class in session
Corridors between lessons and a live classroom tell you more than any answer about ethos. If the only tour on offer is after hours or during a holiday, note it and ask why.
Pick three questions, not fifteen
You will get five minutes. Choose the answers that would change your decision, usually preparation load, planning time and turnover, and ask the rest of your questions of the staff you meet informally.
What to notice while you are there
- Whether students greet adults, and whether adults greet each other.
- The state of the staff room: used and lived in, or empty at break.
- How the person leading your tour talks about their colleagues.
- Displayed student work: recent and specific, or laminated three years ago.
- Whether anyone mentions workload without being asked.
- Who answers your questions, and who defers to whom on the panel.
Common mistakes
Asking only about ethos and values
Every school will answer these well, so the answers do not distinguish between schools. Contact hours, data drops and turnover do.
Not talking to anyone below leadership
Ask, politely, to speak to a colleague in the department. Two minutes with someone who teaches the same year group tells you what the panel cannot say out loud.
Treating the offer as the end of the conversation
Timetable, room allocation and mentoring are usually settled after the offer and before you sign. That is the moment to confirm in writing what you were told at interview.