Pupils advertise for a new headteacher on YouTube

PUPILS at a small Highland school hope to teach education leaders a lesson in how to recruit staff.

The 20 pupils at Melvich Primary on the north coast have posted a two-minute video on the YouTube website in an effort to fill a long-standing vacancy for a headteacher.

The post has been vacant since January, but it is four years since the school has had its own headteacher rather than sharing one with other primaries.

Highland Council has advertised twice, unsuccessfully, for candidates to fill the role and a new recruitment campaign will start on 1 May.

The post is presently filled by acting headteacher Jane Kitchener, who said the children had fun making the video, which is getting the message to a wider audience.

The film starts with pupils lying on the school playing field in formation to spell out the word "Help".

It then follows them in the school bus, in the classroom and in the playground appealing: "We're so cool, we're Melvich School and we need a new headteacher."

The video ends with a member of staff holding up a placard with contact details for Highland Council.

By last night, the video had received 761 "hits" from YouTube subscribers.

Carol Russell, the school's parent council chairwoman, said: "The video is a way of trying something slightly different to help make sure we get someone. We hope it will reach a wider audience and there will be someone out there who sees it and wants to come to Melvich."

Highland Council said it had been hard to recruit permanent headteachers on the north coast of Caithness for some time.

However, it said the problem of attracting staff to rural schools was one experienced by councils across Scotland.

Officials and councillors met members of the parent council recently to discuss the issue, when parents were offered the chance to actively help with recruitment.

They have since produced a small brochure highlighting the quality of life in the area to help attract a suitable candidate and helped the pupils with the YouTube link.

A council spokeswoman said: "It's quite innovative and it may prove to be useful in attracting interest in the vacancy. All credit goes to the parents and pupils for taking the initiative."

Graham Nichols, the council's area culture, education and sport manager, said he would give the Melvich children full marks for initiative in devising the video.

The school has two classes, for primaries 1-4 and 5-7, and presently has two teachers.

In 2006, the council considered recruiting one headteacher to run up to three primaries simultaneously, including Melvich, because of a shortage of job applicants and the size of the school rolls.

Education leaders examined the plan after increasing numbers of vacancies went unfilled. However, the idea was dropped and efforts made to recruit a single head for each school.

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APPLICANTS SOUGHT NEAR AND FAR

OTHER remote communities have taken matters into their own hands to help find key workers when traditional methods have failed.

Mark Darbyshire, of Chepstow in Wales, became a GP in Applecross, Wester Ross, last month after local people set up a website to highlight the attractions of the area amid fears that the isolated location might discourage candidates.

The site received 3,000 hits in just one day and attracted interest from around the world, including the US, Lithuania, Poland and South Africa. In all, NHS Highland received 16 applications for the post to serve as an assistant doctor to fewer than 300 patients.

In a similar move in 2005, islanders on Jura placed their own adverts for a doctor after the island's previous GP retired, and 36 applications were received.