Media Studies
One of the parts of the Tutors International Tutor web site (http://www.tutors-international.net) that I rarely have time to visit, let alone explore, is the group of people who have started — but not finished — registering. The unfinished parts are evident if they were to log in again, through a very simple-to-understand traffic-light arrangement: green if it’s completed, red if not. So, for example, if someone has not yet uploaded their CV then, when they log in, they will see a red blob next to the letters CV on the list of registration items.
This winter holiday I have had time to look through all 2300+ records that had collected in the ‘incomplete registrations’ list, and discovered among them some interesting patterns.
For example, about 10% of these incomplete registrations were from people who presented as strong candidates, the kind of quality and breadth of educational and personal experience that we regularly choose successful candidates from (I have emailed all these people asking them to return to the site, complete their registrations, and subscribe to the RSS feed on our jobs page so that they are notified when each new position is listed — so if you thought you’d registered with us, are reading this, and did not get an email from me in the last 4 weeks or so, then you must be in the other 90%).
Another interesting pattern was the number of Spanish and Greek registrations started over the last 16 months or so, presumably as a direct response to their struggling economies. Many of those teachers who started their registrations were excellent potential candidates.
But the most interesting pattern of all was the number of registrants whose teaching subjects were in the range Sociology, Media Studies, Theatre Studies, Drama, PE, Business Studies, Philosophy and Ethics, Law, Politics and Citizenship, Health and Social Care, and other so-called ‘soft’ subjects such as Life Skills and Study Skills or some variation of TEFL/TESOL. My word there were are lot of you — perhaps as many half of all those who began a registration and didn’t finish it were teachers of two or more of these subjects. It made me wonder why… Are there lots of graduates in these subjects who can’t find work, or is there something about Tutors International that is attractive to teachers of these subjects, more than say teachers of English Literature, History, Economics, Geography, Religious Studies…the more well-respected (harder) subjects…by which I mean more respected by my Clients and by the top Universities.
I have no answer to this question…but it’s certainly an interesting discovery nonetheless.