A secondary school with pupils on a four-day week because of a shortage of teachers may get to share staff with another school.

The idea has been suggested to overcome problems at Beechwood School, a comprehensive in Britwell, Slough, Berkshire.

It came from the borough council's director of education, John Christie, in answer to a query from councillors about the level of the recruitment problem in the area.

Government funding might be sought for a pilot scheme to appoint four staff to work in a "twinning" arrangement.

They would work both in Beechwood and in nearby Herschel Grammar School, a co-ed selective specialist technology school.

'Particular problem'

Minutes of a council strategy committee meeting say there were 35 permanent teacher vacancies in the area in September, out of a workforce of about 1,000 - a rate of 3.5%.

"This was slightly better than the position a year ago and Slough was in no worse a position than many other similar authorities," the minutes say.

But there was a particular problem at Beechwood, with 10 vacancies out of 38 teaching positions.

This has since fallen to eight vacancies.

The recruitment page on Herschel's website says: "There are currently no positions available, please check back at a later date."

Bid for funding

The council minutes say various short, medium and long-term initiatives were explained, "including a possible collaborative arrangement with Herschel Grammar School whereby teaching staff were shared between the two schools.

"Consideration was being made to making a bid for central government funding for a pilot project in this regard."

Another idea to overcome the high cost of housing - a problem throughout the south-east - was to extend a scheme under which 11 teachers have homes through a housing association.

Better training for teaching staff, including placements in industry, might make jobs more attractive.

The education department had taken on a recruitment strategy manager and would be trying to improve the advertising of vacancies.

Councillors decided to refer the matter to their children and young people sub-committee, to report back in January.

Precedents

Herschel Grammar's head teacher, Julian King-Harris, said: "We have had very little discussion regarding this proposal and it has yet to be discussed by governors or staff.

"Given that the only meeting I have had on this subject was last March it is difficult for me to comment other than to say I look forward to hearing more details of the proposal so that I can decide whether it is something in which to participate."

A spokesman for the Department for Education said it was difficult to see how the sharing arrangement might work if Herschel did not need any staff.

"I'm not quite sure what the aveneue for special funding would be. We would await any proposals with interest," he said.

The practice is not unknown in some education action zones - such as Slough - and between small rural schools.

"There's nothing to stop schools sharing staff if they come to a financial agreement as to how it would work," he added.

Beechwood's success in recruiting two teachers has eased the four-day working.

Pupils in the top, GCSE year are now back in school five days a week.