Diary of a Surviving Supply Teacher: Have you found a description of your agency consultant's experience on Linkedin?

The following is an article that I posted on the TES site:

A couple of years ago, after seven years of working for an agency, a member of their staff shouted at me on the telephone. This was his reaction to me being unable to work for them, because I had been offered and accepted a placement by another agency. He was also angry because I had not recognised that he was the manager, despite the agency not informing me this was the case. Letters to the agency, REC, QM and local authority were to no avail and I did not work for them again (as described in the Worst Agencies . . . Worst Agency Experiences thread).

Recently, while researching another agency, I came across this description of the aforementioned individual on uk.linkedin.com:

 "[Person's name] BA Hons MIRP's Summary 

-Experienced recruiter with ten years industry experience 

-Almost eight years served in the Education sector 

Worked as consultant through to Operations Manager. 

Developed existing business further and experienced in three start up business/ desks through to success 

Specialties 

Education recruitment 

Operations Management
Strategic Development" 

What is significant is that this person has considerably less of what he calls 'Experience' (with a capital 'E'), albeit undefined, than I have in teaching. He appears to have no experience of teaching at all. None of the jargon is defined, particularly 'industry' and 'Education sector' (with a capital 'E'), although it needs considerable explanation. Further down the page, under 'Experience', are woolly phrases with more jargon, such as, 'Worked as a Consultant developing relationships with Schools in the ********** and *********** area, predominantly working with Primary Schools. Also accepted as one of five people onto the company's Management Development Programme.' What this means is not explained, much less how it constitutes experience. Presumably, punctuation, capitalisation and sentence structure are not a requirement of the agency or Linkedin! 

He claims to have been university educated with a BA in history and something called a MIRP. He says he has spent two years with the John Lewis department store and another two years with what appears to be a marine engineering agency. 

Reading this Linkedin page confirms my belief that one of the reasons teaching agency employees are rude, and treat supply teachers inappropriately, is because they are not professionally trained. This person's description indicates that he has no first-hand experience of teaching or education whatsoever. Furthermore, the experience that can be discerned, has little, or no, connection with teaching or education. 

Have you found a description of your agency consultant's experience on Linkedin?

Originally posted on Tuesday, 6th December 2011