Celtic Teachers - Who are we?
We call ourselves 'the ethical supply pool' as our aim is to provide an excellent service to our colleagues in schools and look after the welfare and professional development of supply teachers registered with us.
We don't spend money on advertising gimmicks and unnecessary marketing. We believe money should go back to our teachers and our aim is to pay the highest rates we can.
Alison Arkinstall
Alison has been teaching for over 20 years and has experince of both the primary and secondary sector. She has a B.A. Hons. in French/Spanish and a P.G.C.E. in Modern Foreign Languages with T.E.F.L. More recently she attained an M.A. in Literary Translation French/Spanish.
During her primary teaching career she had experience of teaching all KS 1 and 2 age ranges with more than ten years of receiving MA2 for language across the 3-11 age range. Alison also had responsibility for language support throughout the school in her last three years of teaching. She has received a wide range of training both in language teaching, raising self-esteem, experiential learning and delivering key skills across the curriculum.
After taking time out to travel with her family, Alison did supply work in several counties on her return to this country. She soon found herself with more work than she could accept as local schools began to use her regularly. This is what started the idea of passing work to others rather than turning down schools who needed a teacher. She and Phil also recognised the lack of support available to supply teachers and the lack of opportunities for their professional development. They decided to try and do something about it.
Phillip Arkinstall
Phillip completed his teacher training at Trinity College Carmarthen in 1967. During his first five years of teaching he studied with the Open University and became one of the first students to graduate from the O.U. with a B.A. (Educational Studies).
From 1980 - 2005 he served as Head Teacher in R.C.T. During his last five years of service Phillip took all his staff through the Pacific Institute 'Investors in Excellence' Programme - the first Primary School in the country to do this. Also during that time the staff at Phillip's school received training in the 'Critical Skills' programme, his school becoming the first accredited school in Wales to have all staff trained to at least Level 1. Both of these intensive and extended courses were delivered to colleagues in the primary and secondary sector as they transfer across the age ranges and the curriculum. They were found to be invaluable to staff and pupils alike and inspired more enthusiasm than any other training anyone had done.
Professional development of staff has always been high on Phillip's agenda. Consequently, during his period as Head Teacher, twelve of his teaching staff progressed to headship/advisory posts. He now puts his knowledge and experience to good use in helping supply teachers develop their careers and schools to find good quality teachers.
Further Expertise
Sue Longthorn joined us in September 2020 with over 20 years management experience in a large corporation. During her long management career, Sue has been responsible for Accounts, IT, Customer Service, Business Retention, Quality and Sales Departments. Working in a high regulated financial service industry. Sue decided to leave her successful career to spend more time with her family and start her own business in hospitality. Although this proved to be a highly successful venture for Sue, she found she was still looking for a better work/life balance and felt it time for change.
We are delighted that Sue is happy to share her management experience as part of the Celtic Teachers team. She is enjoying the opportunity to learn about the education sector and finds this environment very different to her previous high pressure roles. Sue is passionate about customer service and offering the best support to both schools and supply staff to achieve the desired results. She fits in perfectly with our friendly but professional ethos and her experience of running her own business lends itself perfectly to our ethical philosophy, where people are at the heart of all we do.
CELTIC TEACHERS is recognised by the E.W.C. and all the Local Education Authorities we serve.
