How to Become the Teacher Schools Fight Over

1. They teach to results, and they keep the receipts

The requested teacher can answer one question instantly: "What happens to scores when you take a class?" — "I took SS2 chemistry at 54% average; we finished the year at 78%. Here's the breakdown."

That sentence is built, not remembered. Start now:

• Record your class's baseline the week you take over — average score, failure count, topic gaps.
• Track the same numbers each term.
• Keep it in one simple sheet per class, forever.

Two terms from now you'll have evidence no interview panel can ignore — and most teachers cannot produce. When a proprietor forwards your CV to a partner, this is the line they quote.

2. They master the exam, not just the subject

Schools don't pay premiums for "knows chemistry." They pay premiums for "my students pass WAEC chemistry." Those are different skills. The fought-over teacher:

• Works through the actual past questions every year — and knows which topics carry the marks.
• Teaches students how the exam scores: command words, mark allocation, timing, the difference between knowing and earning the mark.
• Runs mock exams under real conditions and turns the results into a targeted revision plan, not a scolding.

Add a second exam board (IGCSE, Checkpoint) and you've moved into the scarcest, best-paid bracket in the market.

3. They manage the classroom so well it looks like luck

Ask head teachers who they'd fight to keep and they rarely name the most brilliant subject mind. They name the teacher whose class is calm, started-on-time, and predictable — because that teacher never generates the problems that consume a head teacher's week: parent complaints, discipline referrals, syllabus panic in week 11.

The mechanics are unglamorous and learnable: routines taught explicitly in week one, consequences applied consistently and without heat, lessons planned so there's no dead time (dead time is where disorder starts), and names — learn every student's name in the first two weeks. Order is a skill, and schools can see it from the corridor.

4. They make parents feel their child is seen

Parents drive private-school economics, and parents rate teachers on one axis: does this person actually know my child? The requested teacher sends short, specific, unprompted messages: "Chidera solved today's simultaneous equations unaided — big step from last month." Two minutes, three parents a week, rotating through the class.

Do this for a term and watch what happens at the next PTA: parents ask the proprietor to make sure you take their child's class next year. That sentence, overheard once, is worth more than any certificate — a parent request is the strongest job security that exists in private education.

5. They behave like professionals in the small, visible moments

Schools infer everything from samples: Are you punctual — not usually, always? Are your records (lesson notes, marks, reports) complete without chasing? Do you reply to messages the same day? Do you dress and speak like someone parents trust on sight? Do you handle disagreement without drama?

Each item seems minor. Together they form your reputation — and in teaching, reputation travels through proprietor circles, HOD friendships, and parent WhatsApp groups you'll never see. Most careers are decided in rooms you're not in, by people repeating what your small moments taught them.

6. They keep growing — visibly

One credential or skill per year, chosen for scarcity: TRCN if you haven't; a second curriculum; further maths or French or coding; basic ed-tech fluency (a teacher who can run a proper online lesson serves diaspora families and survives any disruption).

Then say it — an updated profile and CV each year. Growth nobody can see doesn't exist in the market.

The compounding truth

None of these six is difficult on any given day. Their power is that almost nobody sustains all of them — so the teacher who does becomes visibly, referrably different within about two terms: the results sheet fills, the classroom runs itself, parents start requesting, and the phone starts ringing inward.

Certificates get you considered. This list gets you fought over.