THERE is a growing crisis in the number of people wanting to become headteachers. A national survey has revealed that, in a teaching world increasingly seen to revolve around paperwork and administration, fewer and fewer teachers want to climb the ladder to become heads.

And the problem could hit Worcestershire even harder than other areas, according to the county's representative for the National Association of Headteachers.

John Teago, the national council member for Coventry, Solihull, Worcestershire, Warwickshire and Herefordshire, agreed there was a headteacher crisis after a survey showed less and less people are applying for the posts.

The survey, produced by the General Teaching Council, showed that only one in 25 teachers wants to become a head within the next five years.

Mr Teago said the situation could be an even bigger problem in areas such as Worcestershire where there were smaller schools.

"Where you have a rural area with village schools you are going to find even more trouble - there is a crisis and it could hit places like Worcestershire even harder than, say, Coventry," he said.

"If you have got a smaller village school in Worcestershire where you have perhaps got a headteacher who needs to teach 50 per cent of the time, with the bureaucracy that goes on, it's almost impossible to run a school.

"Increasingly, headship is seen as a high risk area because, if you have an Ofsted that does not go well, it's usually the head that goes."

Mr Teago said leadership posts in schools were increasingly unattractive to people and the job was seen as more insecure than it actually was.

He added: "As people on main professional grades have been earning more and more, the differential in salary makes people say, why should I bother to take on more responsibility for not very much extra pay?'"

A county council spokesman said, of the 300 schools under its control, there were 25 without a permanent headteacher in post.

"However, 13 of these are in the Wyre Forest, where all 45 schools will close on August 31 and 30 new ones open on September 1, and heads for the new schools have virtually all been appointed," he said. "In terms of recruitment in general in Worcestershire, we have always fared much better than other education authorities when it comes to filling posts.

"Salary comparisons with similar-sized authorities show that the county's wage bill is much higher than others because teachers stay in the area and thus earn pay increments.

"We are continually told that they find Worcestershire a beautiful place to work and live."

He said there were exceptions to this, such as in maths and the sciences, where there were national shortages of teachers.

"However, in Worcestershire, this merely translates as having shorter shortlists than headteachers would probably like, rather than failing to fill a post at all," he added.

"Every potential employer would rather have five candidates to choose from than three."

Gareth Morgan, deputy head at Cranham Primary School, said he was currently studying for the National Professional Qualification for Headteachers which was the qualification all heads must have or be in the process of obtaining.

"There are thousands of people doing this throughout the country but I believe the percentage that actually go into headship is quite low," he said.

He said the role of headteacher was absolutely vast and they were responsible for a massive budget, managing a growing group of people, were ultimately responsible for the welfare and education of hundreds of pupils, and answerable to hundreds of parents.

Mr Morgan added: "Personally, I think the role is challenging but extremely exciting and rewarding.

"However, the hours involved and the weight of responsibility and accountability puts off many, many teachers."

He said there were ideas of headteachers coming from a management or business background instead of an educational one, which could work in larger schools but he thought would be disastrous in most primary schools.

Cranham's head Valerie Holland said she had noticed that, when a vacancy for a headship arose, there were proving to be few applicants.

She thought this was the result of several factors, including the recent workforce reforms, which led to an improvement in teachers' pay.

She said this meant there was less incentive to go for a headship to improve pay. What was putting people off was, she said: "The ever-increasing demands of the job which are the result of the many government initiatives, many of which have not been thought through, and the lack of sustainability of many good, funded initiatives as money is withdrawn after three years."

Mrs Holland also said budget worries were a problem and she thought many Worcestershire schools were underfunded, yet were still expected to provide more and more. But she added: "Despite this, I still think that it is the best job in the world!"