ABSTRACT
To many staff, the deputy head teacher is the person appointed to the school staff to understudy and deputize for the head teacher whenever necessary. During February and March 1982 details were obtained of thirty secondary deputy headship posts that appeared in The Times Educational Supplement. They were from a wide geographical area, both urban and rural schools, from Northumberland to Kent, including the London Boroughs, and from Gloucestershire and the West Midlands to Salop. The messages from some schools were loud and clear, stemming from either a prescriptive starkness or political nuance. There was little need to use one's experience of schools to read between the lines of some job descriptions. The essential nature of some jobs became all too clear upon a first reading: a concern for the interests of girls - in the curriculum provided, in access to the choice available and in day to day pastoral matters.
