Common Online Teaching Application Mistakes

Dr. Scott Ziegler Superintendent of Schools, Loudoun County Public Schools, Virginia

The way in which you complete your electronic application may be keeping you from getting an interview and a teaching position. Even in the midst of a teacher shortage, principals pay attention to the way in which you present yourself in your electronic application. Before you can dazzle anyone with your experience, your love for children, and your cutting edge pedagogy, you have to land the interview. Avoiding any of these common mistakes can enhance your chance of a successful job search. Pay particular attention to these areas:

1. Outdated Information:

Does your application contain old and outdated information?

If so, it could be costing you an opportunity to interview. When principals and hiring managers screen applications, they want recent information. If you’re applying for a position that starts in January 2022 and your most recent update was in 2020, update your information to include your most recent employment and references.

2. Capitalization, Spelling, and Grammatical Errors:

Remember, you’re applying to work in education. You should not make mistakes when capitalizing any proper noun. To avoid spelling and grammatical errors, type your responses in a Microsoft Word Document or similar. You can then make corrections before posting in your application. For help with proofreading, use a program like Grammarly to check your work.