Taking a quick look on the average jobs site you’ll notice just how many jobs in teaching are available, when many other sectors are suffering from a dearth in open positions. Every country, the world over, always needs teachers. It is because of this constant need that jobs are always fairly numerous and starting salaries are above the national average.

Whether you are a recent graduate or looking for a career change, the best, fastest and easiest way into teaching is through a Post Graduate Certificate of Education or a PGCE for short. These, as the name suggests are open to people who have already completed a degree and thus have an advanced level of learning. You don’t however, need to teach in your degree subject, depending on the age of pupils and subject you want to teach.

Right now, the UK is in desperate need of science, maths and language teachers. To encourage people into these subjects and to teach at secondary and A-Level ages, rather an primary ages, the government is offering some pretty attractive incentives. For example, if you decide you want to learn to teach physics, chemistry, maths or engineering, you could qualify for a bursary of £9,000. Likewise, you can also get an attractive bursary for pursuing biology, combined science and modern languages; in these cases you will get £6,000. This amount it to cover you for the yearlong PGCE course. Additionally, you may also get a ‘golden hello’ when you start your first teaching role as an NQT, Newly Qualified Teacher. According to tda.gov.uk the teacher training website, newly qualified teachers can expect to get a starting salary of £21,588 outside of London and £27,000 in inner London.

As the UK population continues to diversify, job opportunities for language teachers will broaden. Right now, the main languages taught in schools are French, German and Spanish. However, other languages growing in popularity are Italian, Russian, Mandarin, Japanese, Urdu and Bengali.

Teaching also opens a lot of doors in terms of travelling, especially if you’re a native English speaker. You can add on a TEFL course to your qualifications, which allows you to teach English as a foreign language in numerous countries all over the world. Additionally, you can move abroad and teach your chosen language, e.g. Spanish in places as far flung as Australia and the US.

However, for a wide range of school jobs in the UK, check out the Guardian Jobs website. The site also has career advice, CV tips and online chat forums, so if you want to test the waters before jumping in with both feet, make use of these online tools first.