A job board is an electronic or physical bulletin board on which open work positions are posted. An education job board is such a board that is dedicated to positions in the field of education. Electronic job boards often allow for both the posting of position openings by employers and the posting of resumes by job seekers. Such boards may be managed by a number of entities and may be private or public. Many electronic boards allow job seekers to apply for a position directly on a website.
The purpose of an education job board is to facilitate communication between employers and job seekers. Such boards collect information from a broad range of employers and consolidate it into a single location, making it easier and more efficient for potential employees to find jobs for which they are qualified. This reduces the amount of time the job seeker must spend searching multiple individual websites or inquiring with individual employers. It also reduces the amount of time the employer's human resources department must spend posting the position in various locations.
The name "job board" evolved from the physical job boards popular prior to advanced electronic communication. These boards often were quite literally bulletin boards placed in a prominent location, such as the lobby of a corporation or governmental agency. An education job board would most likely have been placed in the lobby or human resources department of a school and also in the lobby or human resources department of a district's government building. Job notices were pinned to this board and potential employees were encouraged to check the boards periodically to find newly posted opportunities. While still used in rural areas and in developing countries, physical boards have largely been replaced by electronic job boards in developed countries.
Electronic boards are now the most commonly used type of education job board. Such electronic boards list job postings on a central website and provide information such as the required qualifications and, often, the rate of pay. While other types of job boards frequently do not list the name of the hiring company, educational boards usually do provide the name of the district and, for school-based positions, frequently list the name of the school at which the employee would be located. Employees also can find information on how to apply for positions and can sometimes apply directly through the site.
An education job board can be run by an individual district, a state, county, country or other geographic entity. It also can be run by a private entity, such as a coalition of private schools or an independent employment company. Most boards list positions for teachers, staff and administrators, though some boards are restricted to classroom teaching positions. Boards may or may not include positions in higher education facilities such as colleges and universities.