Justine Greening and part time working

[Appuskidu]

tes

Nearly all of the teachers at my school are part time already just because we couldn't cope with the job full time plus having our own family!

Can't something be done to make the job something with a workload that is actually possible to manage full time?!

[noblegiraffe]

Useful TES article that just reiterates all the reasons that part timers are treated badly. Awesome.

[AppleKatie]

I'm certain that Justine Greening writing down the myth that 'part time teachers can't hold middle management roles' is actually going to do anything to change its pervasiveness. Which is a sad state of affairs really.

[physicskate]

I saw that article and laughed and laughed... everyone part time I know (0.6, 0.5 or similar) works equivalent full time!!

I honestly think it’s impossible to work a 37 hour week while teaching the sometimes crazy numbers of lessons expected of uk teachers. I know this is why some of my lessons are terrible... should we not look at other models?? Plan and mark for 27 55 minute lessons in 55 hours?? Never mind 37 hours or whatever were meant to aim for!!

[Appuskidu]

I just wish I could be a teacher who arrives at 7.30 and leaves at 5.30/6 and that was it. Those are not unreasonable hours, really-are they?

I can understand that many many people (my DH included) work much longer hours- but he gets double my salary!

I hate having to work every evening, plus weekends and holidays (which DH doesn't do) just to stay afloat. I resent that the solution to this is to have more part time teachers not a reduction in workload and bureaucracy.

We've had troops to teachers, independent school teachers coming to save the day, super graduates (who couldn't possibly have done a PGCE) being fast-tracked into teaching, retired folk being enticed back to teaching and then more recently non-graduate apprenticeships and this.

It's just sticking Elastoplast over holes in a sinking ship.

[noblegiraffe]

It annoys me that my DH works roughly the same hours as me and earns far more, but he is classed as full-time in his job, gets loads of professional development, promotion opportunities and so on, but I'm 0.6ish, in a career dead-end and seen as a shirker pain in the arse.

[catcatcatcat]

I went PT in January and after lots of reflection I think it's the biggest factor contributing to me wanting to quit teaching for a while.

I feel so sidelined and unimportant it's unbelievable. Previously I had a more important TLR and mattered, my new school being PT means that I am totally and utterly insignificant. Never consulted or spoken to properly, don't have my own room, etc etc. I can't believe how hard it is.

And yes. Still so so much work!

[SweetSummerchild]

in a career dead-end and seen as a shirker pain in the arse.

That pretty much sums up where my career has been since I went part time in 2010. It has been made very clear that there are no promotional opportunities for part-timers. I also made the decision several years' ago not to go through threshold as I didn't want to take on all the extra post-threshold crap that teachers were expected to do at our school.

Seven years down the line and all the post-threshold crap is now a standard expectation of all teachers. What was the point in staying on main scale? My curriculum leader took on extra teaching as a 'favour' to the head and went on to dump all the overload of their curriculum admin duties onto me as the only other experienced teacher in the department and because I have a 'lighter teaching load' than others. Hence, I've ended up with just as much (if not more) scheme of work writing and extra exam support crap as the full-timers but on a fraction of the pay. As a teacher with 14 years' experience I am still earning less than I did in 1999 as a junior engineer.

The worst of it is that I went part time as my disability means that full time is just not do-able for me. Whilst I've never questioned the fact that their 'only full-timers need apply for this leadership post' policy as being discriminatory, I have every grounds to do so.

When it all got too much and I had a breakdown, DH's employer were far more supportive of our family situation than mine. He was told to take as much time off as he needed to support me whereas my school pulled the usual 'think about the children' line.

I've had enough. I'm not going back.

[Changerofname987654321]

I have just gone part time and work approx 40 hours a week and I have taken 7 day ‘off’ at weekends and holidays since the start of the summer holidays.

In our school staff are expected to do the same number of CPD projects, planning to share with others, break and detention duties as full time staff.

[DrMadelineMaxwell]

I'm full time for the first time in 15 years. I miss walking away when school is still on knowing I can have some time for me or to get jobs done to then leave more time with my DC.

But they are both high school age now and it seemed the natural thing to up my hours and the ht dislikes part timers so was keen to ask me to go full time again .

I am finding lots of aspects much easier. I do miss sharing the responsibility. But I don't miss having to remind people that I couldn't do x or y because I wasn't in work that day. Or having to go in on my days off to make up my pro rata training days. Or just feeling like my class would be better behaved if it was only me and them (plus ppa).

The money's nice, too.

[hollytom]

I moved to part time this year and still find myself working on several days a week. Like others my DH is in a much more senior role and does very little work at home.
I am not sure part time is working for me but there is no way I can return to full time as I found it was making me ill. In a real dilemma as to what to do. This was my career change do I change again in my 40s????