Do you think teachers are paid too little?

No the people I know who did the course were paid while training as they were working in a school, not all in the same school obviously, they did a day a week in uni, no fees to pay no contract to sign up for anything, they could resign during the year or immediately afterwards, I believe they did have drop outs. At the end of the year when they qualified they got jobs some in the school where they trained and some elsewhere.

So yes it was savvy, earned money for the year, qualified without paying a penny. Not sure what wouldn't be savvy about that if you want to be a teacher.

really not very savvy at all, as these schemes normally require you to sign up for a minimum number of years, or you are hit with your full training fees, which are massive, ( much bigger than PAYG training) and realistically unpayable - this has lead to many desperate young people trapped for 2 or 3 years in situations they hate, and cant handle, much to the detriment of education, and to the teacher's mental health.

On one hand, forcing people to remain in the classroom like this has been one way that some schools have survived and been able to keep children in, but a pretty desperate and ultimately unproductive way

Some savvy people (I know some) didn't pay fees for their PGCE and earned money while doing it. Maybe you could have researched that?

I did, there was a scheme where I believe you were sponsored by a school, but overall the starting salary was still lower than the admin role I was doing back then and I wasn’t in a position to have any other financial support.

I’m not suggesting anyone’s wrong for wanting to be a teacher and believing they should earn a decent wage for doing so, but having worked for a couple of years it wasn’t financially viable on any level to do it.

Oh absolutely, it’s a really sad state of affairs!! I can see people coming straight out of uni not realising, I’d worked for a couple of years but was only in my early 20s at the time so the exact age they need to be recruiting.

Presumably they were happy with that level of income and didn't know the Conservatives would in effect cut their pay year on year. What you chose to do for more money isn't actually relevant, some people wanted a career as a teacher even if they could have earned more but they didn't know, and neither did you, that the pay would be cut.

Some savvy people (I know some) didn't pay fees for their PGCE and earned money while doing it. Maybe you could have researched that?

I dread to think what state education would be in if all teachers had made that judgement! But maybe better than it is now, if everyone had just refused to work in those conditions for that pay

20 years ago I had a PGCE place, even then it was quite obviously not worth it financing, once I looked at the starting teaching salary, plus the additional loans I’d need to cover the course I’d have been earning less even then than I was in the office admin role I was doing at the time.

If other people chose not to figure that out and go into that career anyway then more fool them imo.

Teaching salaries have been sinking for decades, it was a pretty simple decision not to follow that path personally.

I have no clue what teachers get paid but it's very clear that their working conditions are dreadful. I am not convinced that even doubling the salary would help much with recruitment and retention when the working conditions are so challenging. I personally wouldn't do it for 100k. My DS gets into trouble a lot in school and I'm absolutely mortified that teachers have to tolerate his behaviour.

That looks scary.

These are the graphs that matter here.

They are quitting, that's exactly the issue.

When the private sector can't recruit (as with lorry drivers) it puts wages up because failing to provide a service would put them out of business.

When the government can't recruit, it dithers. It doesn't care if the service is failing.

Yes I think so. My mum was a teacher and did a huge amount of overtime!

I work in employment law, specialising in the public sector. IME lower-ranking teaching staff (who are not necessarily the least experienced) are underpaid and over-worked, at the expense of managers and, increasingly CEOs of MATs etc. IMO the budgetary resources which go into educational organisations are distributed in a highly unfair way which is not conducive to equality and staff motivation.

I'll be honest, I don't believe you or you are working for an organisation that pays really badly (contract lab?). I've worked in STEM for almost 20 years and the only know one person who went into teaching as "semi-retirement" for a few years (didn't last long). I do, however, know a lot of ex-STEM teachers working in other STEM careers now.

Saw an ad at McDonald's in my town for £11.75 an hour. A 40 hour week turns in £24,440 a year at that rate.

So you get a degree, go to teacher training college for an additional year and start on less than £4k more than a fast food worker while being expected to put in huge amounts of additional hours unpaid and
have to deal with hugely laborious accountability procedures.

Yet we still have people in this country that think teachers are overpaid and can't see why people are leaving the profession in droves.

People expect to have professionals delivering public services but the want to pay fast food wages and treat them like shit as well. It is hardly rocket science why we are having issues.

You said, So I accept teachers should be paid more, but if it’s a surprise to anyone once they’ve already trained then they should’ve done some research beforehand. So do tell us what research someone could have done 10 years ago or 15 years ago or whatever so that their pay now isn't a surprise.

My neighbour teaches at an independent boarding school. While some private schools pay considerably well, his pegs its wages to the Welsh pay scales. They're not struggling to recruit, so clearly the better conditions (smaller class sizes and less bumph) are more than enough to compensate for the wages. He certainly doesn't have anything like the volume of marking to do compared with his oppos in state schools

But they have endless open evenings and have to give up Saturdays.

The job is anything as ‘directed by the headteacher’

It doesn't matter what anyone thinks about whether they get paid enough or not.

If the pay and conditions are right, there won't be a teacher shortage 🤷‍♀️

If society wants teachers / nurses etc - how much you want to be paid to do it - someone has to?

That makes no sense. You can’t ’ strike on behalf of other people. That’s called a general election. There’s a reason so many professions are striking. I’m a teacher but I’m in my late 50s - my years of house buying and childcare were in a very different landscape when these things were manageable on a teacher’s salary. I’m also lucky in that I’m in a school That values experience so won’t be managed out. But I earn 50k after 27 years which isn’t a lot for my qualifications and experience.

Well, to put it in perspective, I'm in a job experiencing mass shortages of labour (trucking) and I get £40k for a circa 7.5hr shift. I'm content with the pay as I've got no kids and the job is almost zero stress now I'm used to it - spend two hours waiting for roads to be closed, load up, and then deliver to quarry and off home.

I could be getting a fair bit more if I wanted to push myself a bit. Guy I know is getting £200 a day delivering booze to hotels/pubs etc and has a driver's mate to help him.

So, yeah, to me £28k or £32k seems quite low given the short supply, additional hours worked at home, and the general stress.

Schools are struggling to recruit and retain staff. That's usually taken as a sign that either pay is too low, conditions are too poor, or that there's a combination of both issues.

My neighbour teaches at an independent boarding school. While some private schools pay considerably well, his pegs its wages to the Welsh pay scales. They're not struggling to recruit, so clearly the better conditions (smaller class sizes and less bumph) are more than enough to compensate for the wages. He certainly doesn't have anything like the volume of marking to do compared with his oppos in state schools.

That won't work for all areas, as this isn't an expensive place to live, but it shows that the issues are both about pay AND conditions. Address both and we'll have happy teachers and happy kids.

…much later… apologies for typo.

@caringcarer , it has been ruled to be discriminatory to make any stipulation about toileting in state education - whether that a child must be toilet trained or that a parent must be called for changes.

I was around - involved in pre-school not as a teacher - when this change was made, and at the time it was an improvement as it meant children with SEN affecting continence were no longer unfairly excluded from educational settings such as pre-schools. However, over the intervening 20 years or so, it has had an unintended consequence in terms of allowing parents to toilet train much water or not at all, even where no SEN affecting continence is present.

However, the law is as it is, so your proposal would be illegal.

@noblegiraffe I get emails from schools and agencies, even though I am in my early 70s and retired long ago. Of course, none have offered me any money; they expect me to work for free.