Taxpayers Alliance thinks that schools spend too much on teachers

Don’t know much about teachers salaries but I do know they don’t get paid enough havin to deal with self entitled know it all bratty gubshytes all day.

As someone on Twitter said "surprised they didn't mention the teachers gold-plated pensions while they were at it!" Because obviously they will be minted when they retire

The TPA is an arm of the extreme right-wing of the Tory party who are completely shady about who funds them. So, obviously they'll have a go at teachers.

The govt is forever going on about how badly we do in Pisa compared with eg Singapore and S Korea. When I've seen programmes about schools in Asia that are doing well, I see huge classrooms of 40+ students, rows of benches or desks, and a teacher with a whiteboard. Nothing fancy, no expensive equipment. Just old fashioned human teaching and a lot of engaged kids whose parents and governments are interested in their education. We have it all the wrong way round here! Well-paid, well-trained, better respected teachers and sufficiently-funded schools would surely negate the need for masses of IT. Not to mention seeing the children of ministers/CEOs/etc at state schools too

The tech market has tried really hard to break into education but the problem is that the results aren’t there to justify the massive set-up costs.

A few years ago loads of schools were looking into providing every kid with an ipad. They were going to replace textbooks and exercise books. There are a few schools that do it, but it hasn’t actually taken off in the way that was anticipated. My school was all set to do it then backtracked, and some local schools have gradually phased out the scheme.

But on the other hand you have a Glasgow council buying virtual reality headsets for all its schools. www.heraldscotland.com/news/16095496.Scots_council_becomes_first_in_UK_to_give_virtual_reality_headsets_to_schools/ Colossal waste of money - I don’t think the Taxpayer’s Alliance would approve of that.

I think we’ll be stuck with boring old human teachers draining the education system of money for some time to come. They’re just too damn effective.

I think the human element is irreplaceable too Stripeybeachbag.

Have a bit of a wobble about that though when I think of the kids who are around 5 now. The ones who try swiping and double tapping books because they are totally tablet adapted.

LapsedHumanist I believe this is the aim too.

Of course anyone who works with kids (or teenagers at least) knows that this won't work. A teacher at a previous school tried a computer-based guided teaching method. Basically he wrote lessons for the kids to do on their computers every single lesson. They HATED it. They were very well-behaved and supposedly compliant students, but they revolted. Students need the interaction with the teacher and surprise surprise learn better when an knowledgeable adult explains things to them in an accessible way.

But I have had at least 3 heads complain about the size of the teachers' wage bill - their own salaries not withstanding of course. Many heads, let alone politicians, would love to replace us with computers and reduce us to babysitters.

I'm sure they can do the job quite expertly on a voluntary basis, themselves

Well, Piggy I’d say that’s a legitimate reaction to this.

Nearly 20 years ago, I worked, briefly, with someone who was pretty friendly with James Tooley (above) and Michael Gove (and other now senior Tories). I was vaguely aware of Gove back then as he lived close to me when I was little and had attended the same primary school several years before me.

I remember this colleague talking to me about vouchers, academies, free schools, gradual marketisation of education back then. And over the last 20 years I’ve seen it gradually rolled out. And I know what kind of thing this colleague talked to me about as being the end goal.

One of the places that this colleague ended up working for a while was the (then) Specialist School’s Trust. It’s trajectory and evolution since the 80s is a pretty good indicator of the direction education policy is following.

stop it lapsed : you're scaring me!!

James Tooley

The agenda here is —everyone back to the workhouse— adopting a model that relies more on technology.

So more and more teaching being delivered remotely or via apps/computer programmers. The people actually is the classroom, lower skilled, lower paid, essentially just babysitting an iPad/kid farm.

There have been some models like that rolled out in developing world countries, out of necessity (for example in African countries with huge numbers of orphans and working age populations heavily affected by HIV epidemic, so class sizes compared to available teachers just off the scale).

This what free school/academy chains and hugely restrictive curriculum standardisation and control is aiming towards,

Big tax breaks for companies that supply the tech hardware and develop the programme/software. Then a partnership with an academy chain, which spreads rapidly due to reduced overheads and economies of scale.

Then provision of education becomes a voucher to chose your private provider (and of course there will be “top-ups” for a higher standard of provision, longer hours, better facilities).

Quite quickly no public sector education system. Any school buildings that are in decent nick sold off for a song, possibly rented out to private education provider as premises by some savvier councils. Other sites sold off to developers for housing.

Potential for a huge amount of central control on what is taught too. Just update the code.

Enjoying a pay rise? Hell - I got 1%. And considering it's been frozen for several years and yet inflation is higher than that I'm actually considerably worse off than I was, say, five years ago.

And I'm pretty sure I earn less than the dick that wrote this.

I'm really not sure how they could have expected any other result?

Perhaps the Taxpayers Alliance would like their own children taught by someone else? Someone cheaper? Maybe children could just do a few e-learning packages, that would save a fortune?

What next - Study shows sky is blue?

You have got to wonder what they think the resources are!

What exactly should the education budget be spent on if not teachers? Including recruiting and training, not just salaries.

You could have lovely shiny buildings with amazing resources... but without teachers skills to deliver the curriculum and engage children in learning, nothing much would happen.

Or women squiglet

Tax payers alliance are a right-wing pressure group. Ignore.

Well that's a waste of time and money making that report! Where did that money come from to pay for that?!

I suppose the biggest cost in the police is the police men and biggest cost in fire service is the fire men. I know just spend all the money on empty police cars and fire engines cos that's more important!

I think they are spending too much money on generating these reports!

"It is therefore clear that schools in England are spending vast amounts of money on staff costs and other items of expenditure."

Er.... yes!

Who do they think plans the lessons? Who do they think marks the books?

Labour costs are almost always the highest institutional cost.

From the report “Although we are not calling for teacher pay to be cut, our analysis in this paper shows that teachers have been enjoying a pay rise and so there is no need to increase their salary further at this point in time.”

How generous of them. They do realise that there’s a teacher shortage don’t they?

“As there is scant evidence that teaching assistants improve the educational outcomes for the vast majority of students, a considerable amount of money should be cut from the education support staff bill. However, as there is evidence which suggests that teaching assistants do have a positive impact on pupils with special educational needs, some of the money should be reallocated to this area.”

Um, who exactly do they think teaching assistants are currently working with? We’ve got hardly any left at my school, so evidence that they have a positive impact on kids with SEN would mean hiring more of them.

I suspect the children of the author of the article (if he has any) do not go to a state school. And he sounds a bit thick for someone working at Oxford Uni, I would have thought someone intelligent would know better than to compare teacher pay to the pay of the average person.

Or, in other words, What have the Taxpayers Alliance been smoking?!

I'm sorry, but if staff costs aren't where we spend most money in schools, we're going even more wrong as a nation than I thought...