I need to quit my job, don’t I?

[WorkStressMax]

First day back at work today and I honestly could have walked out halfway through the day. I’ve been feeling this way on and off for ages, but having a couple of weeks off for Christmas has really cemented it now. I’m really struggling with it.

Pros: it’s term time & school hours only so fits in really well with kids (they’re primary age). Part of the job is something I love and have specialised in for years. That’s literally it.

Cons: the pay is minimum wage, so after a 45 minute commute each way and having to pay for breakfast clubs so I can get to work on time, I don’t earn much at all. Most of the job is dealing with bad attitudes, being sworn at, ignored, being given tasks to do and no training (even though training is promised), being given jobs well outside the remit of what I was hired for. I can cope with that as I can pick it up (although not to do it with much confidence). It’s really stressful and I’ve had enough of dealing with being sworn at and expected to put up with it. Lots of people I work with are great at that part of the job but I just find it so stressful.

Would I be an idiot to change jobs, given that the term time aspect is really helpful? There aren’t any opportunities to do the same job anywhere closer to home as it’s quite London-centric. And then I start doubting myself that I’d actually be any good at any other jobs and think I may as well stick it out. Gah. I know I need to leave so I guess I’m asking:

Have you left a job like that and been happier?
If you’ve previously worked in ESOL, did you transfer to a non-teaching/non school based career, and do you recommend it?

In a word yes. Hated that feeling of dreading going in, the childcare fees eating into my wages. I now work from home as a tutor. Is that something you could look at doing. I just cracked on with the job hunting and found then I could cope with the crappy job as I knew it wasn’t forever.

@Juststopit I would love to do tutoring, but I’ve been worried it might not be a stable source of income. Do you find it’s ok though? As honestly, I have a chronic pain condition (I still get around and can work but I’m in pain every day) and working from home sounds absolutely bloody blissful

It is, I work for a company but make all my own appointments. I do go out sometimes
for meetings. This means I still have a monthly income. Lots of my friends work freelance though and they get enough work in. I m a single parent so need a guaranteed income at the moment but will probably go freelance eventually. It’s hard, start looking for other jobs. If you know of company’s that might need your talents email them, don’t just rely on job sites. Honestly, once you start looking you do start to feel better.

Thank you! It’s lovely to hear that an escape is possible I’ll look into some tutoring work, as I think that would be ideal. I’ve worked in esol and similar for so long that I was getting the absolute willies about doing an office job.

Whereabouts in the country are you?

I’m in the southeast, technically commuting distance to London but it’s expensive and takes a while so I’m trying to avoid that

Why not start looking at a less 'state funded' job? By that, I mean at one of those colleges that specialise in overseas students/Oxbridge entries. And everywhere has a private school or two that might be very interested in a skilled ESOL teacher - you could potentially take on one part time post and then use the extra days to build up private tutoring clients or initially work for a fairly low wage at an out of school tutoring place, where they get kids up to a standard needed for entrance exams.

I sympathise completely, though. I'm just hanging on for the expected redundancy this year - I've just completed another year so qualify for slightly more money and, if I were to receive the letter confirming it tomorrow, I'd feel relief more than anything else (they keep on claiming they'll announce the decision on x day but then pushing it back again and again).

The moment I have freedom and financial breathing space, I'm going self employed and building it up.

How much do you earn after you've paid for childcare and travel?

I’m normally pro staying in a job until finding another one, but your situation sounds really hard, for NMW, so unless money is a big issue quitting sounds sensible!

@MitziK That sounds so stressful for you I can completely relate with the relief you’d feel though. Good luck with the self employed plan, hopefully it will be a much happier job! I did use to work in in a language school and loved it, but it was the wrong side of the city so all my money went on childcare as even though the hours were 9-3 the commute was horrendous. We do have a few private schools nearby so I will definitely look into that route, as well as the out of school tutoring. Thank you for the inspiration. I work as a kind of TA in a secondary, and I though I was hired to run literacy programs for students with dyslexia/spld, that hasn’t really happened and it’s 90% dealing with horrible behaviour and 10% actually teaching/helping students. The behaviour really gets to me. My first day back I got told to fuck off, you’re boring, don’t fucking tell me what to do, I ain’t fucking listening to you etc etc. I’m not a pushover by many means, and use the behaviour system but there’s no end to it. Well, until I quit at least!

@AntiHop I earn a glorious £750pcm after childcare and petrol costs, for a 4 day week of 2 full days and 2 half days.

@Loopytiles Thank you I rarely make sensible decisions so that’s good to hear

If you’d like to work as a tutor, I would contact Virtual Schools in your area offering your services or ask which tuition agencies they use. A growing number of children in care are unaccompanied asylum seekers, and often need additional ESOL tuition. There are not enough ESOL tutors around IME.

For £750 quid, you might as well work in a local shop or type a few letters. You'll probably get help with childcare fees for school holidays (I can't promise this, but I'm pretty sure you can if you work over 16 hours) and the lack of pressure might be all you need to start feeling better - primary is completely different to secondary as well; plenty of places would love somebody able to work with little ones who are learning English and would be truly unflappable when compared to dealing with teenagers with emotional and behavioural issues.

There's also the local Adult Education providers - they tend to get a lot of their income from ESOL classes. The pay's much better, too, albeit hourly and only available on a termly basis.

Thanks all, I will definitely look into those areas. Teaching EFL has definitely been my favourite job, even though the pay is not great there, it’s still better than minimum wage! Today was another crap day. I have been given a tutor group to run this term. No other TAs at the school have a tutor group, and they’ve worked in secondary schools longer than I have. I don’t have a clue what I’m doing! I feel so angry now that the talk when I started of “we’ll treat you as an HTLA” clearly meant they use me as an HTLA but not pay me HTLA rates. I’ve completely run out of motivation for even the good parts of the job