"Gold dust" school jobs

[Smartsub]

I am currently trying to recruit for support staff in school. I need kitchen, staff, admin and TAs. All term time only and all school hours. The jobs I've previously seen referred to on here as "gold dust".

We are getting hardly any applications and those we do get a poor. Admittedly the money is poor, but that's always been the case. Until a couple of years ago the difficult part was sifting through the 100s of applications we'd get for such jobs, now we rarely get more than a handful.

What's changed?

Maybe the issue is that you see these people as SAHMs who want a bit of 'extra' money for their household and maybe SAHMs nowadays are more interested in finding/going back to a career rather than be seen as someone who works for a bit of pin money

So you are saying the job was good because you spent your 40 minute break doing work but at least you got food for it?

Some certainly do, yep. Not all of them are able to enforce that, because unless the employer is something special its an employees market these days. That's the supply and demand you mention. And those who are able to insist on full office attendance aren't a big enough group to prevent some of the people who'd previously have taken school jobs for the holidays from getting that flexibility elsewhere.

Fwiw I think we'll see more organisations finding it harder to justify paying for physical space for employees to work in. More wfh was part of the public sector austerity drive years before covid. Obviously at the moment the government position is all go back in the office, but that won't last forever. As time passes, there'll be fewer expensive leases to justify!

None of this is to comment on specific sectors like tech though, you'd know more about your sector than I would.

No I'm not saying that mycathatesmecudding, and you know that.

Do I know that? Oh great thanks for telling me what I know

What I said is exactly what I took from your post. I may have misunderstood your post. You may have not made your point as clear as you think you did.

What I absolutely did not do is take one thing from your post and then type out something completely different in reply.

You jumping to the conclusion that that's what a person would do may say more about you than me then

But do please continue to tell me what it is I'm really thinking as I clearly am far to confused to know myself

Things are very different if you're a member of SLT is all I will say.

I’m a cleaner at one of my local schools. The council are struggling to recruit cleaners not only for schools which tend to be 3.15 to 6.15 pm term time) but cleaners across the whole department. It’s 15 hour or under contracts and not much above minimum wage, same for lunchtime and kitchen staff.
its just not feasible anymore, changes to universal credit and the cost of living don’t help either.

a lot of women my age that I know surprisingly do not drive and unless they get hours in a local school etc it’s just not feasible or worthwhile.

I can drive and so I am able to pick up more contracts within the council for other sites which boost my hours and when things settle down for me and my family I will be looking fir lunchtimes jobs too.

it works for me but I can see totally why these gold dust jobs no longer work for a lot of people

@Dwightlovesmichael OMG!!!! The timekeeping bit. It actually wouldn't surprise me if that was done to me when I leave. Honestly I would flip. I already have a few times but to use something like that when as you say, all the additional hours you put in is shocking.

SBM is absolutely hard work - but nobody publicly bollocks the SBM for things like going to the toilet or choosing to stop and eat or go home on time rather than work unpaid. They can and do get grief in Finance Committee meetings and when saying 'no' to people used to being in charge, but not in public. And when you can be on anything from fifty grand upwards in London, the money makes the occasional difficult conversation behind closed doors all that more tolerable - getting twenty times the grief (and outright contempt in some cases) for less than 20% of the salary and barely being able to survive unless you receive in work benefits or have a well paid spouse whilst working one's arse off is the reality for most Support.

It's easy to tell when somebody crosses that invisible demarcation point with a role change - within five minutes of the new job title going up on the phone list, people who would previously shout at you in corridors, hiss threats, corner you where there are no witnesses or snark on emails (copied in to all and sundry including your line manager in an attempt to get you into trouble) became oh, so very, very polite and friendly...

I have been in a pastoral position at a secondary school for the past 7 years. I have never had a payrise, so I officially get paid less now than when I started. I pay my cleaner more per hour than I get. And you know what I do? I support all the poor students with poor mental health who might even be feeling suicidal and CAMHS have told parents 'school will put support in place'. Yeah, me.

@DayDreamsOfMaria oh my, yes. I had a meeting today with a parent and child and the parent told me that the GP had said "go back to sch for support". Unbelievable. Given that I had suggested student see GP for additional support at our last meeting where we had exhausted most avenues.

My cleaner too also earns more than me. I am paying a cleaner to manage my house and washing as I am just always at work and as a single parent cannot do it all for my own family while, supporting other people's.

Yup. And I don't know about you @Tron80, but school has invested a grand total of zero pennies on my training, aside the customary safeguarding. So I have to do what I can at my own cost and my own time so I can somehow support these poor kids who unfortunately for them have no one else but me!

CAMHS also told me the same when my 7 year old son was harming himself and speaking of ending his life. It's terrible

@DayDreamsOfMaria yep! Also no chance of me moving up to DSL as I have no experience/training. When I asked how do I then get experience/training... met with a blank face and silence. Sad to say I do not know how much longer i will continue to work in schools. My colleagues and I at at breaking point with volume of work.

@Needanewadventure2021 very saddened to hear this.

The recruitment process is a nightmare here.

I am desperate to land one of these roles.

One school lost my application. Another never got back to me.

Specialist agency wants me to pay for my own DBS and then 10 years of professional references.

I interviewed for a SEN learning coach role. I did online courses to prepare. They sacked all of their staff and have loads of vacancies but didn't recruit anyone because they didn't have enough experience.

They told me I need to volunteer first. Even in a nursery. I questioned that because I can't believe changing nappies for free is considered more valuable experience than genuine academic credentials. And this was from a prestigious academy!

I've since been offered a catering assistant position without even needing a formal interview. The pay is better than the SEN learning coach role was.

The whole system is absolutely baffling.

I work as a classroom assistant. I love it but it is hard work and very demanding - But that said - I really appreciate having time off with my 3kids and having Easter/ Xmas off as it saves trying to find childcare ( and it's nice to be off oN these key dates) but I will admit my DH is a high earner and if it wasn't for his wage I simply couldn't afford to work here.

I don’t think comparing a Senior Business Manager to school office staff is fair. One is appropriately paid for the role and the other really isn’t, just for starters.

I agree with the WFH theory. Also SLT are deaf in many cases. My ex rural school now has a real problem recruiting. TA’s used to start at 8.45 and finish at 2.45 . Fighting chance for parents to do school pick ups. We had mums, dads, people with second jobs etc. Staff stayed for years, remembered the kids , knew the systems.

Then hours were changed to 8.15 to 3.15 plus a weekly meeting. So yes an extra 5 hours a week of already really low paid work. However it meant for parents of kids needing childcare and second jobbers it was just not viable. Noticeable all we had were students wanting experience or supply staff, who only want temporary work. The few experienced staff had the burden of training and filling the gaps as well as being the most called upon.

Yup, remote working has made it easier for mothers to work from home especially and fathers also. So, often people are splitting childcare and pick-up days.

People also now need 2 salaries to survive to pay mortgage, bills and have fun money.

Everything except for cost of living, I think this is great for women. No longer they have to become a SAHM and give up their careers or be part time which will affect their pension etc.

As a blanket statement at my work no one has meetings between 8-9 or 3-4. It wasn’t even me who enforced this rule as I only joined in January.

The problem is SAHM’s can’t afford to work for pin money anymore unless their husband is on a really good salary and won’t be affected by redundancy etc.

Prices wise everything is going up, childcare is changing to 9 months - the government want people in work. The only benefit is wfh and flexible hours. This is why women can earn a full time salary and do drop offs/pick offs at the same time. They don’t need a term time job anymore. They can make triple (or even more) if they’ve been in that career a while and no career break compared to a job in school. Also, if they’re husband wfh’s they can split pick up/drop off days. This is the biggest difference.

Working for pin money has always screwed women over financially.

I agree SBM role is still tough and less well paid than equivalent out of sector. But I know exactly how much mine is on and she is nearly 3 times my hourly rate. Yes she has to make difficult decisions and works hard, but she also delegates much of her workload out.
Being paid more fairly as a pp mentioned, would make one accept the office stress more. Minimum wage now has led me to make private plans to dump 'em in it!

On reflection, I don't think my SBM contribution was helpful. I didn't read the room. I do think however all school support staff are paid less well than other sectors and then schools wonder why they can't recruit or retain staff. Learning Support Assistants, Teaching Partners etc do a valuable job and are paid peanuts and their T&Cs are much less favourable than they were. The job market is a different place since Covid and I think we will be moving to a two tier salary system - higher if you are required in your workplace, lower if you can work from home.

@mrsnec The recruitment process is a nightmare here.

Where are you?

I am desperate to land one of these roles.

Why?

One school lost my application. Another never got back to me.

Was lost application ever received? The one who did not get back you could be sheer volume of applications. Some adverts do say if you do not hear, you have not been successful:

Specialist agency wants me to pay for my own DBS and then 10 years of professional references.

Yes, if you want to work with children or venerable adults you will need a fully enhanced DBS. If agency work, you will need to provide that yourself.
Yes, your full employment history ( any any gaps) will need to be verified. Nothing unusual about that at all and a requirement for working in school's.

I interviewed for a SEN learning coach role. I did online courses to prepare. They sacked all of their staff and have loads of vacancies but didn't recruit anyone because they didn't have enough experience.

This is because SEN roles are extremely challenging and a combination of high level qualifications and experience are needed in this provision .

They told me I need to volunteer first. Even in a nursery. I questioned that because I can't believe changing nappies for free is considered more valuable experience than genuine academic credentials. And this was from a prestigious academy!

Because there is more to understanding children than changing nappies . You have failed to identity that.

I've since been offered a catering assistant position without even needing a formal interview. The pay is better than the SEN learning coach role was.

Take that job then!

The whole system is absolutely..

Geared towards people that have a proven and sincere interest in furthering the outcomes of the young people in their care.

Vulnerable not venerable 🤦‍♀️

Schools were spoiled for a long time as you used to get dozens and dozens of applications for TA roles. It meant they felt they could treat these roles badly too. Now they are lucky if they get one or two applications (secondary school).

Ive shared offices with several SBM and I can tell you some of them are working very hard/long hours, and some of them aren’t. Worked for one who was an expert in delegating all their work.