Teachers balloting for strike action - school closures

[noblegiraffe]

A pre-ballot poll from the NEU suggests that the ballot will be in favour.

The NASUWT have announced that their ballot will open around 27th October in England, Scotland and Wales, and will close on 9th January, I assume that the NEU will be doing similar and it would be joint action.

Strike action would mean school closures around Jan/Feb time and obviously this will impact parents who need to start thinking about arrangements for this eventuality. Please consider emailing your MP asking them to forward any concerns about this to Kit Malthouse, Secretary of State for Education, as any pressure on him from parents to avert strike action by entering pay negotiations would be highly welcome.

The current pay offer of 5% for most teachers is unfunded, meaning that it has to come out of current school budgets. This means that the pay rise will result in cuts to education provision for your children. However, this offer is after over a decade of real terms pay cuts for teachers and with inflation at 10%, teachers cannot afford more pay cuts and to continue to shoulder the burden of government financial incompetence and deliberate running into the ground of public services any longer.

The unions are asking for an above inflation fully funded pay rise for teachers. A teacher pay rise, any teacher pay rise, cannot come out of current school budgets as this will mean a lower quality of education for your children. This could involve even bigger class sizes, even fewer courses on offer, even less provision for SEN children, fewer school trips and extra curricular activities.

School funding has been devastated by the Tory government over the last 12 years. SEN funding has been cut: the impact falls on schools and teachers to deal with. CAMHS funding has been cut: the impact falls on schools and teachers to deal with. Schools are being asked to solve more and more of society's issues, with fewer and fewer resources. It's unsustainable.

People will tell you that teachers are well paid and don't deserve a pay rise. However, we have a critical shortage of teachers, and the obvious conclusion is that if we can't get teachers for the pay that is on offer, then the pay is not enough. Market forces, right?

The government know the impact of increasing pay to attract and keep teachers; they have, this week, announced a big increase to the teacher training bursaries in response to the truly dire and alarming numbers of applicants to teacher training this year. They have also introduced early career payments in shortage areas. They have yet to extend this logic to increasing teacher pay to retain more experienced teachers - the ones who are crucial in training and supporting the new and early career teachers.

I'm not suggesting in the slightest that teachers are more deserving than other workers, or that we have it harder than other workers. If you have also not had a pay rise in years, that's unacceptable. If you are balloting for strike action, or undertaking strike action to try to improve your working conditions, then all power and support to you. I really hope that school support staff join us in taking action.

This government is ruining the country. I think everyone can see that now. Instead of proposing increases to public funding, they are proposing further cuts. But we've already cut everything.

They'll claim there is no money, but then propose tax cuts for the best off. They'll reject windfall taxes even when Shell is asking for them. They'll claim that higher wages will increase inflation so they can't possibly increase wages, while talking about how important it is to move to a higher wage economy. Not higher wages for the ordinary worker though, they mean the ones already on high wages. The ones who would have benefited from the 45p tax rate cut that they've already had to u-turn on.

The DfE have said that strike will damage the education of children, that they can't afford to miss out on more school. Teachers, if they vote to strike, will be voting for better education. We want a qualified, decent teacher in front of every class. This is absolutely not happening at the moment, and will not have a chance of happening unless teacher pay and conditions improve.

TLDR: Support teachers; the government are self-interested, public service destroying, incompetent shitheads.

After 12 years of denegration of state education, perhaps we need to think why teachers are even having a ballot.

Twelve years of Tory government have brought public services to their knees. The depressing thing is I'm not convinced people wouldn't still vote for them, usually with some guff about how much worse things would be if labour were in power. Oddly enough I don't remember education and health being decimated under Blair and Brown. Neither do I remember food bank presence everywhere needed to feed those in full time work. It's fucking horrendous but I worry that we get what we deserve.

Total, 100% support for all the strikes.

They force strikes to only be about pay and then the media moans about strikers being greedy.

Yep, and then people complain about the unions talking about pay and not the massive issues in education.

I've seen on here posters saying stuff like 'if schools are in such a dire state, why haven't teachers done anything about it? They only strike when their pay is affected'.

The backlash from the Gove strikes in 2013 was awful.

Will schools actually close during the strikes, though? As a TA, I totally support the strike action from teachers but also worry that TAs will be expected to hold the fort during strike days and that this will undermine the impact.

It would be perfectly reasonable to refuse to cover a striking colleague and I would hope that a HT would know better than to ask.

The headteacher unions are considering their own industrial action so I'd hope that they wouldn't seek to undermine a teacher strike.

There have been previous strikes which were just one union, and I think some primaries kept classes open where the teacher wasn't a member of the striking union, but closed the classes of striking teachers.

This strike would be joint union action, I wouldn't have thought there'd be many teachers who would be going in.

I think people roll their eyes when teachers talk about another strike is because it feels like that's literally all we've heard from teachers for decades. They've never been happy, and most posters on here have nothing good to say about their job, any aspect of it.
The unions are dire, their PR is either non existent or completely missing the point that public support will help if they got the OR right, so I guess what I'm wondering is why haven't teachers addressed this aspect so that the public don't just think "teachers are moaning again "?

My teaching union last went on national strike in 2013.

Grim news about public spending cuts incoming. Government departments are being asked to make cuts of 2%. Back of an envelope calculations from Sam Freedman suggest that this will mean £850 million cuts to school budgets - 17,000 teachers.

So if the teacher pay rise isn't funded, and schools are already having to pay 10% more for basic supplies due to inflation AND there will now be budget cuts on top of that, schools are basically going to be unable to keep the lights on.

twitter.com/samfr/status/1581567101235793923?s=61&t=wYthhLsrHxd5yxGaeIC3VQ

I’m a teacher in an indie. The government doesn’t pay my salary but our salaries are in line with state teachers - not increased as many indies do. I won’t be striking because it isn’t the government who sets our pay/conditions. However, I fully support colleagues in the state sector though.

I hope both unions pick to strike on the same day so that massive inconvenience is caused. This isn’t because I’m a firebrand but because schools (all state schools) are on their knees. Along with science and maths teacher shortages there is also a massive shortage of DT and Food Teachers - in the past we’d have laughed at such “soft subjects” having shortages but no longer.

I also know that on the university training courses (PGCE) all subjects are down with STEM subjects being particularly affected. One friend who teaches the science PGCE has moved to primary as there was an 80% drop in numbers of people training this year.
With 1/5 teachers looking to leave anyway this suggests education is well and truly screwed.

Teachers have to strike to get the point across that education need proper funding not just on wages but resources as well. Our children have been done such a disservice and education really is at breaking point.

That wasn't my point. My point was that if the unions did an effective job in garnering public support, maybe you'd get somewhere. Assuming they are not so arrogant that the don't think they need public support.

I have just written to my odious MP. It is not pretty or prefect. But I thought rather than just saying, yes I support teachers, I could actually do something. So anyone else agreeing, feel free to copy and paste.

Please forward this to Kit Malthouse, Secretary of State for Education
Dear Mr Malthouse
I am deeply concerned about the government's lack of engagement in discussing teachers and school staff's pay and conditions.

Teachers are leaving the profession and there are not enough new trainees joining the profession. There is already a teacher shortage and this is only going to get worse. The impact of this on the education of our children could ultimately be worse than the impact of Covid-related school closures during 2020/21. Children need to be taught by qualified, subject expert teachers. There needs to be experienced teachers in post to help train and nurture willing, capable trainees. Not science taught by historians or maths classes of 34.
Basic market forces show that the current teacher salaries are not sufficient. They need to be increased to reflect the workload and the real-term decrease in pay over the last 12 years.
The recent 5% increase to teacher's pay is unfunded - meaning that for schools to award the increase they need to cut already impossible budgets to pay for it. This is wrong and needs to be changed immediately.
In addition, the pay for support staff and TAs within school desperately needs improving. It is these staff that help our most vulnerable and disadvantaged students access education. They help "diminish the difference". Whether through sitting 1:1 to help a primary aged child grasp phonics or supporting a 14 year old with absence or behaviour issues - they are the gateway for so many to education - and vital in supporting teachers in the classroom. During the current economic difficulties these gateway staff are leaving their roles as they need to earn more money. In supermarkets. As delivery drivers. Their skills, experience and empathy are not valued by the Department for Education and are being wasted. This is wrong. And as with teachers, schools are finding it increasingly difficult to recruit because the pay is just not in any way competitive.
You, as Secretary for State of education, must realise this is in your hands. You need to open discussions with the unions and fight for the education of our children. For the future of this country.
Yours sincerely

My point was that if the unions did an effective job in garnering public support, maybe you'd get somewhere.

You must admit that it is quite difficult to garner public support when the newspapers print lies and whip up hatred against teachers, and the government do the same?

Thank you Panty, that is great 👍

I also know that on the university training courses (PGCE) all subjects are down with STEM subjects being particularly affected

This is really, really concerning in my area. My school offers placements to PGCE students, and this year, there just aren't enough students to go round the local schools, and schools that are offering placements are being told no. Maths numbers are particularly dire.

I saw in the ITT recruitment figures that maths had reached 90% of its target, which was really confusing given the numbers on the ground. Then I found that the government had drastically reduced the target, making recruitment look better, when actually it was worse. I don't know why they reduced the target as we don't have enough maths teachers and need more, not fewer trainees to plug the gaps.

I wish we were allowed to strike about the unfunded part as i do think it might help increase support, but yes every parent, or would be parent really needs to copy the letter above and send it to their MP.
I also teach in a leafy “good” comp, we have continual teacher shortages, and in order to pay the unfunded 5% ( announced after school had done their budget for this year)we are
closing earlier at night to save money on heating,
we have cancelled our online textbook subscription that all kids had access to ( we don’t have any up to date actual textbooks either),
we are not allowed to print anything out,
classes of 32 in science including kids with considerable additional needs who would really benefit from a ta/ smaller/ quieter classes,
we are scrapping some practicals because they cost too much to do
etc etc.

If your kids are in state education then they are paying the price for the underfunding hugely.

We've reduced the number of teachers in core subjects. Class sizes are now becoming a real issue, particularly for pupils at the lower end of attainment. The TAs who would have supported those classes were made redundant years ago.

Our heating hasn't been switched on yet. When it is, it will only be on in the mornings, same as last year. Kids will be expected to learn in conditions that are really uncomfortable (coats, hats, scarves in classrooms last winter, and basically nothing was learned during the heatwave this summer).

I don't know why parents haven't been kicking off at the government for years about the state of schools.

Then you should strike too.

The truth is, teachers are leaving in huge numbers, ITT courses are not recruiting, and the state sector is increasingly reliant on unqualified staff. Something has to change, and it really does have to change soon, or the quality of education in this country will be eroded forever.

I feel really passionately about that, and I'm not going to suck it up because other workers won't strike, or do anything about it. If you went on strike, I'd support you. I support the RMT, the CWU, the UCU, the barristers, the nurse, the junior doctors, and so on. But I'm not going to sit quietly because other people have it bad too.

If we all work together, then we could see positive change for everyone.

I am pretty sure the NEU is planning to ballot support staff. I know Unison etc don't seem very interested in fighting for TAs, but the NEU is, and I would assume they'd co-ordinate strikes to all be on the same day. Anyone who works in education can join the NEU- it's not just for teachers.

Teachers who are in unions can also refuse to cover the work of a teacher in another union who is striking. I think as a TA member of any union, you'd have a strong argument to not do anything outside your normal duties on a strike day. I'd certainly take union advice (e.g. via the NEU advice line) before agreeing to e.g. supervise 90 kids in the hall.

The last time both main unions were out on strike was the pension strikes I think- and I remember a lot of schools closing then. When it's just one union on strike, many schools can stay open (although often very little learning gets done, so I'm not sure if it's really worthwhile), but if both NEU and NASUWT go out on the same day, that's the vast majority of teaching staff in some schools (including much of the senior leadership).

The other difference is that I feel a lot of heads are actually on board with these strikes- they're the ones trying to recruit with no applicants for jobs etc. So they may have less interest in keeping schools open than in previous strikes (I know some will, no matter what).

The ST today mentions the NAHT balloting for strike action. If they, or ASCL, go out , some schools will close if the school safeguarding leads are not at work.

I don't really follow the argument that we are greedy, or appear to look that way. If you received a 10% 'payrise' this year, you would have no more money than you did last year, assuming your spending stayed roughly the same, because of inflation. Teachers have had real terms pay cuts for a decade. I've just started on not much more than the starting salary my dad had joining the profession 30 years ago. There are teachers I work with earning circa 40k with big responsibilities and 20-30 years experience. We want, and deserve, more money, and we shouldn't shy away from that...

The school I left last year has done similar- they couldn't recruit in maths and science, so they've put Year 10 and 11 into populations, with a maximum of 4 sets in each population- so they all do get access to specialist teaching, but are taught as part of a much wider ability range. But because the specialist teachers are constantly teaching exam classes (KS4+KS5), many KS3 classes are getting very limited specialist teaching.

When I started at that school, my bottom set Y11 had 13 students and TA support. The equivalent set going into Y11 now had something like 24, and no TA. 24 might sound like a small class size, but there's children in that group with significant learning needs, and it is to big for them. The other sets all have 32+ students. It also makes moving students between sets very tricky, as to move students up, you also need to move someone down, as otherwise there's no space.

Current school has A-level classes of over 20, which I also think is too big. I'm sure in previous years, it would be e.g. one class of 12, one of 11, but that simply can't be justified now. I'm actually hoping some students drop, as it will make practical work etc more managable!

That could be a big deal- if NAHT co-ordinated with the other unions, even on one day of strike action, that would presumably see a lot of schools closed, because who's going to open a school with the majority of staff and the head on strike?

The teacher pay rise of 5% ^is being funded by redundancies. Did you miss that bit of the OP?