Staffing crisis in schools - teachers/school staff, what's your school like?

[noblegiraffe]

Discussions with fellow teachers about the current crisis in school staffing has raised the issue of whether parents know how bad it is. I guess they won't know if we don't tell them?

My school - struggling to recruit teachers. There are subjects at A-level where students are currently teaching themselves, and with no prospect of a teacher on the horizon. Last year we had similar issues, pupils went into exams not fully prepared, and coursework was a huge problem. At GCSE where we couldn't recruit, there was a teacher in front of the class, but not qualified in that subject and pupils complained about the syllabus not being taught.

TA provision has been cut to the bone. There is only in class support if a child has an EHCP, this support is then spread to other children who need help. Due to backlogs with EHCP applications, and applications routinely being rejected (the assumption is automatic rejection, then appeal) some very needy children get no additional help in class. In addition, we have bigger classes due to leaving teachers not being replaced, so teachers are spread even more thinly.

There are huge concerns about teacher recruitment for next year as the number of trainees on local PGCE courses has collapsed.

And I know my school is in a relatively good position compared to others.

The work situation is really bad for a lot of people. So many on zero hours contracts, who don't earn when they don't work. They basically don't know if they'll be working for the month ahead. No security for them.

Labours manifesto for education was awful. I’m not voting for that.

That wasn't their actual manifesto, though.

Basically imagine how ramshackle the NHS is and multiply it by about 80

It's only going to get worse.

I've been to briefings this term where the LA have outlined the financial situation - schools are looking at having to cut the workforce by 15-20% because of a shortfall in staffing.
KS2 could be talking about classes of between 35 and 38 with no support.
Apparently the only reason they aren't considering classes larger than that is that they have done an audit of school building plans and the rooms aren't big enough.
The majority of schools will be setting a deficit budget next year with no feasible plan to get out of it.
Unfunded payrises, rising costs of utilities and consumables will break us.

For context - the average school in my area has a surplus of about 50K. Next year we are looking at being 50K plus in deficit

On another thread recently about school finances I got told I should let out my hall and encourage fundraising - I do not thing people realise the enormity of the situation.
But presumably once people start to realise teaching as a career will become even more undesirable.

Labour’s manifesto for education is not yet written, please let them know what you would like (and not like) in it.

Previous post should say shortfall in finance - not staffing.
But one will lead to another

Do we know where their actual manifesto is?

Sorry X post. Screaming toddler

It's horrendous. I'm a Cover Manager at a small secondary and we are spending a fortune on supply staff. We can't recruit decent teaching staff and getting TAs seems impossible. We have 23 EHCPs and 9 TAs now. I've never known it so bad.

It all feels like it's on a knife edge at the moment.

We have 2 teachers on long term sick. Cannot recruit science teacher to replace the one who left.

I teach in a lovely rural school with a superb head and supportive SLT. My colleagues are brilliant.

But there's a lot of people who are not far from "the edge".

Where to start with this....

but out of interest, how would you choose the "best teachers in the country" to record lessons?

@VioletLemon parents can’t access any support for children outside of school CAMHS is non existent, parents don’t think schools are psychiatric support, they just have no support and are desperate.

Have you a link to that? I'm not sure what their current position is on education.

Experienced member of a secondary school SLT here (comprehensive).

Just to correct one minor misconception, if a teacher is on long term sick the cost of their cover is covered by insurance so it isn’t a cost issue (unusual, most things are). Where no cover teacher is forthcoming, that’s a recruitment issue.

My biggest concern, which has been mentioned, is the number of trainee teachers coming through. I’ve never known so few trainees, and the quality of the ones we’ve had are pretty poor. I had to have one removed from placement for the first time ever last year.

DS is currently at the nursery for the independent school where he’ll be staying. His sister will be joining him there. Make of that what you will.

It wasn't so long ago that there weren't shortages across the board, though. It's not as simple as "no-one wants to be a teacher".

No-one wants to be a teacher given the current pay and conditions, but if these could be improved a bit, we could attract more people in/back to the profession, and that would make things better for everyone- it would be a virtuous circle.

And this still doesn't solve things like provision of TAs/LSAs.

It also ignores the fact that the students have to be supervised by someone- it may as well be someone well qualified and able to directly help them with the subject they are studying...

School governor, we have gone from a prudently run set up to a complete cluster fuck.
. Money set aside for school maintenance with a one year, two, five & ten year strategy - nothing now, totally raided. And we"ve wrecked our good will by taking and never giving back at all.
From tracking and targeting pupil premium money to using it to fund class teachers.
We desperately hope our high needs kids leave, previously we could be nurturing and see the good having a mix was for our community.
TAs have been absolutely screwed over on hours and pay. (parents don't realise they are hourly paid, nothing when the school is shut)

Even our lovely cleaner, been with us for 15 years has left for a supermarket. She was part of our school family and we just don't seem to be a family anymore, just a memory of how a family should be.

And you can fuck off with your cake sales and renting a hall for £30 to a yoga class it doesn't even touch the sides.

I am proper angry at the swift decline. Ofsted are under inspecting and under reporting what is going on.

Two year induction is a further problem.
"It's funded" they say.
Not upfront it isn't. So we have qualified teachers on a reduced timetable for two years, entitled to a timetabled mentor session for two years (requiring someone to be off timetable to do it), to be released for (piss poor) "training" for two years... it all costs money.
Add to that the fact that it's poor quality, and we have to pay out for it....
And that they've spunked huge amounts of money up the wall on websites and portals which are crap and don't work.
And that, actually, all of this utter bollocks is making good new teachers want to leave because it's time condoning, condescending and downright insulting.

Have stopped working in primary school now, burnt out from lockdown and dealing with increasingly complex children in MS and children who haven’t had the exposure to regular social experiences because of lockdown. The school I left was haemorrhaging staff, spending a fortune on supply, often the supply TAs (all lovely and keen) hadn’t any experience in school and were sent by agencies saying the y had SEN experience.

Now work in a an advisory role connected to SEN. I had no idea the amount of mental health needs in children, some as a result of SEN not being meet, or just not even started on the journey of diagnosis because parents don’t see it, schools don’t want/afford to see it. Plus, the massive numbers of children with no SEN but struggling mentally from being back in school and just not coping.

Schools are expected to pick up all the services which have been cut. SALT is delivered from photocopied sheets. The therapists don’t come in, too few of them, too heavy a caseload. One TA will be ‘trained’ then probably won’t deliver as they are pulled to cover elsewhere. The same with OT and counselling.

There is no money to support SEN and mental health. The lists for CAMHs are years long then, if the child needs medication, they join a new waiting list. It’s insane. There are no specialist placements locally. Children are ending up either forgotten at home, that was a massive shock to me, loads of children who have been left for a couple of years out of school but technically on role. Expensive EOTAS packages put together to paper over the cracks of no suitable placements for these children.

Then, those children who are managing with no SEN or mental health are having to witness increasingly extreme behaviour in MS.

No idea what the answers are, no promise of an increase salary would get me back into school. I don’t think for many staff pay is the main issue, yes compared to other professions it’s poor, but the issues are deeper than pay.

*time consuming, obviously

And it's only going to get worse from 2024... (the number of trainees, I mean).

Just to correct one minor misconception, if a teacher is on long term sick the cost of their cover is covered by insurance so it isn’t a cost issue (unusual, most things are). Where no cover teacher is forthcoming, that’s a recruitment issue.
Only if they have insurance. We don't.

Things seem ok in DS’ village primary. Very low turnover of staff. DS has a teacher, a TA and a trainee teacher in his class of 23 kids which feels decent.

I am aware of things being dire in other schools however.

The workload for both ECTs and mentors seems, from the outside, much higher than the old NQT system. Which means people don't want to mentor, and it's also causing ECTs to struggle when perhaps they wouldn't have otherwise (I know covid is also an issue).

It also drags on forever for those who are part time!

ILoveAllRainvowSX

I think you've got a point. Not wanting to be pushed down, for saying the wrong thing, but, let's say in primary schools, why don't they follow a proforma schedule with materials to be printed off?. Or online quizzes and games for kids to attempt?. It isn't hard to obtain donated second hand laptops. There must be imaginative strategies which could be use to reach numeracy and literacy, and somebody has already thought it all through, as BBC Bitesize do, with their Defenders of Mathematics, and other games.

I agree it's awful for teachers, but surely there is a way of following a pre-formatted plan of lessons, so you're not literally on PowerPoint, or whatever, designing worksheets from scratch?

I wonder if the snap shot of staff shortages is the same across the whole country? I'm surprised that there is a shortage of TAs, for the reason that childcare is so expensive, that to be able to work the same hours and days as your kids are in school is a real bonus.

Also, we do see some secondary schools being extraordinarily strict, about not allowing talking walking along a corridor, or little tags on shoes, and publishing the achievements of all the pupils in the year in rank order. Surely those schools don't experience ill-discipline in major form and probably exclude those whose behaviour challenges.