Up yours, Gillian Keegan - teacher pay offer.

[noblegiraffe]

£1000 this year one-off payment (unclear if taxed?)

4.3% pay rise for experienced teachers from September, (well below inflation), 7.1% for newbies, presumably to meet their £30k manifesto promise.

Fuck all on Ofsted
They'll set up a "Workload TaskForce" (so fuck-all on workload).

The £1k will be funded, they reckon schools can afford the 4.3% next year (hah) so will only fund 0.5% of it.

NEU have strongly recommended that members reject.

NAHT re-balloting members too. More details within 24 hours.

From the NAHT email
‘In terms of the funding of the pay offer, to reiterate: the DfE has said that the £1,000 payment would be funded by the government. However, the government has said it believes that schools can afford a 4% pay award for 2023/24 and so will only fund what it sees as the 'additional' 0.5%’

‘In the upcoming electronic ballot, we will ask relevant members whether you accept or reject the offer. In that ballot we will also ask you to carefully consider your school’s budget so that you can confirm or correct the view of the national executive that the funding provided will prove insufficient.’

I left at Christmas. I taught science and the teaching I left has been shared out amongst non specialists. I gather the school has since advertised again since Christmas but with no success. There is no SEN department to speak of as we can't get a decent SENCO, and two of our ECTs are leaving at the end of the year. One teaches maths so that's another core subject teacher gone. Many of my ex colleagues are also planning to get out.

Be careful what you wish for. Who do you think will be able to fill these vacancies caused by teachers leaving?

If there really were a recruitment crisis market forces would lead to higher pay

Oh wait, no recruitment crisis guys, nothing to see here

In my subject this year, ITT met only 30% of it's target. You realise this means every single one of those newly qualified teachers will have their pick of schools?. They'll end up in independents and the best state schools. For those of us with kids in bog standard comps (ie most of us), that's pretty shit news.

I worked supply for a while but haven't for 5 years now. I am contacted daily with a choice of work in great schools locally. I could literally name my price. 2 local schools have been advertising vacancies in my subject for over 12 months now. Currently, one great school is advertising 2 positions for the second time and another school.is doing the same. These are schools teachers would want to work in. Schools that even 5 years ago would have had 10 or more appointable applicants.

It is dire. Those of us left clinging on. I can't imagine anyone will be left at all within 12 months.

@Didgerydoo the Government set the pay, they also set the funding. The Government don’t care enough that there is a recruitment crisis to do anything about it

Is this table showing if we accept or reject the pay deal.
I’ve voted to reject. I’m not worth 10k less than a Scottish teacher and the main reason I voted to strike last time was that the pay rises weren’t funded. So to offer another unfunded (let’s be honest that’s pretty much what it is) pay rise is beyond a joke.

My youngest has a couple of years left and I'm glad too. Since my eldest started school I've seen education drop down to a shocking level. I foresee in the next few years more parents will have to juggle work and home schooling because there just won't be enough money in schools and teachers available to accommodate them. The stories are an utter shitshow.

Ugh Tories not stories. Although their stories are a shitshow too.

How are things going for Gillian this week?

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/teachers-stage-mass-walk-out-as-education-secretary-makes-speech/ar-AA19e7Tm

She spoke at the Bett conference today to a largely empty room as teachers got up and walked out on her.

And a Teacher Tapp poll has 67% of teachers angry with the offer. Angry! (A further 22% disagreed with the offer, so 89% think it's shit).

Far from placating teachers, she has managed to totally piss them off. I can't see this ending any time soon.

Walking out needs to happen everywhere she speaks. Well done those teachers.

Note that Scotland is M5. Why should teachers in England be so underpaid for so many years?

Be careful what you wish for. Who do you think will be able to fill these vacancies caused by teachers leaving?

Maybe it's part of their secret deal with Rwanda? We send them our refugees and they send over their teachers which we pay as little as possible to.

I just can't understand why all the parties are trying their hardest to destroy children's prospects, the nation's health and our economy.

Better than most the private sector

Where exactly?
For a comparable job?
After that much training and experience?

Show some examples.

Private sector post-grad entry requirement?

Nope.

The percentage increase for the year

"Average regular pay growth for the private sector was 7.0% in November 2022 to January 2023, and 4.8% for the public sector"

https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/averageweeklyearningsingreatbritain/march2023

I don’t think further strikes will have any impact. My child has only had one year of schooling not effected by school closures and it’s just become the norm now.

I absolutely believe that all school staff deserve better pay and a fairer workload but the strikes are only hurting children, and especially vulnerable children, whose education has already been decimated by covid.

How do you suggest we bring the government back to negotiations?

Or do you think we should give up?

I’ve no idea. I just know that neither side will back down and kids, who’ve already missed so much schooling, will pay the price.

Kids are already paying the price. We need things to change so they don't carry on suffering substandard education due to government incompetence.

But things aren’t going to change are they. The government won’t back down so kids will continue to have a ‘substandard’ education as well as another year of disruption.

My child is in year 4 now and every year, apart from last year, she has missed huge chunks of education and it has just become the norm.

Her teachers and TA’s have been utterly brilliant - passionate, kind, caring, hardworking and thoughtful. Of course they deserve more but it’s not going to happen because the government just don’t care and parents are used so used to school closures it’s become the norm so there wont be the outcry or pressure on the government to increase the offer.

A number of schools will actually close forever, combination of lack of funding and falling birth rates

Already happening and includes inadequate schools, as judged by OFSTED, where academy trusts will not sponsor them. ( cherry picking, financial vulnerability and too much hard work)

But it’s ok, Gillian Keegan says parents shouldn’t worry themselves about school funding.…

Nothing to see here, folks…