Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to be pissed off at school revelations?

341 replies

HKLP · 27/04/2011 23:19

Have name changed for this as the route in which I found out this info makes me very identifiable.

I always have my friend's DD on Teacher training days as she has to work at the school the DC attend.

My 2DC are off school today and tomorrow as the school decided to manipulate TT days so that the school broke up on 8th April(1.30pm) and return 3rd May. It means the school will be open on Polling Day (with extra safeguarding in place Hmm) and we will not finish one day early in July as we normally do.

That's fine, but obviously 3 weeks and a day and a half makes life very difficult for WOHPs.

After speaking to my friend last night, it was revealed that the staff are not going into school on these 2 days as have worked/will work extra hours after school to make up the time.

Shock

Apparently, attendance at afterschool events will count towards this time, rather than actual training. Is this acceptable standrd practice?

AIBU to be pissed off about this?

OP posts:
mrz · 28/04/2011 21:48

MoreBeta you seem to be forgetting that many teachers are parents with children in schools that don't automatically have the same Inset days so we have to sort out childcare like everyone else perhaps we are just more organised than you?

AnnieBesant · 28/04/2011 21:50

You would keep children at school, being taught by teachers, for 47 weeks a year, 8 hours a day?

I'm not sure what you're actually suggesting Betadad. Is it the above? Or is it that teachers should in addition to teaching, take on a playleader role. Because, as I said earlier, that is a different skill set.

I do, for what it's worth, think that training days should always be on the beginning or end of holidays. As they are, and have always been, holidays for the children anyway.

clam · 28/04/2011 21:51

Sorry if this has been said already but hey ho.
I am a teacher. I am trained and paid to educate children, to teach them to read, write and count, predominantly, plus a few other things. I am not a childminder and I do not exist solely to enable you to go to work. That is your affair. If it is snowing heavily and my colleagues and I cannot get to work, along with half the rest of the population, you have to have a back-up plan for the care of your children, as I have for mine. If my children's school has an occasional day that does not coincide with my own, I do not have the luxury of taking a day's holiday. Our, admittedly generous, holidays are set in stone. I do not choose where polling stations are sited and when elections are held, nor am I responsible for the safeguarding issues that determine that a school cannot be open whilst members of the public use the building to vote. These things are part and parcel of British life these days and are NOT the fault or responsibility of teachers.

mrz · 28/04/2011 21:53

We didn't close at all for the snow although many parents chose not to send their children. Most days I had single figures which was really annoying after a very scary journey each day. We also don't close for elections as the school isn't used as a polling station.
I'm beginning to feel I'm short changed!

goodbyemrschips · 28/04/2011 21:58

Do you get paid if it snows and you don't go to work.........this is for the teachers.

NinkyNonker · 28/04/2011 22:05

If the school is closed, yep.

If you can't get in...difficult one. Some schools yes.

But then, I used to have to get a ferry to work and when it was too windy the ferries stopped. I'd still get paid then even though I wasn't at work, like I haven't heard of anyone who didn't get paid for snow days to be honest. Though here on the sunny South Coast we didn't get any to speak of, bah humbug!

AnnieBesant · 28/04/2011 22:05

It's discretionary I think. I have always been paid, but we have only had the odd day, and none this last winter, much to the children's disgust!

clam · 28/04/2011 22:06

If someone higher up the food chain has made the decision to close the school, and I therefore work at home instead, as thousands of others do every day, should I be paid?

goodbyemrschips · 28/04/2011 22:07

Well that is another thing I would change you don't go work you don't get paid.........................

ssp only

AnnieBesant · 28/04/2011 22:08

Can I get paid SSP if I'm not sick?

clam · 28/04/2011 22:09

so "work" only counts if it's on the premises then? Coz that wipes out a large proportion of the working population if so.

goodbyemrschips · 28/04/2011 22:16

yep

going now

wont be back

fed up

lynehamrose · 28/04/2011 22:19

We know you're fed up. And bored and bitter. Try and get a job eh love? Keep your mind off belly aching at other people who have one.

TethersEnd · 28/04/2011 22:20

She just flounced off the other thread by mistake Grin

goodbyemrschips · 28/04/2011 22:20

I have a job.....love

MoreBeta · 28/04/2011 22:21

Tethersend - "I don't want to alarm you, MoreBeta but... some teachers are parents too"

Yes and you NEVER have to juggle school holiday cover because you are not at school in school holidays.

clam - "If it is snowing heavily and my colleagues and I cannot get to work, along with half the rest of the population, you have to have a back-up plan for the care of your children, as I have for mine."

Yes your back up plan is that you are off work when your children are off school. You dont do an extra day to make up for the snow day. You dont have to use up your holiday to look after your children on a snow day. We do.

It is clear that teachers hardly ever face this issue because their working hours and days are virtually identical to the days when their DCs are at school. The rest of us do not have that luxury.

Can you see why this issue is a major one for parents who are not teachers?

Of course MPs have school holidays off as well so nothing will change.

penguin73 · 28/04/2011 22:21

More Beta - 9-5 sounds fab, much more appealing than being in at 7.30 til at least 4 then starting again at home - although you realise I will never phone you at convenient time for you no matter how much you want me to as you'll be at work til 5 and I'll be finished by then. No parents' eve dragging on til 9 so best you take some time off work to attend earlier in the day, no intervention over the hols and in the evenings/weekends and leading up to the exams, no trips that involve overnight stays and no-one to look after your kids when they arrive at 7.30am thanks to erratic buses or that being what suits you.

It's a good job that many teachers do the job for the pupils and personal satisfaction rather than recognition/gratitude from the parents and carers isn't it?!

mrz · 28/04/2011 22:26

When my school was closed for snow a few years ago staff had to report to the nearest LEA setting that was open or we didn't get paid

CurrySpice · 28/04/2011 22:28

Our Parents "evenings" are 3-6:30 Hmm

And I am working now penguin, with no union to fight my corner. And no 13 weeks holidays. I regularly have to travel for business, often with overnight stays.

Put the violin away!

AnnieBesant · 28/04/2011 22:32

My working hours are nothing like my children's school days. My DH takes them to school as I leave the house before they get up. I pick them up from after school club. My working days are, of course.

Anyway, my question again. What do you want teachers and children to do together, 47 weeks a year, 8 hours a day?

penguin73 · 28/04/2011 22:32

No violin, I love my job and happily put the hours in. Just fed up with people having no idea about what truly happens thinking we are easy targets - and people accusing us of moaning when we try to clarify our position. But please feel free to continue to have a go - the constant criticism is obviously an added bonus [chmm]

lynehamrose · 28/04/2011 22:32

LOL at all these people who claim to be working while posting on MN! Nice work if you can get it

Feenie · 28/04/2011 22:33

Our Parents "evenings" are 3-6:30

God, I know. The lazy bastards, only doing a couple of 3 and a half hour parents' evening after a full teaching day. Hmm

SlackSally · 28/04/2011 22:35

I see MB hasn't addressed the clear mathematical explanation of how teachers (well, i, and most of the teachers I know) do less work than everyone else.

Or is his tactic merely to now claim that he's just worried about inconvenient hours for parents?

clam · 28/04/2011 22:40

morebeta for the record, this winter, as last, my school stayed open on several days when my own children's school closed. Therefore, as for INSET days and occasional days which often do not coincide, I need a backup plan. Taking a day's holiday is not an option, as I said.