to not worry about teachers aged 60+ in the classroom

[NotaTeacherBasher]

No teacher bashing, please.

A recurrent theme in the discussions about the changes to teachers' pensions is that teachers will not be able to retire at 55 any more. They will need to work until they are 65+ if they want their full pension.

Just like everyone else.

So what's the problem with that provided they are fit to work? Obviously some won't be able to and will, presumably, be able to retire on ill health grounds if they're not.

I had hoped that I may just be able to make it to 50 . I already have a hole in my pension from children so my pension is not great . However I hoped that by working to 50 I would not be so far off my pension age and therefore I would have a pension that I could live off. I would do another less demanding job until 65.

However as the goal posts have been moved my plan has been proved worthless.

I'm part time (just back from mat leave). I work about a 40 hour week and am paid for 3 days a week (I go into work and teach every day). It has made a huge difference to my work-life balance, but sadly also my pay (and now pension) and there is no way now I could apply for a TLR. Because I am part time, this causes timetabling difficulties for my HOD and some of my classes are split with other teachers which isn't best for continuity of learning for the children. Schools couldn't cope with a big increase in part-time teachers so really shouldn't be encouraging this as a solution.

at my prat time rather than part time.

I agree schools do not like part time and it is often the death if your career.

Maybe all those teachers aren't 60+, they just look it.

65 really isn't that old nowadays, and it will be even less so in 30 or 40 years time. For teachers to be able to retire at 55 and live for another 25-35 years on the taxpayers dime is ridiculous. For those that say that they are entitled to it because they agreed to it years ago, plenty of people got jobs years ago and expected all sorts of things, then the employer went bust and they got little or nothing. The public sector would have gone bust hundreds of times over if it was subject to the rules of a normal business, but since it isn't, it keeps being run badly, knowing that the taxpayer will just have to keep stumping up more and more taxes. Well we've come to the end of the line. People aren't prepared to pay any more.

Ok, ok, I know I might NOT be so chipper in my 60s as I intend to be now (see my previous boasty post after a couple of glasses of . BUT with the career average scheme, teachers will be able to go part-time and not have it affect their final pension as before. Most people at this stage of life will have paid off their mortgages and this might be a good option for them. I honestly don't think schools will be full of struggling full-timers in their 60s.

"with the career average scheme, teachers will be able to go part-time and not have it affect their final pension as before"

Um. Going part time will affect your pension contributions and thus your final career average pension.

I'm currently part time, planning to go back full time later on. This career-average scheme is fucking my pension, along with many other part-time teachers, most of whom are women.

I think you were thinking of teachers close to retirement. But I think that there was similar provision anyway, I know a lot of SLT who stepped down from their positions in the last couple of years of teaching to become normal classroom teachers without it affecting their final salary pension.

The porters who work on a very low wage for my public sector employer are almost all in their mid 60s. Probably because all the younger ones were given the boot in the many rounds of redundancies we've had over the past 5 years, becuase they were cheaper to make redundant.

These verging-on-elderly men spend all day lugging boxes, doing office moves, shifting recycling etc etc. They look ancient and totally knackered to be completely honest, and half the time younger office workers end up helping them out because its so god-awful having to watch them struggling.

There are some jobs (and teaching is probably one of them) which shouldn't be done by people in their mid 60s.

And re. 65+ not being very old these days, I think it depends on how hard you have to work!

My dad has just retired (for the second time) as a teacher. He is 65 and LOVED his job. He has been pt for the past 5 years, and despite being very sprightly for his age (long walks/bike rides/tennis etc) and regularly mistaken for being in his mid 50s, there is no denying that he is getting knackered increasingly quickly.

Teachers should get no special treatment. If we all have to work to 70 then so shall they. There are much harder and demanding jobs out there.

Honestly, you public sector lot are such martyrs.

lassy, I hope you're volunteering for your kids to be taught by 70 year olds. And no, you don't get to pick whether they're the ones who are running marathons or the ones taking months off to have vital operations/recover from strokes/plagued with arthritis.

I agree totally with exotic fruits.

Teachers enter and leave the profession at all ages, and there are very few jobs nowadays that are for life.

The meeting that I went to on pensions started with the words 'the people in this room are the last of a dying breed-in the future people won't enter at 21yrs and work through to retirement'. Apart from the fact that it makes you sound a bit like a dinosaur I think that it is correct. When teachers just had a teaching certificate they were a bit stuck -now they are not.
Work is changing in nature-no one has the 'job for life' and they chop and change.
I am surprised that schools have 'lots of older teachers' they generally think of the budget and young NQTs are far cheaper!

IMO job shares will become much more common. Women come back from maternity leave and want part time.Increasingly older teachers-close to retirement are wanting job shares.

The 60+ teachers at DD's school are much less likely to be part-time than the younger teachers with children.

It is coming though Bonsoir-I am noticing an increase just in the last 2 years.

noble - I was. I meant people nearing retirement age as you said.

People have to work for longer, we all understand why. Some people get past their sell by date whilst still working. Those people need to job change down or be forced down through capability procedures if they don't see the writing on the wall. For a teacher, obvious step down jobs would be TA, teaching adult education classes, lecturing to students, marking exams....there are loads of options.

Manual jobs already do this as manual workers get worn out quicker. Go to a builder's merchants and it will be old blokes giving advice, doing pricing, making phone calls. They might work as a caretaker or do decorating. They used to be the ones doing the building outside all year, some of them got old and had to take a different direction. That's life.

I have no objections to capable teachers that are nearing 70.

I am now 67 and took early retirement from teaching [secondary] at 55.I couldnt do it now.The energy needed to keep up with admin,plan interesting lessons,deal with personal problems,discipline,marking etc is more than most could manage at 60+.some could do it but most would be less effective than they were 10 years earlier.There is so much more to being a teacher than just being in the classroom.It truly isnt a job for the elderly unless they are super fit.

My colleague recently retired at 55. He could possibly have physically gone on longer but it wasn't best for him or his classes. He had been teaching 33 years in the same school and was well respected but the constant cheek, initiatives, observations, breaking up fights, being sworn at does tend to wear you down after a while. Working longer isnt really an issue in 'nice' schools in the suburbs where supportive parents will give the teacher a helping hand, same goes for private schools or even for those who have climbed the management ladder (and therefore have less contact with actual children!). Some schools are places only for the relatively young and fit which is unfortunate because the kids could get so much from spending time with some of our older teachers. I'm 31 and can't imagine not teaching but I'll see how I go............!

FFs 65 is not old.

If you are breaking up a fight between two teenagers its pretty old. I wouldn't want my parents doing that.

My mil retired in her early fifties and is now early 60s, acts like an old women. Bad for you retiring so young.

People ski at 65yrs, they run marathons, ride horses etc. If you have your health you do not have to be old. (I wouldn't call 60's old)

yes, some people do. others have dementia.

I don't think this is really about teaching, but about work in general. Workplaces will have to adapt to older workers. For example, at my work we have no chairs while we teach. They would have to change that. People may need to work on the ground floor. Small changes, but needing a willing management. Early sixties is not old, but i know only one person still working at that age. My Dad. He is capable, but knackered. My mum is young for her years (early sixties), but admits she just does not have the stamina she used to have. Getting up and out to work all day everyday requires a different sort of energy to going on a sling holiday. It is more draining. For a few.sedentary or part time jobs it may be ok, but for lots of others it will be hard. I hope I'm wrong though.

People can have dementia much earlier than 60yrs.