To already be fed up with teachers/eduaction workers posting about their long holiday!

[Freshlysqueezed]

Facebook is swarming with people saying how much they deserve it and other people patting them on the back. It seems like the world and his wife are in education or SAHM's with 6 glorious weeks ahead of them. Apart from a one week holiday I have a juggling timetable of various childcare arrangements to run to and fro from.

I've never understood that viewpoint, though.

One of the best teachers I had was a teacher because he loved to travel and the holidays allowed him to do so.

Why shouldn't someone teach for a while, then try something else?

I think that attitude is one of the most damaging ones in fact (not a criticism of you Flat, I've seen it before.) That to be a good teacher, you should have a burning desire to do it, a commitment, a passion.

I don't think you do. I think you can do an excellent job whilst acknowledging you are a teacher for the pay, convenience, holidays - whatever.

That 'you should WANT to teach!' is one reason teachers get crapped over from a great height.

Would it be helpful then to increase the entry requirements and length of training? So perhaps insist on having a Masters before you can do a PGCE, and perhaps increasing the length of training in line with doctors, architects, accountants etc. So having ongoing professional studies and ongoing professional exams for a number of years.

Not unless you want one teacher to ninety students!

For the past year we have had 2 PE staff and 1 Business teacher taking Yr7 Maths!

I was luckily on mat leave from the KS3 coordinators role but the support they needed in the first week when I was in was huge.

For most posts we have had to interview 2/3 times before we find a good teacher to employ.

Culture - that's not what I'm saying at all. Again, it's twisting things I have said to try and make it appear that teachers are being attacked. What I am saying is that while there is a perception that something is easy (which is not a perception I have of teaching) some people will always see it as a 'back up'. If something turns out to be not so easy, unless somebody has a desire to make things work then they will quit. It is the same with other professions, but as the 'run up' to joining those professions is longer (eg 5 years of medical school, 2 years of rotations then many further years of extremely challenging exams) there is more scope for people to back out in the earlier stages of their careers or even before they have started.

How else can we weed out these uncommitted non-passionate teachers though? If they're going to drop out anyway when the going gets tough then isn't it better to stop them from even starting? And, if the entrance requirements are really high and the training really long and difficult, then maybe people would have a higher level of respect for the teaching profession?

I'm being serious.

The pay would have to go up and that won't happen.

Culture - not sure if you were having a dig at what I said. I assumed you were being sarcastic in your reply, but if you weren't and were genuinely asking a question I apologise for the blunt reply!

On the point Culture made about longer training, my view will be unpopular but I rely don't think it's that hard - there's not that much to know.

Good teachers aren't always the ones who have the masters and know the theory. It's a hands on job.

However your next post Culture labours under the misapprehension that it's only the crap teachers who are leaving.

It's not just uncommitted non-passionate teachers that are quitting. It's excellent, dedicated and extremely experienced teachers.

Actually, this is the first year in 10 years of teaching that I have had to see a doctor because the job was making me physically ill. I don't think I'm that unusual in that respect.

Why would the pay have to go up?

Culture - it looks like you were being serious. Sorry - I assumed you were having a go at me! In answer to your questions though: I don't think it would be a good idea. Yes, you'd almost certainly weed out the people who were just doing it because they thought it was easy and didn't know what else to do. Unfortunately, you'd also prevent many people that wouldn't reach the academic requirements to become a teacher but who would have actually been fantastic teachers!

Because we have a recruitment issue as it is. Demanding better qualified teachers will exacerbate that. So they will have to be lured in somehow!

I totally fell into teaching Flat - I was a pub landlady & rock gig promoter, then looked for a change in career as a young widow, & dusted off my degree in order to do a PGCE.

As it happens, I love teaching (& I'm good at it). Being a teacher in the UK atm, however, sucks. I've done it for 15 years & the conditions & working culture are simply worsening.

There's always been a high attrition rate in the early years of teacher careers - this is now increasing. Some of it has always been down to the factors you describe, but it used to be a winnowing process of those who weren't cut out for it.

Most of my younger colleagues now, however, will openly tell you that they see teaching as a 'starter' job; hard work but yes, good holidays, & it looks good on a mortgage application if you're a 20 something. They intend to do other, easier jobs once they're ready to settle down & start families.

The difference is that now we're starting to also lose those of us who are 10 or more years in, love teaching, & had genuinely envisaged it as a career until retirement.

My dc's school just got slated by Ofsted, largely because there's literally not an over 30 in the building except the Head - it's 23yo NQTs as far as the eye can see. Lovely, talented young teachers, but no-one is mentoring them properly & the body of experience that was there 6 years ago when my eldest started no longer exists.

Don't want to teacher bash but there are plenty of people who are in stressful jobs. My DH is on call 24/7 and he has just had his first week off (barring bank holidays) and he has only be able to get a couple of days off during the summer and only gets 20 days plus bank holidays. He has to deal with all sorts from his staff as in they confide in him and some of it is seriously shit (think social services involved with the families etc)

The extra hours (unpaid) I work amount to an extra day a week. I am basically working full time hours for a part time wage. To be honest if I could access the work from home I'd be working even more hours. Good on one hand that I do get my evening (although they are taken up with chores) but bad that I am even more stressed in the day trying to get things done.

No-one has said other jobs aren't stressful. At no point has any teacher here said this.

Tbh I think parents should spend more time trying to truly understand what's happening to their DC's education than bashing the people still valiantly trying to deliver it.

echt maybe not here but can't say the same in real life.

I wonder if those younger teachers will find those less stressful jobs they seek?

And it has always been hard to recruit maths and science teachers.

On the sick leave/medical leave point, I don't think teachers are becoming more ill than in other professions but I do think it's more acceptable in teaching to take sick leave (please read what I am about to say before you assume I'm implying something I'm not!). In teaching, and certain other jobs, people seem to be much more open about it than in other jobs (eg the fact that many of you are actually even aware of your colleagues being on sick leave!). Ignoring people who take the piss when it comes to sick leave (in any job)...this is a very very good thing and hopefully other professions will follow and improve.

Unfortunately in my job it would be career suicide to take any form of sick leave. As such, there are extremely high levels of
Mental Health problems, drug/alcohol abuse and suicide as there is a culture that you MUST
NEVER EVER GET SICK and if you ever do get sick, you most definitely should not tell anyone or take time off. It's an awful situation and I pray things improve.

My point is that these problems are not exclusive to teaching, and the levels of stress/ill health will be comparable in many other jobs, but as there is a more open culture in teaching people have a greater awareness of the health problems people are suffering from.

As a teacher myself, whilst I haven't posted on social media about my happiness to have summer holidays, I do feel that for staff in a school the students' excitement about the holidays rubs off on us unavoidably; there is a palpable sensation of freedom in the classrooms and corridors that gets into our bloodstream. No doubt parents of school aged children experience the same sensation, to a lesser extent.

Raven - that really is a shame. I can also understand how frustrating it must be that the powers that be won't listen to a word you say or your suggestions on how to improve things and you can literally see a school disintegrate before your very eyes!

Flatwhite what a ridiculous assertion. What am I supposed to think if a colleague is off work? They're hardly going to be on holdest are they? What do you think happens when a teacher misses work? Who do you think covers the lessons? Of course teachers know if colleagues are off sick - there's literally no other reason for someone to be off school for any length of time.