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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

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

815 replies

Freshlysqueezed · 17/07/2015 19:26

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.

OP posts:
DadOnIce · 17/07/2015 22:51

Most people's salaries have the 4-6 week holiday as part of the "package" and people understand they are paid "for" that. Teachers are not paid "for" the holidays in the same way. That's the bit people don't get.

The salary thing is a bit of a red herring, anyway. Whether teachers are paid well or not is not the question. Some people will think they are, some will think they are not - depending on their definition of "well paid" and, I imagine, comparison with their own jobs. I only mentioned pay because if the term were to be restructured it would - or should - have staffing cost implications. (Not just for teachers, but also for TAs, ancillary staff etc.)

Anyway, it's probably not going to change any time soon. I hope all the teachers on here enjoy their well-earned summer break. And anyone who wants to moan about it, you enjoy your moan :)

EllieFAntspoo · 17/07/2015 22:53

They make doctors, nurses etc work longer hours for no additional pay and they have run legal aid lawyers into the ground.
That is the nature of becoming a public sector employee. If you are going to hang your whole life on the generosity of the public purse, you have to accept that the money in that purse shrinks. If someone doesn't understand how a welfare system works, then why choose to work within it? It's the same system that has run for decades, so it's not like you can blame they system.

DadOnIce · 17/07/2015 22:53

EllieFantsPoo you seem rather cross about it all. Maybe you've had too much of the "real world". I'd go and have a lie down if I were you. :) HTH.

CamelHump · 17/07/2015 22:54

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

notnowImreading · 17/07/2015 22:54

Haha suck it bozos! Teachers be drrrriiinnnnkking tonight.

IamJeff · 17/07/2015 22:55

Teaching is crap I would never recommend it as a job ever but being a staff nurse or any public sector employee , don't do that either
Teaching is feast or famine
Also agree if you're that bothered train to be a teacher ?

EllieFAntspoo · 17/07/2015 22:55

Ellie if I don't send my DC to school the State will send me to jail!
Really?! You personally? Or all of us?
I think Court 1 of the Old Bailey had something to say about that this morning.

OwlinaTree · 17/07/2015 22:55

I've never seen such vitriol toward a profession. Unbelievable.

BackInTheRealWorld · 17/07/2015 22:57

What's with all the teacher bashing? Im a school receptionist and on Tuesday I will be gloating and gleeful and bragging on Facebook about my 7 weeks off too. Bash me, bash me. I deserve it cos I promise you my job is a breeze compared to the teachers. And when I clock off at the end of the day/week/term I DO clock off. They don't.

DadOnIce · 17/07/2015 22:58

I imagine a lot of the "you know nothing about stress, try being a teacher" stuff from teachers is largely defensive - and understandably so. If you are in a profession which is so often derided, undermined and undervalued, you're probably going to want to defend it once in a while. As someone else said, though, it's not a race to the bottom.

PirateYellowbelly · 17/07/2015 23:01

As a full time teacher and parent, I can't wait for my holiday so I can spend time with my own child! As much as I love my job, and my classes over the years I've been teaching, I am certainly going to make the most of being with my little boy who has been woefully abandoned by me of late.

My objection to some comments on this thread is the implication that teachers aren't in the 'real world'. Well, I do a real job, with real children with real and diverse needs and I get paid a real salary so in what way is this not the real world? Or have I lived in an alternative universe for the last 17 years???

Anniesaunt · 17/07/2015 23:03

I think it depends on exactly what is said.

I've seen posts talking about how excited they (teachers) are about their holiday what they're planning to do etc. I think that's fine I'd be excited if I was a teacher.

I did see one post that really pissed me off though. Something about the long holidays then "because only teachers work hard, do unpaid overtime and care about the quality of their work" The word only on that sentence made my blood boil.

CultureSucksDownWords · 17/07/2015 23:05

Pirate, that's really why I left teaching. My own child was not getting enough of my time and attention over the ones I was paid to teach.

It's better now I work longer hours (on paper, 9 to 5. In actuality I do less work than when I was a teacher each day, and none at the weekend) and have less holiday! How mad is that?

FlatWhiteToGo · 17/07/2015 23:06

Loki and Culture - you're right on the friend-front! Perhaps I'm extra sensitive because so many of my friends (50%+) are teachers and they all act like this. Thank you for your nice (and slightly more normal!) comments.

I completely agree that it shouldn't be a competition. There are things about my job that are so much worse than things teachers have to put up with, then there are things about my job which are real benefits which I know teachers don't get. There are pros and cons to all jobs. What we can agree is that: 1) we're all overworked; 2) we're all underpaid; 3) the government's crap; and 4) it's 11pm and we're all exhausted!

OwlinaTree · 17/07/2015 23:06

Education provides the best possible life chance for many children and young people in this country. It's all very well to sneer and say you could do a better job with your own kids, but that's just not the reality for many is it? Can't believe I'm rising to this to be honest.

Pipbin · 17/07/2015 23:08

There are a lot of jobs that are as and more stressful as being a teacher. The difference is that most of those jobs don't seem to be open to public vilification all the time.
There aren't many threads complaining that a lawyer has put an apostrophe in the wrong place, a doctor doesn't know the whereabouts of someone's jumper or that a nurse was seen drunk in public.

CultureSucksDownWords · 17/07/2015 23:10

Flatwhite, I think you've nailed it with those points, particularly number (4)!

CalmYoBadSelf · 17/07/2015 23:10

My Dad was a teacher, we had great summers as he was off with us all nd definitely not working. I have several friends who are teachers, if they are working over the summer holidays they hide it well as they are chilling and socialising with the rest of us. One of them qualified just a few years back and commented at the time that whinging was an essential part of the training, although she seems to have learned it quite well

I too am sick of the entitlement and the whiny "we are still working, just without the children" posts on FB

EllieFAntspoo · 17/07/2015 23:10

It's not a race to the bottom.

It's not?

I forget whether you are still in the profession, or out, that was pages ago, but we will both sit, and over the next four years (and probably the four after that as well), and watch; funding to state education cut. Teachers striking. Teachers vilified in the press for their profligate career choice and endless whining. Watch their rights removed to mobilise in union. Watch their hours increase, their performances scrutinised, their personal politics questioned, their social habits curtailed.

I call that a desperate race to the bottom.
Better out than in, IMO.

BarbarianMum · 17/07/2015 23:12

Between now and September I am madly jealous of my teacher friends. Rest of the year, not so much.

LokiBear · 17/07/2015 23:13

I'll drink to that, Flat Wine! Wishing you some well deserved rest in the very near future!

CultureSucksDownWords · 17/07/2015 23:15

It shouldn't be a race to the bottom, is what I should have said. We shouldn't all be competing to see who has the worst, most stressful job. It doesn't help anyone.

I'm out of teaching, thankfully. I am very concerned about where we'll be in 5 yrs time, and what experience of school my DS will have. But I'm in the fortunate position to be able to home ed if needed, as I'm a qualified teacher (if you give that any credit!) and can also afford to do this.

EllieFAntspoo · 17/07/2015 23:16

The difference is that most of those jobs don't seem to be open to public vilification all the time.
Banking... Politics... Estate Agent...

YouTheCat · 17/07/2015 23:19

Ellie, that has already happened. But people still teach.

And anyway, I have the worst school job ever. As well as being a TA, I'm a dinner lady. It ranks as even worse than being a cleaner in a kebab shop when I was 17.

FlatWhiteToGo · 17/07/2015 23:20

Pipbin - I disagree. I think many many jobs are vilified. I am constantly having to defend my profession to people who have read a Daily Mail article and taken it for fact, or listened to a politician say bare-faced lies and taken those lies to be the truth. There are so many jobs that have the same struggles as the teaching profession.

Culture - he he, I try. I come bearing peace-offering cake and prosecco for the teachers Grin!