To feel upset how unpopular teachers are.

[Jellymuffin]

Great news about public sector pay rises - yay! Que countless comments along the lines of 'not all public sector deserve a pay rise, only, nurses, paramedics, police and firefighters'. Everyone except teachers then? Should have expected it really .

And I find it amazing to understand how hard it is to sack a teacher - apparently having sex in the broom cupboard during school hours, with another teacher, is not a sackable offence

Can we have a credible source for that, please?

In defense of teachers, do you know how hard it is to expel a pupil?

I am friends with a teacher; a child spat in her face and wasn't removed from the school.

I don't think £13.50ph for a new graduate is terrible and that's being generous in saying they do a 37 hour week and work 5.22 weeks of the 13 weeks holiday.

They also get incremental rises annually as long they meet their performance along with the cost of living pay rise.

If they did the 40 weeks (39 teaching and 5 inset days) only and 9-3 their hourly rate would be £18 per hour.

I know some teachers don't work that minimum but lots do.

The same way in some offices you'll get the ones who arrive at 7:30 and leave at 6:30 while others walk in at 08:59 and walk out at 17:01 but both get paid the same.

If you think teachers are unpopular try being a social worker. Even your own family slates your job

they do a 37 hour week

But they don't. The average teacher works a 48.2 hour week.

www.google.co.uk/amp/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/37585982

Onemorestepalong

If the school teaching hours are 9-3 no teacher is just going to work those hours as a minimum.

Before and after school duties will take you from 08:45 - 15:15.

Interesting. IME most teachers can spell. Subject knowledge, where people are teaching within their specialism, is sound. Where teachers are not, the obviously there is more of an issue. I have had to teach out of specialism many times owing to the impossibility of recruiting well qualified, good Maths and Physics teachers in sufficient quantities.

I am well paid for what I do. The long holidays are *marvellous". I love teaching.

It is very easy to put a teacher through capability and dismiss them. It takes 6 weeks.

Oh, and I know not one single teacher who works 9-3. You would definitely be risking capability!

Okay KittyVonCatsington, you go with that. Still more likely that it was used as an excuse. What really is annoying is I'm now responding about the pretence more than I was ever bothered about it.

Well once again I will mention teachers do not get paid for their holidays, we get our working hours paid over 12months.
I do not know any teacher who can do the job in less than 50 hours a week. But since I do not do the job for public acclaim I do not care, my pupils are what does matter.

Honey for what it's worth, I appreciate the job you do

Some teachers are less popular than others.

Ok so let's say a graduate teacher works 48.2 hours per week 45.22 weeks per year - I know they don't get paid for the holiday time hence I'm not increasing the pay for the holiday time I'm just putting it at an hourly rate.

Most professional jobs are salaried not hourly, as long as I don't fall below minimum wage then I don't complain "too much" about my hours but I digress.

Their hourly rate as a graduate would be £10.33 if we then compare that to a new graduate working 37 hours a week (but again as in my example they may do 37 hours a week or they may do more) 52.143 weeks a year (365 is not exactly 52 weeks) it's just over £19.5k.

The average graduate salary in the UK is between £19 and £22k so still comparable to other graduate positions.

It's not megabucks I acknowledge that but I also don't think it's bad pay.

The other elements of the job, bad behaviour, continuous changes of curriculum, lack of resources etc I think are justified and very real issues with teaching.

Can't resist... Sorry.

Unless the OP regularly posts about the little plait Chinese mandarins regularly wear in their hair, there was no autocorrect to que. There isn't another usage of that spelling in English. The word is queue.

Now... Teacher pay... Isn't too bad actually. Especially when you factor in the holidays - the only perk, but a bloody good one. It's not the pay which is causing the recruitment and retention crisis. That's caused by insufficient time to prepare properly, too much scrutiny from agencies like ofsted etc (filtering down to SLT), lack of support in dealing with pupil behaviour, working in substandard buildings with poor, even dangerous equipment.... I love my job and I'm bloody good at it. It would be nice to be paid more but it would be nicer to be trusted to do it properly and given enough funds to get on with it well.

I have worked in both sectors and there are positives and negatives to both. However, after 10 years working as a teacher I will be leaving the profession at the end of the summer term and I can't wait. I love being with the children and the job is never boring but I feel utterly drained and unappreciated. I'm sick of the pointless paperwork, the politics, the constant lack of respect shown towards the profession by the government, media and some of the general public. I'm sick of justifying what I do on a daily basis in my job and hearing the constant criticism and misconceptions. I'm sick of the testing and pressure put upon our children and the constant threat of OFSTED looming over our heads and the subsequent pressure put upon us by the headteacher. I'm sick of the government tampering with education and constantly trying to reinvent it but making everything worse every time they do. The pay is ok (but could be better) and the holidays are a godsend if you have children of your own, but it's not enough anymore. I feel miserable and unhappy. Good teachers are fleeing from the profession and the crap ones are remaining. There is an educational shit storm coming our way but many people outside of education don't see or understand this because they just think it's teachers moaning again. Teaching really would be the best profession in the world if it weren't for its destruction by the government.

Their hourly rate as a graduate would be £10.33 if we then compare that to a new graduate working 37 hours a week (but again as in my example they may do 37 hours a week or they may do more) 52.143 weeks a year (365 is not exactly 52 weeks) it's just over £19.5k.

Why have you taken the holiday time off the teacher but this random other graduate apparently gets not a day of leave all year?

Love the cartoon noble. English teachers don't get that so often

Because the graduate gets paid leave of 5.22 which is why I included it in the teachers pay despite them not being paid for holidays but working the holidays.

The reality is that if the pay was so great and it was so hard for teachers to find anything else that was as good, none of them would be leaving.
But they are. Lots of them are.

So they clearly are

• finding jobs
• finding jobs that pay enough/similar amount/maybe more (lets face it teachers are like any of us, it's hard to take a pay cut!)

It's not the pay which is causing the recruitment and retention crisis. That's caused by insufficient time to prepare properly, too much scrutiny from agencies like ofsted etc (filtering down to SLT), lack of support in dealing with pupil behaviour, working in substandard buildings with poor, even dangerous equipment

Hear hear.

I'm not even a teacher and I think they are getting shat on from all directions.

I agree with HipsterHunter the focus should be on those elements

Teaching is a profession that everyone has experienced in one form or another. Most of us have been pupils at a school, some of us are parents of children who are at school, some of us are teachers (me!) Personal experience colours people's judgement. My dh retrained as a teacher 5 years ago because he thought I had it pretty cushy. He has since expressed a small regret of moving out of the private sector but only because the grass appears greener. I.E he would earn more. I think the fact that we get to spend every holiday with our kids doing things as a family is a massive perk. I feel sad when I'm sat across from a parent who dislikes teachers and 'the system' because of their own shit experience. That shit teacher has had a monumental affect on two lives - the parent and the child. It makes my job harder, especially as a head of year, but I have more successes than failures of winning people around and improving the outlook for that kid. When someone starts with the 'bloody teachers' rant, I usually join in and send myself up. A non teacher might not have any idea how hard my job is, but they have no idea how wonderful it is either. And I have no idea how hard it is to be a nurse/banker/police officer/builder so why compare? The only people I get truly mad at for undervaluing my profession are those in government who are fucking the education system right up with ridiculous pressures, underfunding and ill advised meddling, because the people they are hurting are the pupils. I'm a graduate with a good degree, I can get another job, our kids will not have that luxury.

@noblegiraffe if it makes you feel better I really enjoyed maths all the way through to A Level (where the very end of the P3 syllabus was the end reaches of my ability) and always had lovely, competent and caring maths teachers.

Sorry HipsterHunter was commenting on a pp - to the pp and HH I agree with you.

Boggle I agree.
The good teachers have left and the ones that are still there are either extremely dedicated to being a teachers or not so good at what they do (at least that's my experience with teachers, both in primary and in secondary)

The issue is that when do things on the cheap, you are also paying for what you get. There ha SN been that crazy idea thatbif there was so much checks all over with OFSTED etc, teachers would have to be good enough, even if they aren't actually good iyswim. And then inn the other side, there also has been that idea that you can get people on the cheap (maybe from abroad too) and that will do because they will be checked over and over so will have to be good enough.
Exceltbthat it's not how it works.