To ask if any teachers have actually been helped by their union?

[springskies]

I’m not a teacher although I work in a related field.

A friend of mine recently sustained an injury at work and she has been upset that nothing has been done by her union. Looking into it deeper, it seems they haven’t provided support to many teachers.

Has anybody been helped by their union recently? Or is it a bit of a farce?

I've. They were fab. Your fried needs to contact the main union office, not just rely on the school rep.

She did: I don’t even think there is a rep.

I have.
Last year a year 10 boy I taught took a huge dislike to me. There were any incidents I won’t go into here but my union were amazing. The rep went to meetings on my behalf and insisted the school backed me up. The school were crap and I left anyway but I can’t fault the union support.
I suspect it’s a bit hit and miss with the union.

Yes! Amazing! But at a local and regional level. Not at school rep level.

Yes, they helped me when I was injured at work. Contact main office. Their legal department will sort it out.

She has

Recently? No.
But they were invaluable in a couple of potentially career-ending incidents over the years, giving me both representation and confidence that I was correct.

Not recently but minevwere invaluable. Couldn't fault them.

In what way haven't they helped? Do they not think she has a legitimate case?
She needs to be insistent and put in a complaint pronto if that's the situation. They regional non teaching reps are well remunerated so I would have a reasonable expectation of them.

I don’t even think there is a rep

The union, any union, is only as strong as its members.

If your friend thinks union support was important was she a rep?

Was she prepared to put time in to help others or does she think it is a transactional relationship where she pays her cash and wants a service?

Unions are about helping each other and in many schools teachers are often too stressed to take on the role of rep.

Yes. School rep is fantastic, fair and incredibly supportive. Regional advice has also been great when needed. My union are known for being quite militant but I always feel they have teachers best interest at heart.

Also agree with above post there is a strong union group at my school where people will stand united. Not like others school I have worked at. Union is only as strong as its members often.

Yes, had support when required. Very useful and kept me in the job overall (I left the school in question).

Depends on the union I suppose. Mine have been fab in the past.

As another poster said, they are only as strong as Its members. Having a rep in school would be a really good start - I think you can share the role between two of you if neither wants the full responsibility. My union also has a health and safety rep position. Union should provide training too.

If she is unhappy with the support she could take it to a higher level.

Hope your friend is ok now.

It has also been invaluable to me as a point of contact with other teachers- sometimes it's great to be able to run something past someone not in your school to get a feel for what's acceptable and what's not.

I’m not a teacher although I do come from a family of teachers. My dad was in the NASUWT. I remember him saying the UWT had made the largest change in education in the course of unions-they fought to get female teachers paid the same as male teachers-a long time before the Dagenham workers and then the Equality Act. I’d imagine that is quite important to a lot of people posting.

Academisation has been an enormous challenge to the teaching unions. Instead of negotiating with one local authority, they now have to bargain with each individual school. Indeed the opportunity to undermine national pay bargaining by unions, to enforce cuts to teachers’ pay and conditions and to weaken the power of the teaching unions in relation to workload, observations and other such issues was almost certainly more important to the Conservative government than any ideological commitment to academies as a mechanism for ‘improving schools’.

As the pps say, a Union is only as strong as the number and commitment of its members. There has probably never before been a time when there has been a greater need to support your teaching union and for your friend to step forward as a school rep.

The union, any union, is only as strong as its members.

This x 100.

I was a local rep (not in teaching) and it was astounding the amount of colleagues I had that were incognito employment rights experts who loved whinging about the union not doing enough, but were much too busy and important to get involved themselves.

DH works for a public services union and represents people regularly. Often women in underpaid, unrecognised care work who are experiencing the worst point in their professional career. He very rarely gets an outcome which is unsatisfactory to the member, and often wrangles compromises with HR/ managers that wouldn’t be possible for a worker representing themselves.

I'm afraid I do see it as a bit of a transactional relationship and given that the fees are not I considerable, I was disappointed by the poor advice I was given the one time I had to use their helpline. I ended up paying an employment lawyer to get appropriate advice (it wasn't a straightforward problem but a common one to do with being on a temporary training contract and pregnancy). However, I keep the membership up as it means you can access discounted indemnity insurance etc. To be honest, as a grammar school and now independent school teacher, the union publications make it clear they despise people like me so I'm not going to volunteer to be a rep. However, your friend could consider changing union, OP?

not 'inconsiderable'

I see them more as insurance and legal back up at a personal level.
They haven’t been particularly effective in key areas such as ensuring classes are covered by teachers rather than TAs, or work-life balance, or fighting the continuous changes in curriculum, or the massive inconsistencies in paperwork and planning expectations. The profession I joined in the early 80s has changed almost beyond recognition, and I feel the unions have been fairly ineffective in influencing decisions. But I value the back up and protection being a member has given me.
I constantly meet young teachers who haven’t bothered joining one, because they see no point.

I've never really had much call to use mine as an individual BUT it depends on why the Union aren't being helpful- are they being unresponsive or slow? Or is it that they've looked into it and they don't feel there's anything to do, depends on the injury and how it happened.
If it's a health and safety thing the HSE looks after schools and the school will have an H&S governor.

They haven’t been particularly effective

The trade union movement is the reason you have sick pay, holiday pay and basic workers rights.

Management didn't hand these rights out because it was the right thing to do they did it because they were scared of the power of collectivised workers. These rights are now being taken off workers in the U.K. because the unions are losing power.

We are letting down future generations by seeing unions as "insurance policies" for our own personal needs.

The unions are less effective than they used to be due to hostile legislation and apathetic 'I'm all right jack" attitudes.

Windows, people like me and others at the chalk face protesting and campaigning were the reason teachers got designated lunch breaks, maternity rights and job protection. I’m very pro-unions and have been for half a century, thanks to my dad.
But teaching unions have been very ineffective in the last 20 years and have accomplished little that lasted. Which is why I keep meeting younger teachers who save their money and don’t join. They don’t see the point.

Banging on about what was achieved in the 70s is ancient history to most of them. Rather like the ancient feminist that I am, pointing out what the use of that mindset is.