Why all the anti school/teacher threads?

[shithappens123]

I’ve not been a member for long but I’ve noticed the amount of school bashing threads on MM. it’s almost as if some patents see the school as an enemy not as organisations wanting to educate their children the best they can.

I’ve read threads on how they gleefully complain about teachers (seems more in primary education though) and saying how incompetent they are when they have no idea how hard they work.

Teachers are fair game on here and it’s most disturbing.

Ricky44

I believe people who say daft things like this should home educate.

Maldives2006 We need more specialist SEN staff in schools, as the reality is one teacher to often 30 children. It’s the local MP that should be getting involved in raising the issue of slashed budgets. Teachers can only do what is physically possible.

I believe people who say daft things like this should home educate

This.

Tough.

I pay tax and expect a return on investment.

Teachers are not beyond reproach it's as simple as that. Teachers hold much power over our dc.

Admitting issues and simply dealing with them will make most problems go away.
Stone walling and gas lighting parents snow balls issues then parents talk and then you have massive discontentment and no where to go.

I expect teachers to teach. Not to fill any voids created by parenting.

Parents have a part to play in ensuring their child is as educationally successful as they can be, and it's not reasonable to expect teachers to make up for the parent failing to perform their part. It's also fairly impossible.

The teachers have how many kids to educate? The parents have how many kids to parent, and support their education?

Teachers hold much power over our dc.

Now we are getting to it, that’s the problem you think we have too much power?

Ricky44

Return? Unless you’re earning millions, you don’t pay enough tax for that. Your child will cost £73,000 to educate, with this cost subsidised by non-users of the service. If you can’t use the service without compromising it, it ought to be taken away from you. I am talking about the abusive parents, the harassing parents, the parents who make no attempt to support their child or their child’s teachers, or prevent their child compromising the education of others. Send them home, I say.

Teachers hold much power over our dc.

And they need that power to teach them.

Unless - and this is vital - they are the ones telling you it is not working, and then you should plug your ears and go la la la la.

Not so Hercule. I don't believe that at all - but on the other hand public services should be run for the benefit of the public -and not solely for the benefit of those of us that work there. Some public servants have difficulty with that distinction.

But I've never worked in education or DfE so that's is not a comment specifically on teaching.

I earn 70k so pay around 15k a year tax. I expect a return on investment from all public services.

Public sector employees often forget that they are paid to provide a public service.

I'm a teacher.

I do get fed up with people ranting about how easy our job is, how we work part time, get too many holidays etc. Its demoralising and normally comes from a lack of knowledge or poor perceptions.

However as others have said lots think they are experts as they went to school! I was told this on my training year - it was an attitude I should expect.

I am secondary about to start my 10th year, I had a job in a large multinational for 6 years before switching. In my limited experience there were many who coasted in jobs they were not good at, one who was on sick leave for 50 weeks a year but came back for 2 weeks to reset his clock and repeat for the next year, had done it for about 3 years when I first started. So I know rubbish workers/colleagues is not just a public sector thing.

I don't spend all hours doing my job but I do work above average for a normal week during term time compared to a 9-5 role like I had before - I would have odd weeks when I was busy but generally I knew my hours. However I do still have time for my hobby I have done for 25 years, I still exercise once a week and manage 2 small children but it is a juggle, but I know others in different jobs with similar juggles.

I don't think it is the most stressful job in the world, I am well aware of many jobs which are worse but its a pressured job - you are expected to know a lot of information about a lot of people (I am secondary in a core subject and parents will ask what topics their child needs to work on) - I have up to 180 students I can recall some who struggle but that level of detail is hard to remember. I have to prioritise and the needs of my SEN students are more likely to be remembered than Boy X struggled with mixed number fractions! A doctor is expected to know all that info but has it on a screen in front of them, at parents evening I am unable to as I don't have a laptop, so have to predict what I might be asked!

I work part time but parents expect a response to an email within hours, and do not appreciate I am not always in school or logged on to my school email, or not otherwise engaged in doing some teaching.

I love my job, I still enjoy it 10 years in. Its not the best paid but I knew that, Its comparable to other public sector jobs in terms of pay - we could all do with more but I am also a realist and the latest payrise is smoke and mirrors as its got to be mainly funded by current budgets which are stretched already. I would love a payrise but what would be more useful would be more LSA support in my lessons!

Some teachers are not the best, the majority of us are doing the bloody best we can.

I agree with others there is a lot of digs at teaching but it affects a lot of people, they may not feel the best is being done but a lot of the time communications can be improved - I am guilty of not being the best but time is a factor. A lot of us manage to go year on year without needing much involvement with the NHS or with Social Workers so there is little to comment on. It is also normally not an on going issue for the majority of people, I was in for an op, raised a complaint about the level of care it was dealt with - no need for a rant on mumsnet. I left the hospital - issue no longer present as I didn't need to return. With schools it doesn't tend to be resolved so easily if things are still going on or perceived to not to have been dealt with to the satisfaction of parent/child.

Just my few comments which I started writing at 9am and just got back to!

MarieIVanArkleStinks - then people should be venting/moaning about gov policy and the constant slashing of budgets instead of venting at the teachers who have absolutely no say in regards to cutting class support etc

They are. And they're complaining about the end result of said policy, as it translates in schools. Let's consider an example.

I've seen how 'differentiation' works with SATs; an issue observed along with a former graduate student of mine carrying out a qualitative study on a particular school site when I happened to be teaching in the area of pedagogy. Her findings uncovered (on a small scale, granted) that because the effectiveness of teachers was being measured by SATs results, one teacher came up with an inventive answer to this problem. To translate this idea into (very) rough statistics, the kids who were expected to get a decent score were seated in the front rows, and commandeered approximately 90% of the teachers' attention. The 'hit or miss' students, who may do okay and may not, were seated in the middle, and received perhaps 7% attention. The no-hopers were shoved in the back two rows, and got the remaining attention (about 3%). This was observed over several weeks' duration and the teacher was quite frank with the student about his methods - methods which were pretty much imposed from governmental policy to measure teacher-standards, including his own. Proper ethical parameters were observed and recorded, and the reasons given by said teacher were in response to said policies and borne of a wish to see them reconsidered in the future. I'd have found this quite difficult to believe if I hadn't personally witnessed it, and needless to say, it's an approach that no parent of those children would ever see first-hand. But I don't doubt that it goes on on a wider scale and in a less structured or obvious manner.

The result is that the very same demographic of children the likes of SATs, Phonics etc were intended to benefit are being let down once again by the system. It looks 'fair and equal' on paper; in practice, it is anything but. You can split hairs about the colour of shoelaces all you like; all this goes to show is that some parents as well as teachers are losing sight of what's important. The kind of practice I've just outlined does go on, and unfortunately the public sector is one arena of employment which for various reasons makes it rife.

Some of the arguments on this thread are oversimplistic to say the least.

I earn 70k so pay around 15k a year tax.

And how many kids do you have? If 10% of your 15k goes into education (roughly true) that’s £1,500 a year to educate at least one child. That’s debt, isn’t it? No ROI for you.

Because teachers and other public servants don't pay tax

DP also earns about 70k do pays about the same in tax.

We have 1 child.

We are contributors to the system, whether you like it or not.

Ricky44

Get a grip. It costs more than £3k a year to educate your one child.

Anyway, I would be happy for people to have their money back. See how far £3k gets you in the private sector.

Hopefully you don’t teach maths.

If DP and I are paying 3k a year into the education system then over our entire working lives we have paid enough for our child to be educated by the state.

Or does the 3k a year only go in to the education system when DD is of school age? Do we get a discount once she’s 18 😂😂😂

It's odd that other societies don't appear to have this tension between educators and parents.

@herculepoirot2

You said it costs 73k to educate one child?

Look, it’s stupid to say ‘I pay tax’ - we know it doesn’t work like that.

Every kid is entitled to an education and to be educated well and not treated like shit. End of.

Ricky44

No, but have you always been earning 70k? No. Will you always earn it? How can we know? Something could happen to you tomorrow and you could be a net drain on the State for the next fifty years. No assumptions. At the moment you are benefiting from a subsidised service, a service that would cost you £20k annually as a minimum if you tried to secure it without state help.

@herculepoirot2

It’s not up to you. We’ll do what we like and we will ensure that our complaints about shit teachers are dealt with.

Ricky44

You can see that I did say that.

Because everyone's kids go to school?

Pretty natural that it's going to be a regular subject. People also tend to moan about negatives in general rather than posting about positives (obviously some exceptions, but that's the natural trend).