Those who think teaching is easy should put their money where their mouth is

[noblegiraffe]

Teacher training applications which rose during the pandemic have now fallen to 15% below pre-pandemic levels when we already had a critical teacher shortage. The government's decision to slash bursaries is now looking completely idiotic.

www.tes.com/news/teacher-training-applications-drop-pre-covid-levels

The only thing that the government has put an appreciable amount of funding into recently related to schools is £24 million to ensure that they will all be Ofsteded within the next 5 years. With inspectors expected to massively reduce the number of outstanding schools, this is a punishing schedule rather than a supportive one.

This is causing Heads to quit, on top of how terribly they were treated during the pandemic (this continued with an email late Friday telling them that they once again have to take on the job of the NHS and set up covid testing centres for January, with orders needing to be in by Tuesday).

We already have a critical shortage of headteachers.

www.theguardian.com/education/2021/nov/27/ofsted-inspections-headteachers-quit

I've noticed lots of posts on here from people who think that teaching is easy, that school funding is fine and there are no issues in schools, that you can leave at 3 and get lots of holidays.

So isn't it about time they put their money where their mouth is and trained as teachers? We are in dire need of them, and it's such a doss it should be a pleasure for them. A bit of a holiday even. And as it would be a public service, it would be guilt-free.

getintoteaching.education.gov.uk/

Wanting people to do all the work for you again?

What do you suggest?

@noblegiraffe

Wanting people to do all the work for you again?

What do you suggest?

You’ve heard my suggestions and you disagree.

So let’s here yours. You’ve started this thread, great! Now what?

You’ve heard my suggestions

What, the one about turning people away from teacher training if they didn’t always want to be a teacher? Yeah, that one went in the bin.

I gave some suggestions upthread.

@noblegiraffe

You’ve heard my suggestions

What, the one about turning people away from teacher training if they didn’t always want to be a teacher? Yeah, that one went in the bin.

I gave some suggestions upthread.

About why we need parents to pat us on the back? About what the general public can do to improve teacher’s workloads when teachers won’t?

So you are suggesting those chemists attracted by pay should join the ones who actually wanted to teach to swell the ranks so that they can all leave?

Do you really think it is only about pay??

@Piggywaspushed

So you are suggesting those chemists attracted by pay should join the ones who actually wanted to teach to swell the ranks so that they can all leave?

Do you really think it is only about pay??

No, at no point have I said it’s only about pay. I’ve said if we offer a better salary progression, we might be able to tempt people into it, who would otherwise have taken their undergrad degree elsewhere. That’s literally it. It’s really not that hard to understand, and if you’re really struggling with it that much, I’d suggest you forget all about it. You don’t have to agree, you don’t have to understand it, you can continue to have your own thoughts about the retention crisis.

About what the general public can do to improve teacher’s workloads

1. Stop voting Tory
2. Email their MP asking what is being done to solve the critical shortage of teachers and ask for their email to be passed to Nadhim Zahawi.
3. Email their MP and ask why we have allocated such a poor rate of catch-up funding and why our children aren’t valued

4, Email their MP and ask where the £11.4 billion is that is needed (by the government’s own estimate) to repair school buildings.

1. Email their MP etc etc etc
2. Don’t vote Tory.

@noblegiraffe

About what the general public can do to improve teacher’s workloads

1. Stop voting Tory
2. Email their MP asking what is being done to solve the critical shortage of teachers and ask for their email to be passed to Nadhim Zahawi.
3. Email their MP and ask why we have allocated such a poor rate of catch-up funding and why our children aren’t valued

4, Email their MP and ask where the £11.4 billion is that is needed (by the government’s own estimate) to repair school buildings.

1. Email their MP etc etc etc
2. Don’t vote Tory.

Hooray! Lovely!

I agree.

I really don't think pay profession is the problem. It's the excessive micromanagement.

If those suggestions are new to you, pumper then you must be new to my threads…

@noblegiraffe

If those suggestions are new to you, pumper then you must be new to my threads…

Aaaaaand killed it with more unnecessary hostility.

No, they’re not new to me. They’re just much more refreshing to read than the moaning.

No, you killed it by being completely patronising.

What moaning?

@noblegiraffe

No, you killed it by being completely patronising.

Oh fuck that, I’ve taken more abuse here than anyone else because I wouldn’t pander to your little tantrum. If you don’t want to be patronised, try acting like a professional teacher instead of a teenager having a strop.

I’ve taken more abuse here than anyone else because I wouldn’t pander to your little tantrum.

No mate, it’s because of your posts.

@noblegiraffe

I’ve taken more abuse here than anyone else because I wouldn’t pander to your little tantrum.

No mate, it’s because of your posts.

It’s the same thing.

I really feel for teachers back in the UK. The pressure has increased tenfold over the past 10-20 years and it’s not the same respected profession it once was.
My grandmother was a teacher then head of a school in Essex and the changes she had to adapt to over her career are unlike most professions, with most pressure coming from the regulating body (is it still ofstead?) and society as a whole who no longer just accept teachers to educate, but to also educate to an unobtainable standard, while babysitting, safeguarding, teaching children behaviours and etiquette, meeting ambiguous KPIs all while constantly being scrutinised by people higher up, parents, children they teach….while being paid quite frankly, rubbish money.

I have university friends who are teachers and they love their jobs. However, it’s concerning that children are being sent to school with no food, no proper uniforms, not toilet trained, some cannot speak English (some who cannot speak English are actually born in England to English parents?!)… too much is being put on the teachers. How can they teach children who do not understand? Let alone meet these arbitrary deadlines of ensuring children know such and such to prove themselves as a good teacher? It was never like this when I was at school. Teachers in the 80’s and 90’s had flexibility to enhance the educational experience they delivered. They could adapt what they were teaching for their classes and the students in it. Testing was so infrequent and parents and children respected the teachers. These days children are more or less being dictated to so they can retain information for a test to pass, the majority of parents see education as just the teachers job and school as six hours worth of free childcare. No wonder it’s not a career many aspire to these days. Where did it all go wrong?! (Tony Blair?)…

My comment was that for graduates of subjects with lots of options like chemistry, teaching is just generally an unattractive career. The salary doesn't help but the job itself is just not good. My DP is an SLT level teacher and what he had to do to earn his money is just not really worth it in my opinion. Far too much admin, poor behaviour, faddish heads and academy executives, abusive parents and Ofsted. Just no thanks.

I'm not sure I could put up with working in an industry with such an openly hostile and destructive regulator as teaching. Ofsted have done nothing positive to support schools during COVID and are now just going around tearing teachers new arseholes in full bore inspections over low attendance rates that are a direct result of the DfE allowing COVID to run rampant through schools. DP says it is not unusual to have inspectors shout at staff during inspection discussions. Totally unprofessional and not fit for purpose.

There are so many reasons why there's both a recruitment and retention crisis.

Recruitment:

• it's no longer an attractive profession for several reasons (pay, lack of autonomy, declining status, shift in societal behaviour still present in the minds of those applying to university/finishing their undergrad).
• it's seen as a "last option" by some seeing as how ITT providers have been basically instructed to take anyone who applies unless there's a huge neon-painted sign as to why they shouldn't.

Retention:

• some ECTs enter the workforce when they shouldn't have gained a place training or passed their training year. They were always going to leave when the realities hit.
• the pay progression vs working hours isn't good enough when compared to other public sector roles let alone private sector.
• the quality of the pension has been drastically reduced including when compared to some other public sector pensions that were also changed (looking at you, local government).
• Ofsted is not fit for purpose. It, along with the backdoor privatisation through academies, should be scrapped and reversed. The DfE should be redesigned to actually supported LAs, who should also be restructured to support and monitor schools properly.
• reduced investment in special schools has meant that children who require specialist provision are forced to remain in mainsteam and, worse, kept within the classroom and forced into lessons inappropriate for them because "inclusion".
• the behaviour of some children (and some families) is getting steadily worse and worse with each societal shift and decline in the social status of teachers.
• the DfE want to cherry pick innovations from abroad without looking at all at other aspects of their educational systems or those societies.

Hands up I could never teach secondary school children.
The stories my teenage dd tells me about what goes on in the classroom and the disrespect pupils show is disgusting.

Couldn't do it myself and have much respect for those that do!

Great points being made.

Teacher pay keeps cropping up, but I wonder if anyone has the same views for SLT and headteachers? Is there a large disparity or are they also underpaid for what they have to do?

In primary, most members of SLT are still on the class teacher pay scale. They may get a TLR payment but that's often at the lowest level of about £2.5k annually so it doesn't really make a huge difference.

Only assistant heads, deputy heads and headteachers are paid on the leadership scale (and lead practioners but there aren't many of them). Again, in a primary (depending on the size), assistants and deputies aren't paid all that much more than upper pay scale teachers with a TLR. Heads are on more but the responsibility they have is huge so I'd say it doesn't balance there either for primary. As well as a recruitment/retention problem for class-based staff, there's also a shortage of headteachers.

Underpaid and overworked, relying, as with most public services, on the goodwill and belief in communal good by its practitioners, to keep the whole rickety show on the road. I couldn't do it and am thankful that others will. YANBU OP.

I'm a lead practitioner. I get paid something like £50 a year more than when I was UPS3 plus a TLR