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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Nearly half of teachers plan to quit in the next 5 years

848 replies

freebritknee · 11/04/2022 14:04

I saw this from a survey carried out by an education union.

Unmanageable workload is a significant factor.

This is madness how have the unions allowed the state of teachers employment to get this far where nearly half of them want out?!

OP posts:
Malbecfan · 11/04/2022 15:22

In my outstanding school, we have for the first time struggled to recruit. It's in an AONB, but its rural location means that you have to commit to the area to work here as it's not really commutable from large population centres.

I won't be staying on for 5 years because I can draw my pension soon, and that'll be it. I love my school and teaching the kids. To be fair to SLT they do listen to me, but I am always constructive with criticism.

The thing that I hate is the lack of money - we're in one of the worst funded LAs and the constant tinkering with the bloody curriculum by people who think the 1950s were the epitome of learning. Yes Michael fucking Gove, you. Why kids need to know what a sodding fronted adverbial is, I have no clue. My older DD has a First & Masters from Cambridge but doesn't know. Her grammar is excellent because she reads widely and asks questions.

I taught in a primary school alongside my main job for 2 afternoons per week until July. Again, teachers worked damn hard. TAs were brilliant but there was no money for anything. In my 1st year there, I taught a class of 42 y6s with no TA. It was a nightmare. There was no point asking for specialist equipment because there was no money. I managed to get £18 to buy some boomwhackers - my only spending in 3 years.

To the poster who told us to leave so new teachers could be recruited, she is deluded. Who the hell does she think is going to mentor these new colleagues? Very few people walk into teaching with excellent behaviour management; it's something you pick up, just like knowing how to handle students with specific needs. I help train new teachers because I can do those things at the same time as teaching the rest of the class.

If people really cared about education, they would never vote Conservative. Let people who understand schools, teachers and children run things.

FridayBluezzzz · 11/04/2022 15:30

I live in a part of the country with high unemployment and lack of opportunities. I’ve seen teachers quit and come back because they haven’t been able to earn the same elsewhere.
Of course this is probably different in other parts of the county.

The main issue I’ve seen working in schools (not teaching) is poor SLT. Over paid, lazy and useless. Some of them get into a position of power and then coast. The often have very little sympathy for teaching staff and will pass on any tasks they can onto them.
The thing is, if you think teachers are treated badly, support staff are treated worse.

Tulipblacksmith · 11/04/2022 15:31

@Silverclocks

I’m sure they are doing a great job. My family members spelling is ….. interesting Hmm so I have no idea how she is managing to be honest teaching a whole class of year 5s.

Anyhow, it’s all just a slippery slope in standards isn’t it? If you have unqualified teachers doing the job for half the pay packet will they even be running PGCEs in the future? Makes you wonder.

Awalkintime · 11/04/2022 15:38

[quote toomuchlaundry]@Awalkintime parents just blame teachers, probably why there is a retention crisis![/quote]
Oh I know, I face one in court soon who will regret the lies she has told about me.

reesewithoutaspoon · 11/04/2022 15:39

I honestly don't blame them. They are underfunded, overworked, treated like shit, and subjected to endless box-ticking exercises and audits which do nothing to actually improve the teaching.
The sooner they stop cabinet ministers fucking about with health and education when they have no experience of the systems the better. They need to be led by people who understand education, not for political point-scoring or ideologies. Every few years the government changes ministers and the new one comes in and brings a new system in before the old one has had a chance. Education needs a long-term vision, not this constant chopping and changing depending on what a particular cabinet minister's rose-tinted glasses memories of his lovely boarding school was.

Tulipblacksmith · 11/04/2022 15:40

@FridayBluezzzz

I am not so sure. Support staff can be valued more so because they are cheaper. Heads definitely don’t want to lose people who are

A) willing to do the job
B) at half the price!…

You couldn’t really make it up. It’s the expensive, experienced teachers who are bullied.

SandalsAndSox · 11/04/2022 15:55

@Dizzyhedgehog ah, so not anywhere warm and exotic then!! 😂

FridayBluezzzz · 11/04/2022 16:01

[quote Tulipblacksmith]@FridayBluezzzz

I am not so sure. Support staff can be valued more so because they are cheaper. Heads definitely don’t want to lose people who are

A) willing to do the job
B) at half the price!…

You couldn’t really make it up. It’s the expensive, experienced teachers who are bullied.[/quote]
See my experience is the opposite. Support staff are seen as easily replaceable. However in the last 2 years that has changed and posts sit empty for months.
I think say a maths teacher isn’t seen as replaceable, an art teacher would be.

noblegiraffe · 11/04/2022 16:03

I think say a maths teacher isn’t seen as replaceable

However this doesn't result in preferable working conditions for maths teachers.

freebritknee · 11/04/2022 16:08

@Iggly

This is madness how have the unions allowed the state of teachers employment to get this far where nearly half of them want out?!

What mental contortions have you performed to let the government off the hook?

The unions aren’t listened too and are vilified as militant/shrill/etc.

Unions represent the teaching profession and if you knew how a union worked, then you wouldn’t come up with such nonsense.

I did make this admission in my second post. Third in the thread.
OP posts:
Dizzyhedgehog · 11/04/2022 16:11

@SandalsAndSox Well, it can go up to nearly 40 degrees in the summer where we are...and it goes down to -20 in the winter. So you get proper seasons.
We have to fill up our pool again soon. 😁

It also means we can get back to the UK quickly.

Amijustagrump · 11/04/2022 16:15

Currently on maternity leave from teaching, dreading going back and will probably plan to be pregnant again then quit.. 4 years in and I'm done

WhatAHexIGotInto · 11/04/2022 16:16

What's then needed is plenty of recruitment of new teachers.

Oh the naivety! Grin

No one wants to be a teacher now because it's shit. Over the last 5 years I've lost count of the amount of lovely, bouncy new teachers who leave after their first year because the job is nothing like they thought it was.

People really have no clue.

Linestripe · 11/04/2022 16:17

I’m the same. I make a good salary and the holidays and benefits of local government make it hard to leave but I’m so miserable I can’t hack another 4 years never mind 40 until I retire!!

Meadowbreeze · 11/04/2022 16:17

@Dizzyhedgehog wow! What country do you teach in?

SamphirethePogoingStickerist · 11/04/2022 16:18

@Silverclocks

I've worked with teachers who've been planning to quit for the last 20 years. The reality is the salary is nowhere near as bad as they think it is, when they start looking for alternative work.

I wish they would go, instead of just talking about it though. Staying and moaning/kidding themselves they're leaving is doing no one any good.

If the unions are at fault, it's because they've managed to get the job so well paid it's hard to leave Grin

On the other hand, some of us hang on in there for too long and eventually leave without a job to go to.

When I came to the end of my teaching tether I couldn't find brain space to look for jobs and contemplate interviews and negotiating notice periods etc. So I left. And then sat at home crying, decompressing for a couple of months before I could even contemplate job hunting.

I am now self employed, because be the thought of an actual timetable, regular hours quite literally fills me with dread.

I should never have got into that state. My HoD, SMT should have listened when I explained why the job was untenable. The next person in post got all the changes I had asked for already written into the job offer. THAT is the reality for many of us who leave. Not some prissy bollocks about 'suddenly realising the pay was too good to leave'.

Dizzyhedgehog · 11/04/2022 16:21

@Meadowbreeze We are in Germany. 😀

Musmerian · 11/04/2022 16:21

@Tulipblacksmith - that’s not the case in all schools. My dept is pretty much all Oxbridge graduates and you wouldn’t get an interview fora job at my school without a good degree from a decent university.

Wishihadanalgorithm · 11/04/2022 16:21

I think the teaching crisis is due to the fact that except for Estelle Morris, we have never had a Minister for Education who had been a teacher and understands the issues. Just because you have been to school doesn’t mean you understand education - thinking of Gove here.

The government needs to get headteachers, teachers and support staff from a variety of schools to work together and produce an ‘ideal world’ vision of what successful education looks like then plan how to achieve this.

For me, I would like to see proper assistance for families in need - this is utterly essential. This will ensure schools don’t have to deal with the fall out in children who come into school and disrupt and damage the learning of others. Parents need to know that they have to take responsibility for their child’s poor behaviour, lack of homework/effort and disruption. The responsibility for pupils’ learning can’t all hang on the teachers. Children and parents have to buy into the value of education as well and take some of the responsibility when results aren’t what they ‘should’ be.

Smaller schools and smaller classes are also the key as this does create a family feel within a school and helps with behaviour. It is also essential SLT are properly invested in the staff body’s well-being. Teachers being given the freedom to teach and develop their own pedagogy is also important. SLT should aim to have an open approach to staff development rather than having punitive observations, book scrutinies etc - you know treating adults like professionals.

If all of this could happen, I think education would improve and teachers would be happier and therefore perform better. I am not holding my breath though.

Timeforausernamechange22 · 11/04/2022 16:22

[quote toomuchlaundry]@MajorCarolDanvers there is a recruitment as well as a retention crisis, perfect storm really. You don't want to encourage good teachers to leave[/quote]
2 words - support plan.
It’s the only career I can think of where the more experienced you become the less you are trusted.
Good, experienced teachers are expensive and do get managed out and replaced with inexperienced but cheap nqts.

Duracellbunnywannabe · 11/04/2022 16:25

I left teaching 4 years ago this summer. There was a work load survey conducted by some government minister, the one after Gove maybe? All teachers were invited to participate and many did. Nothing came of it. I got the impression the minister thought she could make a couple of simple suggestions and solve the issue but the teacher job role was way more overwhelming and encompassed more than the minister expected.

@noblegiraffe, can you remember this survey?

Wishihadanalgorithm · 11/04/2022 16:27

Was the Ed minister Nicky Morgan?

OnceuponaRainbow18 · 11/04/2022 16:28

@MajorCarolDanvers

What's then needed is plenty of recruitment of new teachers.

Yea this isn’t happening

MissyB1 · 11/04/2022 16:30

My ds left after 3 years - best thing he ever did. He’s still public sector but a project manager for local Government now, earns more and has far less stress.

This Government has no respect for Education or the NHS. But still people vote for them and then moan about schools and healthcare!

Countdown2023 · 11/04/2022 16:30

You are taking a parent to court ?