Govt declares war on teachers again. Fucksake.

[noblegiraffe]

The Telegraph front page tomorrow is reporting that the DfE is preparing an 'army of supply teachers' to keep schools open in the event of a teacher strike.

Is that like the army of volunteers they failed to raise to keep schools open during the covid surge in January?

Changing the law to allow agency staff to cover for striking colleagues is a shitty move, an opportunity I can't imagine agency staff in general would be leaping at; but using it as some sort of trump card against teachers?

1. supply teachers would most likely be in a teaching union (they'd be mad if not)

2. WE CAN'T GET SUPPLY TEACHERS NOW BECAUSE THERE'S A CRITICAL SHORTAGE OF TEACHERS

If they've got an army of supply teachers, where are they fucking hiding them?

If the government think children have 'suffered enough' during the pandemic then:

1. fund schools properly

2. stop haemorrhaging teachers by e.g. not treating them like shit in the national press

3. improve working conditions and reduce workload by e.g. funding children's services like CAMHS, SEN services, social services so that schools aren't picking up ALL the slack.

That would improve the situation far more for children than shitty headlines in the Telegraph deliberately antagonising the few teachers the country has left.

twitter.com/samfr/status/1539717032043859968?s=21&t=uLvLET4xftQW31sTEKBaLg

I agree with this. Rather than a full strike i think teachers need to agree with each other to have firmer boundaries and say no to all the pointless ridiculous admin. If there's a shortage than surely the school isn't going to fire them all

We’ve worked to rule before, did anyone notice? I’m not sure the union work to rule instruction was ever lifted, tbh.

The NASUWT has had it in place for at least 10+ years. It doesn't make any difference, not because it couldn't but because teachers are generally very, very reluctant to do anything which impacts the kids- so it's completely ineffective.

Strikes have clear timescales and goals, so are generally much more effecive. The problem is that I think it will be hard to gather support until the pay cuts really bite in a year or two.

The other problem is that the government really want strikes so they can be seen to be doing battle with the left, so I'm not sure how successful it could be.

I don't think the pay is bad. But I live in the northeast where 25k is considered a lot.

I don't have children so won't have any childcare issues so might be easy enough for me to say, but I agree with the strikes, I'm just not sure what they can achieve though? As more pay won't help much.

The issue to me is workload not pay. My sister in law is a teacher, she's young (26) been doing it 3 years now.

Every time I go round to hers, whether it's evening or weekend, she's got her laptop out and is surrounded by books/paper and she's working.

She gets to work for 7:30am, leaves 5:30/6ish. She teaches in a 'rough' area, last week she had to stay late one day as a child showed up very unkempt, and there were issues with safe guarding. Another day a parent forgot to pick their child up as they were drunk, so she had to stay till that was dealt with, this ended up being 7pm, then shes come home, write reports, lesson plans, marks work etc.

She once received a complaint from a parent for being "too young", she received another complaint from a parent for not being able to appreciate a child's drawing which upset him, because she was too busy dealing with an autistic child's meltdown.

She has 7 ld children in her class. She gets told off if she separates them too much to the other kids, then gets told off if she doesn't adapt their workload and environment enough, she can never get it right.

To me, it is not a case of salary.

I think schools need more staff that aren't teachers such as safe guarding leads, well-being/well fare officers, on site relief support workers to deal with challenges / disruptions, staff trained more in special educational needs...basically, just people around so teachers can just teach !

Still all comes down to money, though I expect all these additional services would save money in the long run.

Yep, when Shapps started talking about agency staff for rail, one of the MDs just said "it's not going to happen". Sure, railway companies employ agency staff for roles such as cleaning, catering, security etc. but the drivers/guards/signallers etc. who actually keep the railway moving are skilled staff who take up to a year to qualify, and longer to become fully productive (route/traction knowledge). Getting agency workers in at two weeks notice to cover these roles just isn't possible.

It's all talk, just like the automation wibble.

Let's get realistic here:

I start on £21k nearly 20 years ago. It's now £25k. Will rise soon but no matter how experienced you are £41k is all you will ever earn if you stay in the classroom and no matter how good you are. And TLRs are a joke for the extra work required for a measly increase. I saw one recently in-house for helping pupil premium kids. £1500 a year. So £1200 after tax. £100 a month, £25 a week or a fiver a day for all that work!!!

The starting salary is being improved at last but with no development or scope then people will still stay away.

What is the right way?

Well, my daughter has not had a full week of scheduled A-level lessons this academic year.

The idea that a school could recruit enough supply teachers to teach 1600 pupils is bloody stupid. I doubt that there's that many supply teachers in the county.

My view is just that inconveniencing the public is not the right way to go about it.

i do agree, however I sort of look at it that the train drivers are taking one for the team. Doctors and nurses can’t realistically strike without deaths - I know there’s rumblings and I know they have before, as have ambulance staff. They are a service that has enough of an impact to make a difference, without risking lives or having wide long term implications E.g GCSEs

I used to do playground duty for 350 kids, solo.... (back in the day when we had to make our own exercise books with sugar paper covers.)

thus you only need two staff to run a school. the poor sod on playground duty and the first aid trained somebody to patch up the kids that inevitably dent the asphalt...

[sarcastic]

You are lucky you have the right to strike.

the government can try and get replacements in if they like but as others have said there likely won’t be anyone due to shortages. But there are shortages in all industries

there are many other industries who have no effective union, are unable to enforce their employment rights due to high turnover in staff , have extremely poor working conditions, have no sick pay, are at risk of death and injury all the time at work and don’t have the support or their employer to fix or challenge it, have the risk of getting fined at work just for doing their job, and work extremely long unhealthy hours.

lorry drivers I’m thinking of as one.

if you are angry at your working conditions be angry and be a movement for everyone

Everyone has the right to join a union and fight for their employment rights.

Those who are working for those industries need to unionise and mobilise

What did 'rule' mean when you tried it before? Did it just mean not putting up displays, and not organising sports days? If so it's not surprising that it went unnoticed.

How about doing as a PP has done? Refusing to work early, refusing to work late, refusing to take work home to finish it, refusing to cover for absent colleagues, if meetings or whatever eat into your planning & prep time then not going into your own time to make it back up.

I love Boris wanting a high wage economy

just not the public sector

I like this.

I had a head teacher have a rant that the Y6 children did not know what tadpoles were... I think she said something alongh the lines of sod the curriculum, get out into the grounds and go look in the pond...

Another head told me to sod the curriculum and catch them up on English and Maths...

This was a long time ago... last century I think

I've come to the conclusion that nothing this government announces is in any way about policy or vision, it's all about generating the right headlines and annoying the right people. I'm not sure they even believe what they say themselves.

What dues this headline achieve?

and it is to take everyones mind off the previous crisis of their own making and their complete inability to follow the law.

@yourmumsnet I guess it reminds their base of Tory voters that they will be "standing up to the unions and taking those work-shy lefty teachers down a peg or two".

They don’t.

it’s about getting the significant proportion of people who never read past a headline het up enough to have a good rabble about the entitlement of people demonised as ‘less than’ or ‘uppity’.

they’ve also managed to demonise knowledge so explanations or discussions end in frustration because one side is endlessly explaining and the other feels patronised because they already know ‘enough’. It was really evident at points during the pandemic when it became acceptable to openly scoff at science.

What dues this headline achieve?

It strengthens the belief that peoples problems are of their own making, not the governments.

Surely, apart from showing the traditional Tory voter that they will stand up to the unions, the message they are sending is that if they give in to the railway unions everyone else will just follow suit. The problem with the teachers is that most people in their 50's can remember, what seems like, the constant strikes. They are also piggy backing on the fact that the general public believe that teachers 'have it easy' with the schools holidays etc.

I stand by my comment, work to rule is the first step and to the poster who said 'we tried that it didn't work', it is this mentally that ensures things fail. Do it again and stick with it, do it differently. For example don't most teachers mark GCSE and 'A' level papers - how about stopping this? Now imagine the knock on effect on uni places etc......

I suppose a fundamental problem with work to rule is that it takes a high level of stamina and detachment. My impression is that a lot of teachers would rather put that energy into getting out of teaching altogether, especially with a government more likely to lower standards than to meet improvement demands.

The point, which flew right over your head, is that Dirtyteacup did a blanket comparison with Nandos and Tescos implying all the staff there are better paid than teachers.

They obviously are NOT.

Last time there was a strike quite a few colleagues refused to participate as they weren’t prepared to lose a days wages.

I wouldn't worry about the losses of wages but in a small primary school it is very difficult to strike unless the majority do as the relationship with parents is that much closer. If you are the only one out on strike they will all notice and talk about you. It shouldn't matter but it's actually quite difficult to take a stand in an environment like that.

And it's not just teachers; it's every worker.

They'll be changing the law next to make what P & O did legal.

Every working person, and those they love & support, needs to be very afraid of the Tories.