To think teachers could stop using parents evenings as a working late example?

[needabreak5]

Reading a few recent teachers threads and I have a few close friends that are teachers. I don’t doubt teachers genuinely work long hours during term time, weekends, evenings etc (as do some other professional jobs but for better pay). However, I do think they sometimes point out the ‘parents evenings’ a bit too much, given everyone knows it’s not even every week, why not just say you work late most nights, without giving that specific reason, surely it’s a drop in the ocean not worth mentioning? I work a 9-6 office job (and usually stay late) but have a fortnightly recurring meeting 6-9pm, I wouldn’t mention it to anyone, it’s a core part of my job (just happens to be outside of normal working day). I just think non-teachers/parents may be more understanding of the relentless long hours if parents evenings weren’t repetitively mentioned as one if the main examples.

I don’t think people who work in offices realise how tiring teaching is. Many years ago I worked 10-7 in an office and sometimes 8-7 if shifts needed covering. It was tiring, but there were lulls in the day. When I decided to retrain as a teacher, I thought I would cope as I was used to long shifts. But by god, teaching five hours is NOT the same as working in an office for five hours. Or even ten hours. It’s exhausting! And I did it for 17 years.

Teaching is like acting. You are on stage. On display. Trying to hold the attention of an often hostile ‘audience’. It is not the same as sitting at a desk for eight hours. You are always being watched. There are no lulls, no downtime.

On top of the acting part of teaching, there is also all of the ‘stage prep’ which is incidentally done by the teacher too. We write the ‘scripts’, make the ‘props’ and review our audience’s ‘understanding’ at the end of most lessons. We then have to account to hostile critics called SLT.

You cannot compare overtime in an office with anything to do with teaching.

The way I read this wasn't teacher bashing, but by using parents evening as an example of being overworked just doesn't do the amount of work they do justice.
Most people will be required to do the equivalent hours as parents evening outside their core hours.

I don't think many people realise just how many hours teachers spend on work. I don't think many people realise how much money teachers spend on their class. I don't think many people realise that teachers essentially earn NMW. I don't think many people realise the downsides to prescribed 'holidays'.

Imagine a secondary teacher.. potentially 7 year groups, 2 parents evenings a year per year group = 14 parents evenings.
Open evenings, Christmas concerts, Christmas fayre, Carol service, other miscellaneous events. It's soon averaging to 1 a week if not more!

(I'm not a teacher btw) I just fully support their strikes.

I work a 9-6 office job (and usually stay late) but have a fortnightly recurring meeting 6-9pm,

that's shit. and frankly? I would come in 3 hours later on that day so i was working the same amount of hours.

That's so opposite to my experience.

I thought most of my DDs' teachers over the years were good. I would have said fewer than 10% were 'mediocre' which is what you might expect on a normal distribution.

Which sector are you in? I can't fathom a job that can make you stay for meetings until 9pm, 3 hours beyond your usual hours without giving you toil or payment. You just have to work any number of hours they stipulate for a fixed salary. 12 hours a day , 7 days a week and there's not a thing you can do about it?

I would say do a full day with a class of 30, stop to nip to the loo then do another 3-4 hours with their parents before judging 😉

Many contracts state ‘you must work the hours required to perform your role’. When I was in financial services all my contracts said this.

The way I read this wasn't teacher bashing, but by using parents evening as an example of being overworked just doesn't do the amount of work they do justice.

This is what I’m trying to say.

I support the strikes BTW. (though from a selfish point of view I hope they will provide some kind of childcare provision so I can work - even if it needs to be at a cost to parents)

But I’m not convinced striking for pay is going to solve this - everyone is facing effective pay cuts and people don’t go into teaching for the money. The pay increase is not going to be enough so that it’s comparable with other demanding industries who are constantly flat out.

the main issue seems to be time, that’s what teachers need. If pay increases attract more staff to relieve shortages then great, but there are much bigger issues, including the perception of many non-teachers. My point is that complaining about parents evening doesn’t help this perception.

this!

sorry didn’t mean to write that at all! i’m new 🙈

Many contracts state ‘you must work the hours required to perform your role’. When I was in financial services all my contracts said this.

yes- my contract says this, and “any overtime will not attract additional payments”, “you agree to opt out of working time regulations”.

my previous job contract said the same so I think it pretty common in all professional service roles including support staff.

SliceOfCakeCupOfTea
I don't think many people realise that teachers essentially earn NMW

Nonsense.

people don’t go into teaching for the money

They may well not go into it for the money, but that doesn’t remove the fact it is deserved and that it should be given.

Teaching is the only job in the world that it costs more time to prepare before you start the working day and then more time again to review, reflect and feedback from that time. Meaning that... for every six hour school day, this has taken at least six hours to plan, prepare, organise, set up, mark, assess, feedback and this cycle feeds into the next day. Your tomorrow is reliant on the success, and effort of today.
Losing two to three hours of your after school time to running a club, attending a curriculum meeting, slt meeting, moderation meeting, learning walk etc does not mean that marking, assessing planning and prepping does not need to happen, just that you need to add it in to the end of the day, whenever it finally arrives

You can not just tack it on to your list of things to do and deal with it the next day.
The next day falls apart if not prepared for

Parents evening is often used as an example because of how awful they are! Having just worked 8am-4pm you then have to talk none stop for 3 hours sat on an uncomfortable chair in a freezing cold hall whilst being verbally abused by parents. Then you have to commute home for an hour, get home around 9pm, then still have some more work to do for the next day. I hate parents evening even if it is only a few times a year.

As a TA, I can safely say there is no way on this planet that I would consider teaching in the conditions teachers have to work in now. It isn't going down the pits or working in a war zone or anything, but it is a hard job which they really don't get paid very well for. They have to convince children to do work that lots of them would rather duck out of. It's not "the hardest job in the world" but it's not fun either. You really need to have a vocation to do it I think. I never could.

Re the op, it doesn't bother me that some teachers use parents evening as an example of working late. It may not be 100% accurate, but it does not bother me.

A first year teacher earns £28,000. At my school they tend to be here earliest and leave the latest. I get here at 7:15am and I leave at 4pm (but work at home after), when I have stayed until 6 they are always still here and don’t tend to be looking like they will leave anytime soon. That’s an 11 hour day, 5 days a week, 39 weeks a year. They also work on weekends, and we are pressured to come in over the holidays to complete intervention tasks, both unpaid. They will also complete work over holidays, I had a week abroad over Christmas so didn’t check my emails, I had 30 internal emails on my return. Once you add up the hours then yes, they will be below NMW, it’s ok though because they wouldn’t ever have time to spend it, except for when they are paying out of their own pocket to stock up the classroom.

195 hours for all that? That's a joke. If you teach state school for 38 weeks a year, that's an allocation of one hour a day for all prep, marking, staff and parent meetings, let alone after school clubs etc. It should be triple that.

GracieLouFreeebush
Once you add up the hours then yes, they will be below NMW

Nonsense -

National minimum wage is currently £9.50 per hour:

40 hours per week, 39 weeks per year is £14,820

50 hours per week, 39 weeks per year is £18,525

60 hours per week, 39 weeks per year is £22,230

So when I get into work for 8:15 and have to teach all day and do duties in my break times and then do parents evening until 7:15 is not an example of a long day. This happens regularly and is absolutely gruelling and then I have to get back into school the next day to teach all day again. Plus I have to organise childcare for this time and open evenings and options evenings etc. and that is extremely hard if you don’t have family help.

I think part of the problem is they feel they have to explain these hours as there's so much more hidden work than imagined. Yes anyone with sense knows teachers don't get all the holidays off but do they know that most spend hours every evening making work....as well as additional ad hoc duties, cpd courses etc. When you say you work 50hrs a week noone ssays 'yes but....'

But they don't work 39 weeks a year. Most teachers I know work in the holidays doing lesson plans, "dressing" classrooms, attending training, marking, admin etc. Plus the outgoing costs for classroom spends.

Also as a teacher I regularly worked 70 hour weeks