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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU to feel that teachers shouldn't really be striking?

464 replies

Pinky1011 · 23/01/2023 02:47

They have 3 months PAID holidays only work 9-4pm, no dangerous or really bad working conditions, great job security, good pensions, They had pay rises last year up to 8%!!! I work in the private sector and haven't had a pay rise in almost 6 years! I just feel compared to alot of other professions, teachers have it quite good? I mean their starting salary is the same as a junior doctor. I get it inflation has wrecked everyone, but surely the issue should be getting inflation down? Not just demanding for more money, which by the way only fuels inflation further. AIBU to feel that teachers just don't know how good they have it compared to the rest of us?

OP posts:
ilovesooty · 23/01/2023 09:39

I suppose this ridulous OP has served one purpose. Several posters were previously unaware that any pay rise is unfunded and set to come from school budgets already struggling to cope. This needs to be more widely publicised so that everyone understands the potential effects on their own children.

Supernova18 · 23/01/2023 09:45

I have a trainee teacher at the moment. His course has 2 trainee teachers in his subject area, 2! there are 25 places..

dottiedodah · 23/01/2023 09:51

Some of my friends and family were teachers.very stressful. Maybe your dad earns a packet and has lovely holiday's. My friend has uk holiday's staying with family,little time to switch off.bags of stress .

Piggywaspushed · 23/01/2023 10:09

Sigh. Please read link about stagnation of pay in the UK ...

twitter.com/tomhcalver/status/1617106459937972226

TL:DR

Our low wage growth for teachers and nurses makes us something of an international outlier.

Nurses' pay has grown in nearly every other

@OECD

country since 2010; not Britain. And as

@JackWorthNFER

has shown, teachers' salaries have stagnated more than in any other rich nation

noblegiraffe · 23/01/2023 11:13

No fucker wants to do the job so clearly however cushy you think it is, it’s not paid enough.

Thats what matters.

In any other industry, if you can’t hire for what you’re offering, you up the offer.

The government knows this and made a manifesto pledge to increase teacher salaries that it has not yet met, and if it did meet has been completely wiped out by inflation.

The ball is back in their court.

neverbeenskiing · 23/01/2023 11:41

Sigh. OP is either a troll or extremely hard of thinking so probably wasting my time, but here goes...

I am not a teacher, I am a non-teaching DSL in a school so I work alongside teachers and know a lot about the day to day reality of their job.

OP's '9-4' claim is pure bollocks. I get into school at 7.15am the staff car park is already half full. Whenever I have to stay late for an event or meeting there are always Teachers in their classrooms working well into the evening. Those who can't stay late due to their childcare commitments work at home, I know this because I often get emails from Teachers at 10pm or later, and on Saturdays and Sundays.

The argument that "teachers got paid through covid when schools were closed" is idiotic on many levels. We were NEVER closed. We had over 200 kids in everyday, more when the government expanded the definition of vulnerable. When teachers weren't supervising the kids in school they were planning and delivering online lessons, making phonecalls to the vulnerable kids in their tutor groups, delivering food parcels and all manner of other things to support vulnerable families that were not in their job descriptions. Then when school staff were asked (told) to don full PPE and covid test hundreds of kids a day in the school gym, in addition to our other work Teachers were there alongside me doing this for no extra pay. We came in during the holidays to do the testing so it wouldn't cause further disruption to learning. They got paid because they were WORKING! The fact that some people genuinely believe this was a perk is fucking ridiculous.

Behaviour has gotten worse, a lot worse. The social issues we are facing have gotten more complex but we cannot get support from Children's services or CAMHS as they are so overstretched. The level of SEN need has risen year on year because we are expected to accommodate kids who, a few years ago would have been in special schools but now there are no special school places. We cannot meet this need because we do not have enough staff, or enough resources. This means more assaults, more serious incidents of self-harm, more challenging behaviour that disrupts the learning of others. None of this is the kids fault, but it's not the teachers fault either and I don't blame those who are deciding they've had enough and walking away.

Staff who have been buying equipment and resources out of their own pockets for years are not able to sustain this due to the COL crisis. I am having to issue food bank vouchers to staff now, as well as parents. Staff are leaving for the private sector because they cannot afford to stay and we cannot afford to pay them more. School buildings are crumbling, we can't even afford to put the fucking heating on. Staff need to be paid a living wage, but the government expects their pay rise that OP keeps bollocking on about to come out of the schools budget. The same budgets they have cut year on year for the last 12 years. This is wrong. Plain and simple.

The recruitment and retention crisis in teaching is no joke. We have teachers being pressured to teach subjects at GCSE and A level that they have little knowledge or confidence in, which makes them more likely to leave. We have GCSE and A Level classes with no teacher at all, just permanent cover. Now we are struggling to get cover teachers because many of them have also decided 'fuck this for a game of soldiers' and gone off to do private tutoring or something completely unrelated. We cannot recruit decent, experienced TA's when at one time competition for these roles was fierce. Where we used to have our pick of candidates who were over qualified if anything, now we have support staff working in schools who we know are not up to the job.

If you are so short sighted or entrenched in your anti-union views that you cannot see how all of the above is so much more disruptive to your DC's education than a few days of strike action, I don't think there's any reasoning with you.

Phos · 23/01/2023 13:23

Theos · 23/01/2023 02:54

Your father can’t make that much as a classroom teacher. Try to look at the pay scales before you troll

If he's an experienced teacher on the top of the upper pay scale and has a TLR he can.

Theos · 23/01/2023 14:10

As a classroom teacher. On 4 days. Unlikely to have a massive TLR

Cracklingfire1 · 23/01/2023 14:18

😂😂😂😂😂I'm assuming the OP is trying to be funny .....if this post is a true representation of what the OP thinks, there's only one expression that springs to mind..."you can't argue with stupid...:

Cracklingfire1 · 23/01/2023 14:34

Pinky1011 · 23/01/2023 03:07

@LokiCokey I have actually considered it strongly because of all the points I already outlined. But I have zero passion or interest in it.

You really should give it a go as teachers have it so much better and get paid so well. It really is a wonder why such lucky teachers are leaving in droves.

Fifthtimelucky · 23/01/2023 15:53

Teachers are not required to work 195 days a year. They are required to work 195 days a year on which their time can be directed by the headteacher plus such reasonable additional hours as may be necessary to carry out their professional duties.

If teachers worked 195 days a year they would lose 1/195 of their annual pay when going on strike. In fact any teacher going on strike will lose 1/365 of their annual pay.

itsgettingweird · 23/01/2023 15:57

MrsHamlet · 23/01/2023 08:14

Thought for the day: why is it only public sector pay that fuels inflation, and not private sector bonuses?

Very succinct. And an excellent question.

And here's another. Why did government state a few months ago if people were struggling with CoL to negotiate better pay rises - but they clearly didn't mean in the public sector?

Winterday1991 · 23/01/2023 16:45

scoutcat · 23/01/2023 02:56

All of the holidays aren't paid.. we get paid for the same amount as usual 9-5 jobs - 5.6 weeks which is around 28/29 days. The rest of the holidays are unpaid but spread out over the 12 months. Why don't people understand this.

If that's the case then the hourly rate of pay is very high for teachers if you divide salary by number of days worked.

blackbird77 · 23/01/2023 16:48

Winterday1991 · 23/01/2023 16:45

If that's the case then the hourly rate of pay is very high for teachers if you divide salary by number of days worked.

But not if you divide salary by number of hours worked per year. The pay per hour is terrible when you tot it up. That’s the crux of the matter all teachers are saying on here. Most teachers are working 50-60 hours a week.

JessicaBrassica · 23/01/2023 17:27

FlairBand · 23/01/2023 07:13

Which means that your actual annual equivalent salary is around 15% HIGHER than the headline figure because it’s prorated.

Therefore meaning…. A £38k (average) teacher salary is same as about £43.8k for an employee.

I’m not sure why teachers continue to peddle this line as it hugely undermines your argument about low pay!!

No. It means you get your salary for the 195 days a year that you are paid to work. The remaining days are unpaid. The annual salary is the annual salary... And spread over 12mo rather than 10. So no, pay is not 15% higher than advertised. It is what is advertised.

Shinyandnew1 · 23/01/2023 17:52

Winterday1991 · 23/01/2023 16:45

If that's the case then the hourly rate of pay is very high for teachers if you divide salary by number of days worked.

Not if you’re working 60 hour weeks.

FrippEnos · 23/01/2023 18:16

FlairBand · 23/01/2023 07:13

Which means that your actual annual equivalent salary is around 15% HIGHER than the headline figure because it’s prorated.

Therefore meaning…. A £38k (average) teacher salary is same as about £43.8k for an employee.

I’m not sure why teachers continue to peddle this line as it hugely undermines your argument about low pay!!

There is no annual equivalent. teachers are contracted for 185 days,
Saying that it is pro rata is just you spreading the usual BS.
Or not understanding what pro rata actually is.

FrippEnos · 23/01/2023 18:27

sorry 195 days.

foxynoxy · 23/01/2023 18:53

You've misunderstood this post completely. It is based on the fact that teachers are stating they have 5 weeks paid annual leave like most other employees and that 8 weeks are actually unpaid.

On that basis, teachers are contracted to work 44/52 weeks a year, I.e. 85% of the time.Therefore the pay they receive, for example 40k, is in fact only 85% of the pay they would receive if they were contracted for 52 week in the same way as other employees. So, if they were paid 100% it would actually be 47k not 40k and then they'd only have 5 weeks paid leave like other employees.

Thinking of it in this way is really helpful in working out where the pay actually sits compared to other roles. If a teacher wanted to become an accountant and have the same take home pay and leave (5 weeks paid leave and 8 weeks unpaid) then they'd need to be looking at jobs advertised at 47k not 40k.

Mrsuntidy · 23/01/2023 18:58

This reply has been deleted

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HereBeFuckery · 23/01/2023 18:59

@foxynoxy

Whilst I support their right to strike and understand some of their frustrations the reality is a lot of teachers have currently got a good deal that their skills and education wouldn't command in any other profession.

I have a BA, MA, PGCE and PhD. There are four other members of staff in my school with the same qualifications. I must remember to email them to remind them they should work elsewhere rather than trying to use their abundant qualifications to enrich children's education.
We are not a profession of under qualified thickos, but thanks for implying that we are.

FrippEnos · 23/01/2023 19:01

foxynoxy
Unless they have changed the meaning of pro rata I haven't misunderstood the post at all.

If people do not understand teachers contracts that is on them.

If you or other posters wish to explain teachers pay in the way that you have posted then that is fine but it is not pro rata.

But I have yet to find anyone that has looked through the teachers pay and conditions (burgundy book etc.) and been able to find anything about holiday pay.

noblegiraffe · 23/01/2023 19:06

Teachers in Scotland have a contract that explicitly involves holiday pay and the rest unpaid which is why their strike pay day calculation is 1/235 of their annual salary. In England it’s 1/365 of annual salary - no holiday pay specified in the contract.

Maggie178 · 23/01/2023 19:08

The most valuable asset of schools is the teachers. They should be given the resources they need, paid fairly and valued. What more important than teaching the next generation?

NewPapaGuinea · 23/01/2023 19:23

Foxynoxy thinking teachers are part time 😂