Does anyone NOT support teachers’ strikes?

[Notbeinggoadybut]

I’ve got mixed views. Support that they, as all public sector workers, need a pay rise. And schools need more funding (but the NEU hasn’t badged this as a public reason which is a mistake IMP).

But 12% is a lot when you’re on a £40k salary. The TA’s deserve 12%, the nurses and ambulance drivers with dire conditions and worse salaries deserve 12%. But not from a starting salary of £40k.

Also public services can be dire. I work in one, it can be bordering on a joke and in so many ways such a waste of money. I will be striking on the 1st of February. But I don’t think it’s right - I voted against the strike. I want a pay rise, but don’t feel like it’s right to ask for 10% and strike if I don’t get it.

Interesting that @FrodisCapering is refusing to answer my question about whether the education system has crashed into a wall.

Because if they answer yes, then that proves that their comments about things being great are nonsense

And if they answer no, it shows they don't know what the fuck they are talking about.

The idea that anyone in teacher training thinks that things are fine when the recruitment figures are as they are is just bollocks.

Still ignoring the questions about conditions, recruitment and retention

And trainees do not teach a full timetable from the get go, that’s utter nonsense

@FrodisCapering you are Gillian Keegan and I claim my £5.

It's an 80% timetable from the start.

What's the point in me saying anything about conditions? I could give my opinion, you will disagree.

R and R, yes, not great. Worth going on strike for? Not in my opinion.

I am glad my children go to private school so their learning won't be disrupted by this or future strikes.

So you’re clearly out of touch with how many independent teachers are unhappy then ? And how many private schools are losing staff due to opting out of tps ? How many private schools are recruiting unqualified staff to save on money ? You are painfully naive if you think you will be unaffected

@MrWhippersnapper oh please. I've done due diligence on my children's school.
I am going to stop commenting now. I've given my opinions and I've shared my experiences. All you keep doing is making judgements about someone you know nothing about.
I have spent the last three days doing A Level standardisation, as part of my second job with a national exam board. I am very tired.

It's an 80% timetable from the start.

Which institutions are doing that??? It's certainly not the norm.

I am glad my children go to private school

No skin in the game.

And you’re clueless, no one’s making you comment. If you choose to make goady comments then expect a backlash from those of us who actually do the job. If you don’t like it, don’t comment

I think we're all meant to be duly impressed that Frod marks exams...

@FrodisCapering I hope you read this comment by @pointythings
Unions are by their nature left leaning. The right isn't known for its support for workers' rights.

Thank God for the left leaning in education. We would have been totally buggered years ago without them and the effects of the unions.

I don't think doing exam standardisation qualifies you in any way to judge teacher workloads, the sufficiency or otherwise of school funding or the state of state education, given that you don't use it.

I ask you again, @FrodisCapering - do you think that all children, not just those of wealthy parents who can afford private school, have a right to a good education?

All you keep doing is making judgements about someone you know nothing about.

People passing judgement on things they know nothing about is super annoying, right?

Private pensions are absolutely not in line. Nearly everyone in the private sector saves into a pension pot. It costs about £500k to buy an income of around £20k per year. Add to this teachers' holidays and they are really earning a lot more.

It a very hard job but so are many others, without the long hols.

Uncivilised? Fuck me.

I'll have you know our picket line is very civilised.

You know one way to attract decent teachers? Paying a competitive wage...

We know we have teachers at are school who are phoning it in, or who are working hard but lack vital skills for teaching. But if we didn't hire those teachers, we'd have no-one to teach those classes.

*Jonniecomelately · Yesterday 21:28
Lovelysausagedogscrumpy · 25/01/2023 21:02

Pension entitlement for public sector workers has been brought into the argument time and time again. And without any regard to the fact that historically, public sector workers like civil servants agreed to lower pay in return for better pensions. It also doesn’t take account of the fact that final salary schemes have been closed to new entrants for a number of years in order to bring public sector pensions more in line with private sector. But still the myth persists.
Show quote history
Private pensions are absolutely not in line. Nearly everyone in the private sector saves into a pension pot. It costs about £500k to buy an income of around £20k per year. Add to this teachers' holidays and they are really earning a lot more.

It a very hard job but so are many others, without the long hols.*

I too have made this point. The comments on here kind of illustrate the bind though. The pension element clearly isn’t understood (it’s talked about as if it’s notional and may not be paid out which absolutely isn’t the case). It’s not perceived to be part of the reward package. The comments also suggest to me an insular view on pensions - it is not true that outside of teaching everyone else is on final salary schemes or schemes that are better than the teachers pension. The teachers pension is a fantastic deal outstripping others by quite some magnitude; that’s not a myth, it’s a fact. However, if teachers are leaving, I don’t think ‘jam tomorrow’, which pensions are perceived to be, is cutting it. I can see why - if you are young looking for a deposit on a house, or even older just struggling to cover bills then the pension isn’t motivating. Could the balance be shifted? Possibly, but, as I understand it, although many other private companies are able to offer some choice in how pension contribution is shared, this may not be possible with the funding mechanism the teachers pension has.

to get a settlement though, something has got to give on both sides. Teachers lost a weeks holiday to baker days, now inset days as part of a previous pay resolution decades ago. If teachers need to work half terms and significant chunks of the holiday anyway, (and many/most already do) maybe that needs to be formally contracted and reflected in the pay. But here the pension kicks in again - as the salary is pensionable, any pay increase has to also have sufficient budget for the higher pension employer contributions that go with this.

and of course teacher concerns re: support and funding to actually
do the job without burning out need to be part of a deal too. I don’t get a sense that the full gamut of concerns from falling down buildings to surreptitious phone recordings are being heard.

You make some very valid points, however I take issue with the fact that it's not notional, and that it will definitely be paid out, as per the terms of the pension when you join the profession, as that hasn't been the case for me, and it isn't for most teachers employed today. When I first trained to be a teacher, the pension on offer was a final salary pension, that could be taken in full at 65. I then had a grand total of 5 years in that scheme before it was changed to a career average scheme, that can't be taken in full until I'm 68. Yes, 5 years do remain in the old, pre 2015 scheme, but so what, when my career will be 35 years long (or 38, if I teach until 68!), those 5 years of contributions are a very small part of my pension, and being required to work for three extra years before I can take the majority of my pension in full is a big deal. I'll be in my mid 60's and probably knackered, and had the retirement age been 68 when I joined, and the scheme career average rather than final salary, I may not have trained to be a teacher. The goal posts have changed since I started teaching, and they've changed quite considerably, what's to say they won't change again? Yes, the pension is still good, but there's no guarantee it will be good for an entire career. How can a young entrant have confidence that the pension they'll get is going to be the pension they signed up for, if they've change the rules of the pension multiple times already? Teachers used to be able to retire at 60, then 65, now 68, and those changes have happened within the career of a teacher who is now only in their 40's, if they started teaching pre-2007. It's not the case that you keep the penison terms as they are when you join, the changes affect pretty much all teachers to a greater or lesser degree, depending on how many years service they have accrued before the change. It doesn't really matter if you've got a few years of service in a good scheme, if the majority of your service is in a much more rubbish scheme. Quite rightly, teachers want money in their pockets now, so they can do things like buy a home, which will afford them some security later life, rather than bank on a pension that can be changed at the whim of a government who seems to hate them.

What I'm saying is, that when I joined, I thought I was going to be able to take a decent, final salary pension, at 65. I nievely though that those would be the terms throughout my career, and the good pension was a factor in my choice to choose teaching as a career. With hindsight, would I encourage a young graduate to choose teaching as a career, on the back of a promise of a good pension? Given the pension I signed up for is not what I'm getting, I can't do that. No, I'd tell them to do something else, where they can earn good money throughout their career, and to save, invest and grow wealth for their retirement that way. The margins are so very large for many graduates, that if someone invested all their extra income throughout their career, over and above what teachers earn, they'd be doing very well in retirement. The days of teachers retiring at 60 with good pensions are well and truly over.

I know the pensions are good, but in all honesty, if we are retiring at 68, it makes a massive difference to post-retirement quality of life if we are too knackered to manage by then.

Scrimping and saving for nearly 50 years while working yourself to exhaustion in order to get about 15 years of a half decent retirement - really not worth the pay off.

I don't really to be honest.

Yes they deserve a pay rise and its a hard job but no harder than many others that get less without the holiday perks. But the real issue for me is the impact on the kids by all the strikes. Kids who have been through lockdown and homeschooling. Their education has been messed up enough.

They've got a bit of a cheek to put such great importance on attendance affecting pupil outcomes but then go on strike when it suits them.

Can you go up the thread and read some of it. You probably only need to read about 10 posts.

This isn't about any of that.

Clueless