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.

"How hard is it? I could do it with a weekend of prep" and "teachers go into it expecting poor pay and poor conditions".

Contradictory, much?!

Teacher here. Regardless of the reasons the NEU are giving, I and a lot of my colleagues strongly feel that we’re striking over school funding and teacher retention. I am genuinely worried about the numbers leaving the profession - three resignations so far this month in my dept, all leaving teaching - and the resulting drop in teaching standards.
The fact is, I can’t afford to send my kids private and am shit-scared of the state the system will be in in a year or so.

Teaching seems to be unique in that everybody feels they are qualified to say how much they should be paid. There is also a perception that teaching is primarily about knowing enough facts to spout. Anyone who has done the job would know what utter bollocks this is. I am a teacher. I have been teaching over 25 years. I am paid 43000 and I am perfectly comfortable saying that I should be paid more.

I have said this on another thread but no teacher I have spoken to is actually chasing a pay rise, this is more about working conditions than anything else. Media always portray it as greedy teachers wanting a pay rise. I'm not even commenting on the ridiculous presumption of what teachers actually get paid except to say you are incorrect.
What I can say about pay is, as an experienced teacher, I had my pay frozen for years with 0% inflationary pay rise, followed by years of below inflation pay rises which has resulted in a real term cut.

Working conditions are awful, the workload is utterly unmanageable and we are expected to take on the roles of cleaners, before and after school childcare, attendance officers, school admin, lunchtime staff, caretakers, behaviour support workers and a million other roles with no extra pay etc due to cuts in budget. Never mind the cost of using our own time and money to buy resources for lessons as our schools cannot afford glue sticks and whiteboard pens.

I work part time - 3 days a week and I calculated that I worked 58 hours last week which was a pretty average week for

You shouldn't have started a thread as your opinion is based on ideas, not facts. No, teachers do not get automatic pay rises. They don't get £40k guaranteed after 6 years. They don't start on £40k. And they are striking as they don't want a 5% pay rise funded by school budgets. Which you agree is wrong.

I mean how hard is it to teach Year7 English or History? I could teach this term’s syllabus with a weekend of prep. And they want a massive pay rise whether they are competent or not. Bit of a joke in some cases.

Come on then. Join us. Show us how easy it is.

Teachers have had pay CUTS year on year, because of inflation. The demand is just to bring them back to be in line with inflation.

The vast majority of workers have, wages have stagnated for decades. It's a major issue but pay rises for everyone is also too expensive.

"Sorry if that sounds grabby but to me it’s just unfair that teachers will make my kids suffer, if the government don’t allow my taxes will rise to pay them more."

Teachers are making your kids suffer? Not the government, for running education into the ground for 12 years, to the point of a recruitment and retention crisis? Righto.

But isn’t this strike for a pay rise? Not school funding? I can’t see how this strike will help school funding, even if you get the 12% pay rise.

Back when I was a teacher, I had a student throw a book at me, throw a chair at me, spit at me, grab my bum, call me a bitch/whore/slag/cunt, scream in my face, self-harm in front of me, threaten to kill me, threaten to kill my children… a colleague had her hand fractured. My DH had a student throw a mug at him and another kick the wing mirror off our car. Enjoy your weekend of prep for that shit.

My private sector salary went up by 25% in September because of the cost of living crisis plus a £2000 bonus. Teaching is shit and I’ve never looked back. This is why we have no teachers.

I'm forever being told I'm making kids suffer. I'm immune to such bollocks.

To my daughter s teachers or course I do ..but after two years when I had a child who reception age being sick pre to school due to fear...no I don't...I want a want a child who wants to go through school and learn. She missed two years of school. No I don't support the strike s and no one I speak too but so scared to tell the teachers....

Is anyone actually a teacher here who has stagnated at the bottom of the scale ie on £28k? Or know of anyone who this has happened to? I know no such people, the ones I know have all climbed the scale and are now at the top, unless they have taken on further responsibilities so of course are earning more…

And yes the covid aspect comes into it too. Kids have missed enough of their education and some age groups have been affected worse than others.

So you’re morally a-ok to strike because you deserve more money and your job matters less? Isn’t that a tad contradictory?

Why is it ok for you to strike op but not teachers ?

I’m off now as I’m getting wound up.

OP, I’ve got three vacancies in my school and would love you to apply, if you are after a change of career.

The starting salary is £28k, assuming you’ve spent the 4 years that most take at Uni to qualify. This is unlikely to go up in the next 3-4 years, unless you take on additional responsibilities (that, unfortunately, we cannot give you time to carry out. You’ll have to get that done on a Sunday). If you don’t have QTS, we can only offer £19k, same hours and conditions. We could offer you some additional hours as a breakfast club assistant or lunch time supervisor at £11 an hour if you need to top it up.

I’ve also got the number for the local food bank and will let you eat breakfast at school with the children, those options are fairly popular with staff about now.

LadyRoughDiamond said this was what she felt, not what it was. Teachers can't strike about funding, but as pay rises have been unfunded so the money comes out of existing budgets, it is still an issue.

I'm stuck at the top of the main scale on UPS 3. I've been teaching 22 years and don't want to be in a management position. So not at the bottom, but no further movement.
We've cut everything to the bone to balance the books (which actually leaves us in a hole) so the next step will be redundancies. And only appointing inexperienced teachers on fixed terms so they can be replaced.

I stayed on M1 for three years because my school did not progress people up. I left and went into a job that doubled my salary and three years later I’m on six figures. Check my posting history if you don’t believe me because it’s come up before. Happy now?

So if teachers aren’t paid for their holidays are you saying their full time rate is much much much higher? So £35 would be £50k full time as you’re saying you’re paid pro rata.

You can’t have it both ways.

I don’t think many others are asking for such a big increase and some probably , as nurses and nhs staff deserves it even more

I'm on the fence. In general, I rarely support any strikes as I don't think they hurt the right people but, having had to spend a lot of time around hospitals over Christmas, I changed from being ambivalent to fully supportive of the paramedic and nurse strikes.

On the days of both the national teacher strikes I have big events that can't happen on an alternative day (a visiting workshop and performance company that are too popular to just be rebooked for a similar time and our major school production which has set, tech and licence booked for those specific dates. License can often be moved but set books up a year in advance so it's that week in March or not at all. Luckily I and nearly all my colleagues are NASUWT so I don't have to worry about it but if I was NEU, i don't know what I'd do. There needs to be change in education (not to pay, I don't think, we get plenty of money. But to lots of other things). But this show is the highlight of some kids' year and they've worked so hard. I don't think I could bring myself to not work those days.

I do not support the teachers strikes, they had a pay rise just after Covid.

Not being goady but -

There are significant factual inaccuracies in the stats you have quoted on salaries, % increases and reasons for striking. I can’t be bothered to re-type what I wrote on other threads but I head the finance committee as a school governor so I know precisely what school budgets look like and the UNFUNDED pay rises that went through this year. The larger % increases for teachers went to the most junior/lowest paid and it was tapered that way to attract new recruits. There is nothing retaining experienced teachers which is a major problem.

it’s funny to me how everyone seems to know how long they have to wait for an ambulance or waitlist list in hospitals and poor care - yet so little is understood about the situation in schools.

It’s fine to ask questions and debate. It is not fine to state fake news as fact.