Teachers - well paid, long holidays, gold-plated pension

[noblegiraffe]

I keep seeing this being trotted out as a reason to give teachers yet another real-terms pay cut.

Those who are going on about how great teachers have it, why have we got so many vacancies? Why is there such a shortage of teachers? It is really starting to bite in schools. My school has increased class sizes in maths and English, there are kids who have had a series of different supply teachers in core subjects since September, and A-level students who have had to teach themselves the syllabus in Y13 because they had no teacher at all. GCSE students have complained about their teacher not knowing what they are teaching because they've been roped in from another subject. We used to try to protect exam classes, but can't anymore.

Teaching vacancies are up. But the worst thing is that teacher trainees numbers have plummeted. The government has missed its recruitment targets for years, but the situation is getting much worse. Teacher recruitment for next year where schools generally compete for local trainees, which usually starts about now, will be really difficult and there will be lots more schools with unfilled spaces in September. Maths trainee numbers where I am are genuinely horrifying.

So, given the assertion that the private sector (the "real world") has it much worse and that teachers have a pretty cushy job with lots of perks, why isn't the private sector seeing a mass exodus into teaching?

Is it maybe not that cushy after all? Maybe the government actually needs to do something about it? Maybe those who think that a 5% rise is 'fair' need to have a rethink if they want their kids to actually have a teacher?

getintoteaching.education.gov.uk

That’s not true, as many experienced, effective and expensive older (often) female teachers have found when being managed out.

Nothing about teaching, including staying in your job, is as simple as you say for everyone.

When employers can see you are doing a good job in the classroom they will not want to lose you. Simple really.

I have seen far too many older teachers managed out by Heads in recent years to know that this just isn’t true.

If budgets are tight, employers look to save money and when they could get two ECTs rather than one UPS3, it is surprisingly easy for them to suddenly find the older/more expensive teacher to be ‘inadequate’ all of a sudden. Then they need weekly observations, ‘support’ plans, extras book checks, meetings with the head, more learning walks and targets. It doesn’t take long for them to either leave (utterly broken, usually) or a compromise agreement to be made and that teacher’s UPS is gone forever due to the joys of scrapping pay portability.

Simple, really.

@JangolinaPitt I do not know where you work or how old you are, but you are very niave.

Beyond naive and not just relating to teachers.

This twitter thread just came up on my timeline which illustrates the problem in teaching perfectly.

twitter.com/mathsjem/status/1612519010842644485?s=61&t=QDMih3S6wuA-AUtzYnJdVw

Great job come up, TLR, chance to shape a new sixth form and zero applicants.

What does this mean? It means a lot more work for the other teachers in the dept. The other option would be to not run A-level maths, which is pretty unthinkable for a new sixth form.

Idk I thought it was insulting to clap for the nhs when actually they deserved a payrise.

I actually think teachers deserve better recognition for the work they do. Hats off to all you teachers. I bloody couldn't do your job, so I respect you for it.

Anyone that's grumbling about teachers striking I'm assuming your going to jump into all these open vacancies? No... wouldn't work... not your thing or maybe it's better to bash the people your not willing to trade places with.

Idk I thought it was insulting to clap for the nhs when actually they deserved a payrise.

So did I. I thought it was as patronising as hell, and emotionally manipulative.

Such a void argument, just because one is able to provide a different opinion, does not mean that they desire to do their jobs.

By your rationale, anyone critiquing the police, should sign up?

to be fair @noblegiraffe the Harris Federation hardly has a positive reputation when it comes to how it manages staff.

What it does clearly demonstrate his just how screwed up the system is now. That there are amazing jobs going begging with no applicants in a series of schools much of the teaching community is, rightfully or not, afraid to work in. that's a direct result of the last 12 years of Tory governance (or lack of) over education. It's a mess. An absolute mess.

It’s different to critique the police based on practice than it is to critique teachers based on the fact that they don’t think teachers should be paid more because it’s an “easy” job and teachers are all rich.

If I critique the police by saying there is institutional corruption, this does not mean im saying I could do any better.

However, someone saying that teachers only work 9-3, get 9 million days paid holiday, and have an easy job for their massive salary and therefore shouldn’t strike leads people to question why there aren’t droves ofthese same people applying for this easy, well-paid job.

@WineDup my exact point.

If it's such a Brillant job that's well paid and easy - surely people will be queuing up in the street to do it and no hiring issues... police don't have the same issues to hiring people.. but teachers do. Could there be a reason ? Or do all these people leaving teaching jobs suddenly become work shy ?

But yes my argument that has no reasoning at all. Sure

All I am trying to say, is that people are not only driven by the benefits package. Some people, maybe more than capable of teaching, just do not want to do it. That is not negating the hard work of teachers, or calling it an easy job.

Most teaching arguments end with, if it is that easy, then do it yourself. It is jsut a lazy counter to any potentially valid points raised.

@fromdownwest the thing is, while your critiquing my argument you haven't actually given any counter argument other than "it's dumb argument".

There have been several teachers on here that say actually the publics perspective of what their job is and what it actually is different and their "benefits package" is also vastly different. They are striking because if something doesn't change then they will leave.

And many they are voting with their feet. In droves.

Ignoring a problem saying don't let them strike doesn't actually address why people are leaving in droves.

Me saying I respect teachers and the work they do (because I fundamentally wouldn't want to do it) seems to have struck a cord with you. You saying that argument is dumb, deflects from a issue that iMO needs to be addressed or sadly the system will collapse eventually and then people really will have something to complain about.

If you offer any actual opinions/solutions on this topic im all ears other than than what I put was dumb. Doesn't make you look smart. It makes you look like you have no idea but think strikes are bad which isn't ... the strongest argument in the world.

Hmm. I disagree. It’s more often a counter to comments that specifically argue that teaching is actually easy and does not require much in the way of actual skill - eg, “those who can, do, and those who can’t, teach”; or “you wouldn’t last five minutes in the private sector where the real hard work gets done, so if you find teaching, of all things, hard work, then you must be pretty unemployable in the real world.”

Meanwhile, it’s exceptionally easy to claim loftily that you’d be more than capable of teaching, but just don’t want to do it, when you would in reality be a talentless teacher.

So, acknowledging the skills and attributes required to actually be any good at teaching young people might be a good start in any discussion.

Teachers, on TV this morning, were saying that it wasn't wages causing them to strike, but the paperwork and tick box criteria that they had to complete now.

Perhaps that is what needs changing?

And acknowledging the huge range of responsibilities teachers are expected to fulfil would also help - and asking whether it is reasonable to have heaped so many onerous responsibilities onto teachers in the first place.

Then I’d question WHY they don’t want to do it.

Is it because they aren’t able to study to masters/postgraduate level?

Is it because they aren’t willing to work 10+ hours per day?

Is it because they don’t want to do a significant number of compulsory unpaid overtime hours?

Is it because they aren’t prepared to do a job KNOWING they can’t do it well, because there is no money for resources or support?

Is it because they don’t want to deal with poor behaviour all day?

Is it because they don’t want to be under constant scrutiny and pressure to improve, without being given the resources to improve?

Or do you have any other suggestions? Because the reasons listed above are some of the reasons that teachers are leaving.

I fully support the strikes

The reason I’ve been on strike is because of both - they are not a single issue.

Yes, we do a lot of paperwork. Way more than when I started teaching 10 years ago. A lot of it DOES have a positive impact - it’s not necessarily just “busy work” or paper pushing.

The thing is, there hasn’t been any “give” in other tasks to allow this to happen. It’s been layered on top of the other stuff we do. So we work more hours.

On top of that, there is less support available for us to do our job. Less support staff. Less money in the photocopy budget. Not enough jotters for kids. We had two glue sticks when the term started this year, between 4 staff.

Further from that, the kids in our class have more needs than before. Mental health issues in particular have increased, as have SEBN. So we need to work harder to make sure they can access the curriculum.

Add covid into the mix - we had to completely revamp our curriculum to suit that - for example, no group work, we aren’t allowed to take kids out on fieldwork, etc. - we had to write our own exams because these weren’t set. We also had to mark them ourselves, attend moderation meetings around this, and so on.

The bottom line is we are working 10+ hours a day, being paid for 6. Which erodes our pay down to £16/hour, or even less.

A pay rise would go a small way to redress the balance.

Interesting (that's not the word really but I'm being polite) that the question was why have we got such a shortage of teachers and can't recruit or retain teachers ergo an ever increasing shortage that has reached total crisis point.

Lots of people see that as an opportunity to tell us what's wrong with teachers

It is entirely irrelevant to the question and the absolute crisis schools, ergo children and young people's education, future chances and safety in some cases, are in. What you think of teachers even if you think they're work shy, inept, greedy, lazy, unable to hack it etc is totally irrelevant to the question and to the situation we're in.

I'm already teaching in a building that fits the criteria of, 'imminent risk of collapse'. Is that not a crisis? Would you be happy to see 3 floors of kids and staff crushed in a collapsing building? There are school buildings like this on a list that the government have known about for quite some time and are choosing to leave kids and employees working in without any mitigation.

The only contact we've had about it recently being asked if type A or type B concrete was used in it's construction 60ish years ago. We don't know so have been told we have to get surveyors and find out - at our expense. If I'm understanding correctly the type a or b will tell them if it's really really imminent or just sometime soon but not likely to be any day now. Meanwhile there's still about 700 kids about 30 staff using that building at any one time.

We've talked lots about staffing shortages, not being able to replace people who leave - people who sometimes leave mid term not able to cope anymore and we advertise three terms in a row, shortages of essential resources, added work load of the former points upon remaining staff etc and you can say it's nonsense or teachers moan too much or I work hard too. You can ignore or assume exaggeration about leaked reports saying there are buildings full of kids and staff around the country at risk of the building they are in collapsing at any time but I don't think you can blame that one on teachers unless we're meant to build our own schools and fund it out of our own pocket now too.

Reality is education is falling apart. It's been falling apart for a long time and it, like the buildings IS at risk of imminent collapse.

You can shoot the messenger all you like (most of us are used to it - many of us teach teenagers in batches of 32 all day every day so I'm sure you can imagine we need to be pretty thick skinned) but the message needs addressing or you'll have more to worry about than a day of no free childcare.

Apologies to primary colleagues - I've been learning a lot more recently about how normal dealing with kids who bite, kick, swear and throw things at you has become. You have very thick skins and on balance I think I'd take verbal abuse and disruption and misogyny etc from teenagers than spitting, biting, punching and table throwing youngsters clearly traumatised and in need of support but a bloody nightmare that a mainstream teacher shouldn't be dealing with none the less.

Also for those saying work to rule:

Our contracts specify that we work 1265 hours of directed time and must also do any other work required to fulfil our duties or as required by the school with no limits or definition to that at all except that it can't be directed time ie. they can't make us do it in school. Ergo working to rule doesn't change a damn thing because there is no rule except for how many hours we can be made to physically be in school for.

This is something that is worth campaigning for, for English teachers. Scottish teachers are employed for 35 hours per week.

We obviously do more than that, but we can enforce a work to rule.