To ask what is really so bad about a teaching career compared to other jobs? Does anyone actually enjoy it?

[yardstickss]

I earn reasonably highly in a career in finance. I manage the pressure ok and it’s quite competitive, which I don’t enjoy, but just try to focus and get the work done and go home/log off. I often work until mid evening and will usually but not always work Sunday evening for 4 ish hours to make the start of the week less stressful.

I have always considered working in teaching and very nearly did a week PGCE. I feel finance is such an empty job in comparison to teaching. I feel I would make more of a difference in teaching. I know it would be a pay cut but I’d also have longer holidays. I hear so much about the downsides to teaching though. Does anyone enjoy it? I know lesson planning takes up a lot of time but I think perhaps similar to how I work late now anyway? Just interested in whether I’m actually missing something (likely!) as I don’t know anyone personally in teaching other than one who really likes it but he works in the private sector.

I am a qualified teacher though I haven’t been teaching since I had my son and I’m unsure if I ever want to go back to it. The actual working with children bit was great. I’ve always loved children and it was lovely getting to know each child in my class and supporting them in their learning. What I didn’t enjoy was the workload and the constant interference and criticism from other members of staff. I was an NQT so I realise other teachers had to support me in my professional development. It never felt very supportive though. I literally worked every hour that I was awake for years, and it didn’t matter how much or how hard I worked, nothing was ever good enough for them and it felt like everything I did was wrong in some way. I’m also very introverted. I need time to myself sometimes to recharge which meant I wasn’t always extremely talkative in the staff room or on social things outside of school, though I tried my best. I honestly feel that I was bullied by other teachers and especially my mentor for this and constantly put down. In my experience schools can be a really toxic work environment.

You’ve got to have iron clad self esteem, a dark sense of humour and an ability to let bullshit wash over you! And you’ve got to be in the right subject, in the right school, with the right leaders. It helps if you like being on your laptop at 11pm, and it really helps if you don’t have any dependents. If all that wind is blowing in the right direction it can be quite good fun.

In no particular order:

students
parents
management

Teaching is 90% classroom management. Planning is easy, marking is time consuming, but developing a toolkit for running a classroom takes years and is the main focus of the job. Many teachers who are experts in the classroom side of things are leaving.

Go to some local schools and observe some lessons. See if the day to day reality of running a class (or five classes per day) of 30 children is something you might enjoy.

I just don’t understand how the two jobs are so different!

There wouldn’t be a recruitment crisis in England at all if the job was like that.

If schools in Ireland can teach children without all of the bollocks we are subjected to in England, what’s the point of it all?

Do these happen in Ireland?

Inspections with single word judgements that affect house prices/cause job losses, and result in forced academisation.

Learning/climate walks/book scrutinies, observations.

Deep marking/triple marking

Running interventions on your own, in class, because you have no support staff.

Deep Dives in Primary school where teachers who are paid no extra (time or money) for leading a subject and may have no qualification(or choice ) in the subject themselves but are subject to the same interrogation into the planning/teaching/assessment of it as a secondary school HoD.

What about the provision for pupils with SEN? Our Y1 class currently has a child who is visually impaired, one in a wheelchair/hoist, one in nappies and 3 with ASD. That’s without thinking of those who are struggling with their learning or emotions or the two we suspect have ADHD but referrals won’t be accepted to investigate until they are 7+. The teacher has a TA for part of the morning and half a hour in the afternoon, and that’s it! It’s just a case of getting on with it. Needless to say that teacher is leaving in the summer-it wouldn’t surprise me if she is signed off before then. She is still expected to make sure all 30 make expected progress, put up displays, take assemblies, do playground duty, pass lesson observations, deep mark books, meet parents, lead 2 subjects etc etc

If the results in Ireland are as good or better, why are we damaging the mental health of our pupils and staff by making them do all this?

Are you in England? Things aren't as bad in Scotland. I'm a primary teacher up here and I never work during my holidays or at weekends. It's slightly busier at certain times - like my reports are due soon so I'm working on them. But generally, it's not so bad. I always come home with funny stories about things children have said or done. I enjoy all the time off with my own children.
Some years, you get a God awful class but there's always more time off coming up and it helps you get through.

I have been a primary teacher for 19 years and lucky enough to work in a lovely school where the HT is reasonable with expectations and the kids are generally lovely. I enjoy teaching however sometimes I feel like it's so hard to do a good job. For example this year I have 30 Primary 2s who are a lovely, bright class with minimal behaviour issues which is a luxury these days. Despite that you just cannot do anything effective job with 30 6 years olds in your class. In Scotland so no TA, just me.

It's the cut backs that are the issue. No support in class, inclusion so many different needs that would have been in the past be in a SEN school getting the proper supports, instead lumped in with 29 other kids and a teacher who probably isn't trained properly and doesn't have time to fully support that child. Spending 95% of your time on 5% of the class. In general class sizes too big and not enough staff/support to make anything work.

@FoodieToo

How can you leave at 2.30 & have no extra work? Is the school day shorter? I think you have 8 or 9 weeks off in summer too. Your salary also sounds double what we get in UK!

I teach in a SEND specific school. I absolutely love my job and cannot imagine doing anything else. Yes there are frustrations but I worked in a different industry prior to changing career and I am so much happier with a far better work/life balance.
I couldn't work in mainstream, I think the flexibility I have in what and how I teach and how I can support my pupils is what I love about this role...I was briefly in a mainstream setting and it didn't fulfil me in the same way.

I love being a teacher, and the highs are really great. I teach 11-18 and I love seeing students as they prepare for the next stage of their lives, watching them get ready for college or university. I also love my subject, and the fact that I get to spend my day talking about it is great.

However, imagine you have 5 meetings on Monday, each meeting is an hour and you are running them all. Each meeting will contain 30 people, and around 10 of them will actively not want to be there, they will make the meeting harder by chatting, arriving very late, arguing and throwing things when they think you aren't looking. They will also refuse to complete the work during the meeting. Another 5 of the attendees will have very complex needs and you will need to give them the attention they need (and deserve), whilst also not taking your eyes off the 10 that are throwing things, and whilst helping the other 15 attendees (who just want to get through the meeting).

During your meeting you will be interrupted by a higher level manager, who is here to tell one of the attendees that they now have a formal warning due to poor behaviour at work, however you need to try and avoid this announcement form derailing the whole meeting.

You get to the end of the meeting and take in 30 books of homework, each book takes 10 minutes to mark because the homework was quick. However, 2 people handed in a blank book and didn't do the work, now you need to make a note to find them and chase the work up. They're going to be tested on this knowledge in 2 years time and it will be your fault if they don't remember it.

On to meeting 2....this one has extra excitement because they've moved you to a meeting room with only 25 seats!

I loved the children. I loved teaching. I loved creating a stimulating learning environment (Early Years). I even enjoyed the planning.

I didn't enjoy being given pointless tasks irrelevant to all the above, having to write down every thought and word related to the above, constant assessment of 4 year olds, target setting and the expectation that 75% of said 4 year olds would reach the higher levels and, just before I left, a new Head half my age and not used to my age group telling me to do things I knew were wrong. I did what I was told and then an HMI told me I was doing it wrong and the Head threw me under the bus. Fortunately I was nearly 60 and got out.

That was 9 years ago and from what I read on MN and elsewhere it has got much worse.

In your current job have you ever had to present information for a solid hour to a large audience?
I have a friend who works in hr and has to present something to a group of professionals once a month and it takes her hours of time to plan, make the presentation, practice it, and then collect feedback etc. Preparing for this presentation occupies a good week of her time every month.
Teaching is just like that!

Obviously with it being 4 or 5 presentations a day, 5 days a week. An uninterested audience (who will tell you, throw stuff around, pick up their phones, start a fight etc if you can’t grab their attention enough) The information you need to get across would often take hundreds of hours but you have only 2/3 a week so you have to fly through it and never feel like anyone is having time to process it.
Teachers get 10% ppa time so for every hr of teaching (and however much homework set) you have 6 minutes to plan, prep and assess it. As long as school don’t cancel your ppa, ask you to cover someone else or give you more and more data/reports/admin to do in that precious 6 minutes.

If a child or a class don’t meet their targets (often entirely made up) or a parent takes a dislike to you, or you get a new head who wants his own team or the school needs to save money and your experience so expensive - then you get thrown on a support plan. Where you will have 6 weeks to improve everything you do, or the process begins to get rid of you. Unless your union can negotiate you out before this marker is on your career.

Youll need to start at 7.30am each day, can leave after 4.30 (but people will notice if your the first to leave - and if your behind on anything it will be brought up)

You will need to provide evidence of any medical appointments and will be asked to arrange things like chemo appointments outside school hours (very disruptive for the kids you see)

You can only go to funerals if the head agrees that the person is close enough to you, parents funerals are usually ok, grandparents if your head is kind, aunties, siblings, friends probably not.

You won’t be able to attend any school day activities for your own kids obviously because other peoples kids need you more.

Finally you’ll basically never earn more than 35k because as soon as you cost more than that they will push you out and you’ll have to accept a job further down the pay scale to get back in.

But there are the holidays! So you can spend most of your hard earned money on a holiday 5x the price of the week before. That’s as long as you’re not “asked” to do any unpaid revision days or unpaid residential trips because they are compulsory (see above about support plans).

That’s what I was asking !!!

I wouldn't do it. All the teachers on here seem to hate it

I did my Support Plans ( IEP) in September. Other than that I have fortnightly plans .

They only take me maybe 10 mins as it’s just copy and paste and change a few bits .

I am in special education now but could easily be back to class in September. My class colleagues don’t do much more time other than in their first year where they are an NQT .

I switched careers from a commercial job to primary teaching in my early 50s. As previous posters suggested, massive pay cut (and obviously only student loan while training), so you need to plan for that.

I’m far more fulfilled in my work now; I regularly feel that the work I do has a purpose and visible outcomes and at the end of the school year I tend to have a real sense of a job well done which is great.
However, I routinely sleep poorly due to worrying about certain children, parents or situations beyond my control. This academic year I have been ill in every single holiday (as in needing to stay in bed, be on antibiotics etc) which makes the holiday not a holiday plus loses me the time I’d normally have to catch up on life stuff .
I’m finding parent behaviour increasingly bizarre and difficult to deal with, particularly as our school allows them to email us directly. Some really nasty comment on a Friday or Saturday evening can really destroy a weekend. And quite often on the Monday morning they’ll behave as though it was never said.

I think coming from a professional background is really helpful with lots of aspects of teaching though. I find it easy to do lots of the admin - written reports, formal letters, excel spreadsheets- that others find a chore. Plus I don’t have too much of an issue being observed as my previous work was always scrutinised by others as part of the quality review process.

Seems we are doing well.

I am head of a core subject in a secondary school serving a deprived area.
I love teaching, I genuinely do. I love seeing kids get something in lessons, I love their questions and the things they do that make me smile. It is a great job.
I work in a school with supportive SLT and as a result, good behaviour.

That said, it can be absolutely brutal. Dealing with parents, duties, form issues, following up various things with parents or colleagues, extra curricular stuff, marking assessments etc. For me, also making sure my department runs smoothly and the sheer pressure of knowing you are ultimately responsible for the progress of the children in your subject. Observations/Ofsted/quality assurance.

There are days when I barely have time to go to the toilet.

Before embarking on a pgce I would strongly advise you spend some time in schools, speaking with teachers and looking at what the job entails.

I love teaching but agree with the previous posts. Whether you can survive / thrive depends a LOT on the school and the individuals in management positions. I teach 11-18 and having A-level teaching is a welcome break from the behaviour management.
Second the recommendation to spend some time in a school. This used to be compulsory before applying for a PGCE.

I’ve been a secondary teacher for 20+ years and have some management responsibilities. I can’t imagine doing anything else.

It is exhausting though - by the end of each half-term block I am on my knees and spend the first part of each holiday just sleeping and recovering.

As others have said, it has changed massively over the course of my career in terms of pupil behaviour and demands from management.

It's heavily scrutinised- it felt like I was never trusted to just do the job. All the observations I had to have drove me away in the end.

In your current job do you have someone every so often sat in the corner of the room with a clipboard staring at you and making notes? That's how teaching feels.

So I think you’d be great! I moved from business HR , high level job and did my PGCe and became a primary school teacher. I found I was able to manage my time very effectively- very business like and used excel etc so lesson planning was fine. I would map my whole year out, half term plans in a few hours and then say to day would take me ten mins or so- I used to have all my holidays basically bar a few weeks of working. But ! I didn’t chat 🤣 to others at school, I worked and marked through lunch, made to do lists, gave my TAS stuff to photocopy a week ahead etc I managed it like I did In Business . My other Pgce friends who hadn’t come from that background stuggled a lot- sat in the staff room in their lunch hour, marked at home whilst watching telly etc so it became too imposing.

actual teaching I loved - I had the early years children and also older year groups. I could give them lots of time, enjoyed the topics so I’d say go for it!

In addition to what people have posted up thread. It is much harder to carry incompetent Co workers in teaching as it has direct impact on your time which is already rammed. I'm currently working 10 hour days with very little break. I work 4 days officially but i am working every day off atm. I am carrying 4 non specialist teachers in my subject due to staff leaving. It will ease eventually but it is pretty intense right now. I'm not a line manager but if I don't do this it will have huge impacts on the students and teachers.

I know others will come in with "other professions do this" and I know teaching is not the only hard job. But it's important to realise that when you are in the classroom teaching you can deal with literally nothing else so all the rest of it is waiting for you once you're done. Add to that the decline in behaviour, the pressure of an unsuitable curriculum and supporting Sen needs that shouldn't even really be in mainstream......emotionally after 6 hours of student contact in a day you are completely exhausted.....and then I comes the phone calls, marking and planning for the next round. And That's a basic day excluding parents evening, meetings, training etc etc.

Oops sorry bit if a rant but the actual teaching is a great thing to do, the rest of it is just bullshit.

I absolutely love it. I’ve been teaching since 1994 - with three maternity leave breaks. However, I suspect I wouldn’t still be going strong at 57 in many schools in the state sector. I work in an independent school with a very supportive department where my experience is valued. Behaviour is good and we have flexibility in what/how we teach. I teach English so marking load is big but as I’ve been doing it a long time I’m good at prioritising. I think it can still be a great career but I’d choose my school wisely.

Echo all the above - I'm in Primary in England and the behaviour for me is exhausting. Trying to balance the different needs of various pupils is a hard task and I feel awful when I don't meet all of them. You go into this type of job to help children after all and you'll reflect back constantly on wether you could've done things better. You can be subjected to abuse from children and their parents, usually because of varying MH needs that current services cannot meet so there is no resolution. I do however have some fantastic students I work with and I look forward to being with them on most days.

Also if you have a crap day and want to come on Mumsnet to just vent, don't go anywhere other than the Education/TheStaffroom section because society as a whole seems to have very little respect for teachers/teaching/school staff and you'll be reminded constantly of the long holidays that'll make up for any problems in your job.

Teaching and supporting students is my 2nd career, I remember being full of energy when I started in my 40s. 10 years later and I'm mentally and physically exhausted - I'm usually ill in the holidays because the adrenaline keeps me going during term...just about...then I crash. Teaching is like performing/acting for 6 hours a day in front of a mixed crowd!