To not go on the residential?

[Youthiswastedontheyoung]

I've just started a new p/t teaching role. Towards the end of the academic year the whole year group go on a residential which is about 3.5 hours away, for a full school week.
I have a just-turned 4 yo and other academic commitments outside of school.
AIBU to say I can't attend the residential?
As an aside, my mum (love her) thought teachers got paid for any additional hours regarding this. She was surprised to learn I'd just be getting my standard pay!

Fair point about adult special needs. They are definitely underpaid. Social care is usually shift work though, isn’t it? Not a sudden need to be on 24 hours for a week?

To be honest, during the hundreds of overnight/weekend shifts I've worked in my role (doctor, but applies to nursing colleagues and most NHS staff I know) my "clients" have had heart attacks, strokes, haemorrhaged, threatened to kill themselves... It's not unusual in the NHS at all to work extra hours for free. I appreciate there is reasonable pay progression in medicine but when the workload was at its most intense I was earning £24-30k and that included all the out-of-hours work. Even now after 13 years of this my full time salary would be around £50k.

For what it's worth as a parent I would never "expect" a teacher to do a residential, I have always valued and respected teachers and would support them having pay rises. I also don't think the OP is at all unreasonable in not attending the residential, especially with such a young child.

I’m not the OP. Yes, you are right about some residential/community based adult special needs care.
I am a retired teacher. I used to do residentials and worked as live in staff at a boarding school for a while. I’m not opposed to them as I think they are valuable - what I was objecting to was the ‘oh it’s not really working you’re just drinking with your mates all evening’ comments.

Staff only get paid their normal working salary here too. But the weekend day time hours would be toil.

Overnight responsibility for his clients? Who he has to safeguard to ensure no inappropriate behaviour?
I’m not saying other jobs don’t work long and difficult hours with high levels of responsibility/stress, I’m just saying a residential in charge of children isn’t the same.

They have always been a nice to have, but they have never been a "fundamental part" of teaching.
The only required part of your list is the parent conferences and they are directed time.
Hence the no-one is "expected to do".
So I will ask again
When did residentials become a "fundamental part" of teaching"

There are plenty of professional jobs where people don’t get extra pay, time in lieu, travel expenses, living allowances etc etc for overtime worked. Doctors and nurses who don’t feel they can just clock out from the ward when there are patients who need them, for example. You seem to think teachers are unique in terms of extra hours worked for no extra pay- they’re not. It happens in plenty of office jobs too and not just for roles on v high salaries.

Well, since you asked…. the entire healthcare system is held together by goodwill from the staff who sometimes don’t get any breaks , get cancelled leave, and often times have to stay on hours and hours after a 13 hour shift because there is no one to take over from them.
Ambulance staff frequently are parked at hospitals waiting to get their patient in, or might be sent miles in another direction before end of shift.
Contrary to popular opinion, we don’t tend to get over time for this (as doctors or nurses) as it’s not pre approved and we are expected to to do it. And turn up the next day!
Police, fire, rescue staff are probably exactly the same.
Other industries as PPs have highlighted send their staff on trips and only credit them for working day hours.

Its very good of teachers to go on residential trips, I certainly appreciate any that went on trips with ours and I’m sure it’s not the best of fun, but if that is what your school offers, and this isn’t a surprise, then surely it’s part of your job.
It certainly should not be the responsibility of staff without kids to take on these trips so you don’t have to.

As a parent I wouldn’t say it’s an expectation. The school offers these trip so I don’t think it’s my place to consider the logistics or expectations of staff.

Just like I don’t consider the logistics or expectation of flight crew when I go on holiday. I assume the employer and employee decide the terms and responsibilities expected before they offer a service to the end user.

I agree with this. I've turned down jobs that I realised didn't match the ethical values I hold. I also had to leave another lab job as the shifts changed and I just couldn't do the pattern they needed or the overtime they expected due to the kids and the fact my DP works away 50% of the time. I started up a small business but had to take a completely unrelated part time job at the same time to help tide me over.
It's unfair but sometimes jobs don't align with everyone's life and expectations.

None of them are" expected" to do a 24/7 shift in charge of 60 children for a several days/ a week that takes them away from their home.

That's the difference.

Please don't go on about life and death decisions by medics, this is about being available 24/7.

if you think people, teachers or anyone else, should regularly spend time away from home and be on call 24 hours a day with no extra pay, no time off in lieu or anything then all i can say is i hope capitalism works for you for your entire life.

Teachers (and all other workers) should be heavily unionised and every minute of work should be paid for. But if you don*t think that's reasonable then give back all the perks (weekends, holiday, maternity leave, health & safety etc etc) that unions have won over the years and have at it.

Edited to add: having said that, teachers know these trips etc happen and should factor that into any jobs they accept, and take the "consequences" of not attending in their stride/calculations

@PuppiesLove Even if that meant relying on benefits? If I wasn't earning my teaching rate that is what we would have to do. We couldn't pay the rent on my husband's salary alone. We can't afford to buy as it is!

Oh dear! Are you actually suggesting that the OP is in someway not fully engaged as a teacher or fails to go above and beyond because she does not wish to attend a residential (for very valid reasons)? I would have thought that as a parent, it is also very important to be there for your own young child rather than volunteering for extra work. I know my own children would have been upset if they had been left at that young age for a full week. I am sure the OP does her share of the other things on your list.

I think - as a teacher who has worked part time and full time, and has taken children on residentials many times - it would be entirely reasonable to say that you can only attend the residential on your normal days.

What is your jobshare partner planning to do? If they are attending full time, then a reasonable option for both of you - at no cost to the school - would be for them to be ‘full time’ for the week of residential, and you to cover their days in addition to your own on another week (either as a block or as individual days). You may well be most successful with senior management by presenting this solution together.

If, on the other hand, you are both being expected to go full time (as residentials typically require higher staffing ratios than a normal school day), then it is reasonable to ask for additional pay, or toil, or to say that you cannot go but will of course cover the class of a full-time member of staff from another year group for your normal days so they can go at lower cover cost for the school.

Or, if some pupils don’t go on the residential, you can volunteer to run the activities in school for them during your normal working days.

It’s difficult because you’re new to the school, and will not have established a reputation or working relationships as yet. There is no urgency - staffing for the residential will not be finalised until the Summer term - so for the moment I would concentrate on settling in, establishing a good working partnership with your jobshare, getting a reputation for being a good, hardworking teacher. From that foundation, it will then be much easier to make requests and suggestions about the residential closer to the time.

Op with greatest respect, make your excuses and don't go. Simple.

As a parent, I would hate knowing that the teachers who take our kids away on very expensive residentials didn't want to be there. I'd prefer that the teachers be as excited as the kids, and I do appreciate the extra responsibility and how exhausting it must be.

There are certain professions (I am in one) where you're not paid for the extra work you do, but it's expected and often thankless. I do it because because I love doing what I do and I can't see myself doing anything else.

Family should always come first in a perfect worl, but often in lif, there are comprises that need to be made.

I frankly think your negative attitude and not wanting to be there would drag others down with you, the kids included. Stay home and hope that when your children do residentials they have happy, positive and wanting to be present teachers.

Honestly then I think I would be bending over backwards to get promoted, to show how committed I am and how much the job means to me, which is likely to include going on the residential unless this is genuinely impossible.

Either that or change professions and see what life is like in other jobs- you may love it, you may appreciate teaching more.

Regardless of the rights and wrongs, if you speak to most successful people they have made huge sacrifices for their career. In my case my 20s were basically spent in an office with very little time off- but the upside is that I do now have a job which I love even though it means a lot if travel and “unpaid” overtime.

I think you know what this job entails and whilst it is not unreasonable for you to refuse to go on the residential you should expect that this might not stand you in good stead for the future unless you also compromise (go for some of the time/ go next year)- so it’s your choice really whether you want to do it or not. But this dilemma is one faced the world over in multiple professions- not just teaching.

I don't know the details of your personal situation or how it can maybe be modified to work. I do think these sorts of things like work and finance do get a bit easier over time in general. We would have been in the situation where we couldn't buy or afford things, so we relocated to a cheaper part of the country when our first child was still young. It worked out well for us in terms of giving us choices. I built my career around the values I had in terms of what I wanted for my family and children, which meant I have given up a lot professionally, but I didn't really have the support to do otherwise anyway.

The thing that people are forgetting here is directed time. There is only 1265 hours of that.

I have, once, pulled out of a residential because if a family emergency arising. I could not have done either role - teacher on residential, family member - well had I gone. My head was completely understanding and it was not an issue.

I was referring to the op’s general assertion that no other profession is expected to work many extra hours for free. They are. Not specifically about the residential.

I also didn’t mention or make any implication about life and death decisions- simply an example of a profession where extra time is worked without extra pay.

Doesn’t mean I don’t value teachers and am not appreciative of the extra hours they put in - I am and I frequently tell them so!

Expectations for teachers to consistently go 'above and beyond,' are unreasonable and unsustainable. Teachers have families and their own lives. One of my son's teachers who was described as 'exceptional,' always went above and beyond which led to a marriage breakdown, mental health deterioration and her leaving teaching entirely.

I wouldn't get travel expenses for a very long trip, a daily living allowance (never heard of that)

Ah, OP, I think you just don't understand the terminology. Travel expenses means that our fare and accommodation are paid for (as are yours on a school trip). A daily living allowance is a limited amount of money to cover meals, as these are not provided for us. They will be provided for you for free, so that's covered for you already.

I'm not sure if you're being disingenuous here in pretending that you don't know what travel expenses are.

The people who I do feel are genuinely exploited on a residential are TAs. They really do have a school day only contract, for pitiful wages, and often do not have out-of-school childcare in place because of their normal working hours.

Yet many do attend residentials alongside teachers - often with a specific responsibility for a child with higher needs. They are - ime - paid no overtime and often earn very little or nothing net over the week as a consequence of having to pay for emergency childcare.

What boundaries do you think "any other professional" puts in place, specifically?