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!

Residentials are a thankless thing. When our school had one the parents said "That's us off to Asda for the booze now that you lot have got them for the week" and one parent out of 52 said Thank You to the staff when they returned.

My friend taught the stage that usually went on a residential but chose not to go. She was not under any obligation to state a reason and there was always some eager young teacher willingly to earn some Brownie points by volunteering to go.

Lucky you. Well adjusted kids with standard needs by any chance? My weekends are exceptionally stressful due to the needs of one of my children.

What about if you had 30 kids over for a sleepover and you had to deal with all the standard interactions between them, plus all the high jinx because they are away. Then add in home sickness, maybe the odd broken bone, plus the additional needs of a reasonable percentage of the class. Then imagine you were still out patrolling into the small hours as one group wouldn’t shut up/someone was crying their eyes out. Someone inevitably will get up before 5am, so so do you, and then you have a full day of making sure everyone is safe and accounted for and preferably having fun. Everything has to be done properly least something goes wrong and you get blamed for it not having considered something/not following documentation to the letter.

Ime, if an otherwise conscientious, positive and good class teacher says ‘really sorry, can’t do residentials for family reasons’ (or negotiates eg part time attendance , as I mentioned above) it has very little impact on their career progression in a decent school.

What they do in the classroom day to day matters MUCH more.

However, that does rely on reasonable management, as sone really don’t know who is good in the classroom and who is not and so may be unreasonably swayed by ‘visible’ things like residentials.

Which is why I would counsel the OP to say nothing gor a bit, establish themselves and gain a good reputation and relationships, then say ‘really sorry - but I think it could work like this if that was ok with you?’

I would agree with the pp - just stay quiet about it now. As a new part time teacher with a young child, you may not even be expected to go. Have they asked you already? I would play it by ear. If you start telling people what you are not prepared to do in your first couple of weeks in the job - it will raise heckles and people will get the idea that you are a bit of jobsworth and will be 'difficult to deal with'.

Then again, if you are 'difficult to deal with' then they may not want you to go...

I think it would look bad though, if in the first week in September you start telling about stuff that you are not prepared to next year.

@Youthiswastedontheyoung
Ultimately nobody can force you to do it. You either do it willingly or not at all.

Only you can decide what's in it for you, feel good factor, career benefits, better bond understanding of the kids, better bond with your colleagues and boss.
Only you can decide.

Maybe you compromise 2/3 nights and drive, maybe you say not while LO is so small.

Absolutely, I consciously volunteered with an organisation which does residentials OP consciously took a job with a school which does residentials. If she knew she was not able to do them, this should have been discussed at the interview and sge should have asked whether an exemption could be agreed.

Yes there is potentially another discussion about whether they should be part of a teachers job, but that is a seperate discussion.

The facts are, OP took a job, knowing they may be asked to go on residentials - (before you go for a job you find about about everything that job may involve, and if you are unsure, you ask before accepting). Then once has the job, is saying they will not do it. That's unfair on their employer and colleagues.

Don't want to do residentials - fine. Then don't go and work at a school which does them!

The fact is that no one can force you to do an unpaid residential trip.

The fact is that no one can force you to do an unpaid residential trip.
This

A lot of goodwill has gone from things teachers would once be expected to do like School Fayres, coffee mornings etc because of the lack of respect from pupils and parents and the workload. At the end of the day, it's a job and nobody should be expected to do things out of their normal contracted hours for nothing.

No, I agree. I"m not in anyway saying she should be forced. But I do think, knoeing the school she was applying does them, she should have asked the question at interview about whether she would be likely to need to do them, and explained that she would not/could not.
Would have been much easier than trying to get out of it once has started the job.

It shouldn't be a question that needs to be asked.
If a school requires you to do a residential trip then it should clearly be stated in the terms and conditions of the contract and come with suitable compensation for your time.
What should happen is that schools and education establishments should be run correctly and not require the goodwill of the teachers nor the blackmailing of teachers (ie the withholding of promotions) for these things to happen.

Just read through these as I've been lesson planning/online training since I dropped my daughter off for her half-day. First time I've ever taken in or collected which was so lovely 😍
Some food for thought here - thank you.

@ToLockEyeswiththeLeopard I haven't yet made a definite decision, I'm weighing up all of the options at the moment.

Or they would become more expensive- as the poster from Australia said - as staff would have to be fully paid or given toil.

The line ‘if you don’t …… then what about the poor little children?’ is a very common underlying theme in many ‘unwritten’ expectations of teachers (from parents, from leaders and from ourselves). Is that theme - essentially emotional blackmail - right? Are residentials a childhood ‘right’ that over-rides a teacher’s needs and wishes? Should we in any case be scaling them back, making them shorter, bringing them closer to home, offering them only to children who could never have such experiences unless the school provides them?

That realy usn’t my point. I was reacting, very specifically, to the suggestion that residentials might be cancelled if staff - teachers and TAs - were unwilling or unable to staff them, for completely reasonable reasons such as childcare, part-time working or other family situations.

And I was saying that in that case the additional time might have to be paid - TAs in particular often attend residentials at a net financial loss - or the school
might have to balance the educational benefit of residentials (usually to meet the ‘outdoor adventurous activity’ element of PE, and some PSHE objectives) versus the time, distance and expense. More staff, for example, would find it easier to attend a 3-day residential 30 miles away than a 5 day one 3.5 hours away., and that would prevent residentials being cancelled through lack of staff.

My DH is a primary head and he'd have no issue if someone said they were unable to take part. His staff get a day/days off in lui for doing a residential

I think a union, btw, would absolutely support a member of staff who refused to attend a residential while offering to work their normal hours in school, and would take a dim view of otherwise good staff who were discriminated against as a result (ie who delivered excellently in the classroom 37/38 weeks but didn’t attend a short residential). They just haven’t been asked to rule on a blanket ban.

I enjoy residentials, and have been on a large number. Equally when working in a previous role, I enjoyed courses and conferences and running workshops in this country and around the world. However I see no reason why an otherwise good teacher who chose to say they could not attend a residential should be discriminated against.

Yes it is bloody work! You are out all day with kids who you're responsible for and then up a lot of the night getting kids to settle, calming upset children.
You get no/very little time out other than for showers etc. You often share rooms with other staff. You organise /eat with kids, you do activities during the day with them and during the evening.
A bloody overnight conference visit is not even on the same page !! 😑
And it wouldn't necessarily be known it happens before taking the job!

You said "don't be a teacher if you can't commit" to someone who clearly cares about their job, has a 4 year old child and a poorly husband, and is being asked to work more than double her hours as unpaid overtime.

So yes, my comment "don't be ridiculous" still stands.

It's people like you that put people off going into teaching in the first place.

The school shouldn't be arranging a 5 day residential if they can't afford to pay staff to go.

Absolute rubbish! It’s never been part of the Y5/6 curriculum! @AngelinaFibres

Remember there will be some children who can't or dont want to go on the residential trip.
They too will need a teacher.
Possibly, you could arrange some fun activities for them at school.

@Teajenny7 Thank you. I would be absolutely delighted to do so; it might actually work really well. I specialise in working with children with SEMH needs (social, emotional and mental health) and it is sometimes the case that, totally understandably, it is these children that don't wish to go on the residential.

Above and beyond sometimes is not every week (and yes residentials are not every week but there is something extra every week).

"Teachers just enjoy ranting about it."
Just like people enjoy ranting about teachers.