To think I shouldn’t have to attend 100% of meetings if I’m part time?

[parrrtime]

I work three days a week, but our staff meetings fall on a day I work.

AIBU in thinking that I shouldn’t actually have to attend all of these? Not to be purposefully obtuse about it but sometimes I could really do with leaving a bit earlier and tomorrow is one of these. I am wondering if it’s worth arguing that I really shouldn’t have to stay.

There is never anything important covered in the meetings, by the way.

It depends on how your school structures it's 1265. There will be time allocated to staff meetings & parents evenings.

How many parents evenings are there & how many do you attend?

I have a complex spreadsheet that calculates 1265 for our school & then use it for part timer staff. Mind you we have complicated part timers - no registration or P1, no P5, 3 days of P1-P3 etc

Ask the school to clarify what you have to work as a %age of 1265

You cannot be made to work on your days off. Did you get paid for this overtime?

Sadly in my experience, most schools have no idea on the law over part time workers. You’d think a Head teacher would know, but they absolutely dont. The best way to get correct information is to ask your Union.

We had this issue at my old school, meetings rotated between two days.

You should attend the meeting, especially as it's a day that you work. Wouldn't you miss out otherwise and then other people would have to get you up to speed?

You've clearly never attended a teacher meeting

You sound like a model employee and I bet your manager and colleagues adore you.

OP it's obvious to any teachers what you're talking about, but makes no sense to other workers who have staff meetings as part of the regular working day, if they have them.
Sayint the job you do in your OP would have been a good move!

Why should she do work for free that her colleagues are being paid to do?

OP, schools will shaft part time workers if you let them.

I'm also on a 3 day week, mon to wed. We have non-contact after school directed time on a Monday for 1.5 hrs and Tuesday for 1 hr. I asked principal if this directed time worked on a pro rata basis. The answer was yes, so I definitely see where you're coming from. He did say that I should stay if I'm involved in Monday meetings then stay less on Tuesday to make up for it. Like you, I was also peeved before this that I only work three days but thought I had to stay longer on both.

I work part time but still need to complete 100% of training to remain professionally accredited. I’d love to say “I only work 0.7FTE so I’ll only complete 7 of those 10 modules”. Never going to happen. Working in a profession requires overtime and some give and take, whether FT or PT. I’m surprised teaching isn’t the same. I’d think you were being a bit obtuse, especially if staff meetings were organised on a day to accommodate as may PT members of the team as possible, only for you to not turn up!

Ignore the people who don't understand how teaching contracts work.

Are you suggesting FT teachers only work their contracted hours? It’s not what I hear from teaching friends who do many hours in excess of contract, same as every other profession I know. Seems odd advice to be giving about PT working.

That's because you don't understand directed time.

If you are paid to work till 3:30pm and your colleagues are paid to work till 4:30pm, it's extraordinary that people are suggesting that you should also work till 4:30pm for free because your colleagues are working.

Teachers attend meetings pro rata. So no you don't have to attend them all you attend 0.6 of them over the year

This is correct. However, I would just say I have a pre-arranged appointment and leave slightly early.
If part timers start getting stroppy about attending meetings, SLT might not be so keen on allowing staff to move to part time hours. All teachers work extra, out of hours, regardless of their hours of work.

All meetings are after the typical finish time for all teachers, but they should be part of the 1265 hours or pro rata.

Staff meetings in days you do work?
during work time?
Why wouldn’t you attend these?

Because they're not during your work time.

I think the fact you are a teacher is absolutely vital info here!

For most jobs a meeting would take place within standard hours that are the same for everyone by and large every day.

Im thinking these meetings happen after school so in effect lengthening your working day (as presumably any marking, planning etc happens with or without the meeting!)

So you work part time, you don't want to attend all meetings AND, this week, you want to leave early on one of the days you do work!?

Respectfully, OP, if I was your employer, I wouldn't think you were all that committed.

You’re misunderstanding the OP’s contract.

In actual fact, you find that many part-timers finish up working more than their contracted hours.

The OP is working her full contracted (.6) teaching load. She is also required to attend .6 of the meetings which occur outside the school day. Whether or not the meetings take place on the same days as her teaching days is a red herring.

In my last year of teaching, I dropped to point .8 with - of course -a loss of .2 of my salary.

l realised that - even when I dropped .2 of the after hours staff meetings - I was still giving the LA the equivalent of a day’s free labour when you added up unpaid lunchtime and after school crowd control, tuition, handovers, grading, verifying and lesson prep for my “day off”

Schools have a tendency to take advantage of part-timers: “for the good of the children”.

Most of us work more than we should, to our own detriment.

As I indicated above, in my part-time year the LA was getting more than its money’s worth. No one would have benefited from my attendance at yet another meeting where the HT ‘consulted’ us by telling us what had already been decided.