To wonder why teachers say they don’t have flexibility - isn’t this the solution?

[Greeao]

I could be being quite naive here but chatting away with friends this afternoon, two of whom
are teachers, they were saying they have no flexibility and ’literally can’t go to the doctor on a work day.’ This was in comparison to other jobs in the group which were office based.

Surely you can go to an appointment at 5pm or 6pm in some doctor surgeries? Then for dentist and non urgent care you’d go in the half terms or holidays?

Similarly I don’t understand the issue with schools plays etc, surely it’s feasible to go to some of these events as not all half terms and holidays are the same for all schools and not every event is in the day time. For instance at our local school play starts at 5pm.

It’s not a goady post, I was just reflecting on my drive home and perhaps I don’t get the industry?!

How can they get a same day appt? We had to dedicate 15-30 minutes from 2 minutes to 8 to phone repeatedly. Teachers can’t do this and be at work.

also I can’t get over the line where you think it just hasn’t occurred to your friends to get 5pm appts. Do you usually just assume they’re stupid?

Oh my god! Thank you so much! Why did none of us think of that before, clearly we just need to ask for a later appointment or wait till the holidays to make an appointment 🤯
I used to live an hour commute from school and doctors closes at 5pm - how do I manage that? I now live much closer but afterschool appointments are like hens teeth as, funnily enough, everybody who is working would prefer those appointments. I’m sure you’d be happy to wait six weeks to the next half term to see a doctor about something urgent so I’ll take your advice and do the same shall I? Except why about all the other folks who’ve also waited till they’re on holiday/kids are off school
or the fact that our doctors are closed on most monday holidays from school?
Do you honestly think they’re just making it up or haven’t considered other possible options?

I think you are misrepresenting the situation slightly.

Say you are teaching in an average Scottish secondary with kids in from 8.30 - 3.30ish, asymmetric week with Friday afternoons off (which is flexible, I admit!). Seven 50 minute periods a day, 40 minutes for lunch, one 15 minute break. On that you'd be entitled to around 5 or 6 non contacts a week for your planning. The chances of them being all being blocked together are slim to none, and to go home early you'd have to have them either side of a lunch or at the end of a day. In reality you'd get one at 11.25-12.15 on Monday, another at 9.30-10.20 on Tuesday etc... plus lunch clubs, meetings, after school clubs etc... So stop generalising and making out things are so much easier than they are please ☺️

Oh yes, the next 5pm appointment is in 26 weeks by which time I’ll either be better or dead

Our secondary school has registration at the end of the day. We aren’t allowed to go home for PPA but even if we were we couldn’t as we need to register our tutor group.
I missed loads of stuff my dc did at primary. When I did get to special assemblies or sports days it was due to some lovely colleagues covering for me unofficially or it fell on my day off. I’m so glad I was part time when my children were small or I’d have missed even more.

Because in a normal job you can push back a meeting or catch up on your report writing later. With teaching the students don’t wait they arrive at school and are expecting their lessons. So the guilt that teachers wound feel abandoning them knowing their lessons won’t be covered properly often means they’ll miss self care appointments or come ro work ill

can you not hear how condescending you sound?

Are you not worried that people (you say "friends" but don't seem to have a high opinion of them) whom you seem to think have such a low level of intelligence as to not understand the concept of late doctor's appointments are teaching our future citizens?

As other people have pointed out, it's not even 'just' the idea of later appointments themselves, it's the contacting the surgery to get one in the first place - in mine you ring up at 8am, either wait on the phone for an hour or they ring you back, which could be at any time between 8 and 10. Then you get whatever appt they have, no picking and choosing! Often they don't book after 5 because they know they will overrun. Some doctor's only offer emergency appts in the morning etc.

As for school plays, usually people teach fairly close to where they live, so are likely to be in the same borough, and therefore have the same holidays. Even if they don't, school trips, plays etc. are often on a random Tuesday in the middle of a term - nowhere near a half term or holiday regardless of if they start a day or two earlier/later than the child's school.

Maybe just take your friends' words for it? How would you like it if you started moaning about your job and they told you why you were wrong, without ever having worked there?

I've never known a school play, performance or sports day to not be during school hours...

I’m a TA. If I want an appointment with my Dr I have to submit an online form at 8am and then am expected to wait for a phone call which could be anytime between 8:30am - 6pm to discuss if an appointment is necessary. Trouble is, I’m not allowed my phone with me at school due to safe guarding. It has to stay in my bag in the staff room.
If I miss the phonecall then I’m off the list for the day and that’s the end of it.

So it’s impossible to get an appointment for either myself or my children unless I have a day off to wait for the call.

Teachers get 2.5hours non contact time out of the children’s school week. The other time on top of tha is not all their own a good chunk of that will be accounted for as collegiate time in the working time agreement and will include things like parent consultations, working development groups etc

My doctors is amazing. You can ring at 8am for an appointment. Or you can ring after 2pm for a weekend one. If you can’t do that, you can ring at 6pm and you’ll get one between 6-8pm
or ring sat or sun at 9am and get a weekend morning appointment

I love them

Tutor group comes into the classroom at 8:20am!

In my school we are pretty flexible with medical appointments.

Staff will try to arrange them out of school hours or during non contact hours, but sometimes this just isn't possible and if a teacher needs to leave them they are covered by another staff member. No problem.

I do appreciate this is not the case everywhere. But it should be.

Non contact time isn’t time off. My colleagues and I work flat out during it to get as much done as possible so it reduces the amount of time we have to work late. We don’t just head off.

Most don't but my point was, you can, if you need to. For example, I need to leave 3.30 at the latest on a Monday to ferry my child to a club.

You could take this up with your union. To be honest, it's often more useful to do your planning in school. A lot of my colleagues go home if it's at the end of the day.

I've left teaching and the flexibility is the biggest benefit. The GP situation for example, I can now go anytime and just use my lunch hour. Easy. I've not missed an assembly, play, sports day etc. I've taken my child to his hospital appointments with ease. I can take a day's leave to go to the hairdressers if I want to. I've had a long weekend away. I get far less holiday now, but I actually use the time I've got to benefit my family. It's brilliant, and one of the many reasons I'd never go back to teaching.

@gentileprof7 Are you a teacher? What time does school finish and what happens if a parent is late for pick-up?

3.15. Children older primary so are not released to parents. Younger children whose parents don't turn up wait at the office.

@gentileprof7 But even in the older primary years there will be children who do not have permission to walk home without a parent? I was Year 6 for quite some time and absolutely made sure every child was accounted for at the end of the day - either because they'd been granted permission to walk home or parent/named adult had to come to collect?
It simply would not have been possible for me to just walk out of the door 15 minutes after end of school day.

Ha! My last school had a signal blocker so kids couldn't use phones on site. Even with staff phones registered signal was awful and staff had to walk to the car park (very, very large site) to make/receive personal calls. Not enough time to do that during the 20min morning break, maybe at lunch if you didn't need any resources ready for afternoon lessons or meetings or duties or children crying or clubs or parents to phone etc, etc, etc.

We couldn't. Our contracted hours were from half an hour before the children arrived, and half an hour afterwards.

I'm a retired teacher.

I tried to do just as the OP suggested, and it was practically impossible to get GP appointments.

When it came to dental check-ups, I always scheduled them for half term, etc.

One time, I waited for an after-school appointment for a filling in order to avoid having to have a class covered. I waited too long: the tooth shattered under the drill.

The dentist instructed me to report for an emergency extraction the next morning.

I drove back to school, contacted my HT and left work for my period 1 class.

I had the tooth pulled and rushed back to take my classes, having missed half an hour of the first period. Later in the day, I found out that my HoD had made a formal complaint: "Should staff really be scheduling dental appointments during class time?"

After being on the waiting list to see a specialist for many months, I finally got an appointment. It was in school time. My HT said that I needed to call the hospital and get it changed.

I have a friend who is a teacher and they are allowed to go to the drs if needed during term time. Their classes are covered for them. If you have a hospital referral for example you can’t change the date.