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?!

OK. Well my surgery (and all the local ones are the same because they are part of a group practice), you can phone at 8am and 2pm. You have to be on the phone at those times to stand a chance of getting a call back.

You cannot book a face to face appointment without a call back.

Even if I called when the children have gone after 3.45, I wouldn't get a call back because the call back appointments are all gone by then.

It might be possible at your surgery. That doesn't make it psosible at all surgeries.

It varies hugely. Some schools are more easygoing than others.

Ours is very strange as generally find with prearranged dates but just awful and inflexible with last minute emergencies.

This has hit a nerve with me. It’s the same in my school. An example is when we had a staff meeting until 5pm. Our HT went home to his family with his dinner on the table. I and many female colleagues had to rush to collect children from childcare/take them to activities or sort dinner for much later.

Brother diagnosed with terminal cancer and given a couple of months. Decided to marry. I had to fill in form to ask for time to attend wedding and then as the day was the day of parents evening received an email to make sure I was back for that. NO. I left can you guess why.

Unfortunately at my doctor's surgery you can't ask for specific time - it's on a first come, first served basis and they book in time order so you have to be available for the 'next slot' and can't ask for a specific time. It sucks :(

No. We're all full of shit.

Just read the fucking thread!

I'm sorry but it has been explained at length by me and other teachers that not all schools are the same.

You cannot know one school and extrapolate from that that they are all the same. They are not.

It's a complete waste of time explaining the same things over and over again when some people are just determined to not understand.

I think many teachers could in theory take a bit of time but try and save goodwill for when their own children are ill. They are also aware of the impact on everyone else. My colleagues are awesome and I hate to put on them when they’re already so stretched.

Why not?
That is unusual.

What does this mean re the public sector and sympathy.?

My kids needed regular orthodontist visits. I'm not a teacher, but I used to book appointments after school so that the kids wouldn't miss school - this was the most popular slot, but I could usually get it by booking straightaway. But, many times this appointment would get cancelled a week or two beforehand as the orthodontist was on holiday or something, and I'd have to rebook and get a slot in the middle of the day - of course we couldn't just wait another 6 weeks to get another after-school appointment.

There does seem to be quite a range of experience, and some of the things I have read on this thread have shocked me, specifically that women are being forced out of teaching because it is not family-friendly, and that in some schools senior leadership teams are predominantly male for the same reason. I'm also really shocked at PP who have described being micromanaged and having no control over when they leave school etc. Teachers are professionals, and I'd expect them to be fairly autonomous beyond obviously having to follow the timetable.

@GlasgowGal2014I am shocked that you are shocked!! It is true that experiences differ between different schools and different academies. Our head is absolutely brilliant about time off for medical appointments or family issues. I know from friends that not all schools are like that. However what is generally true is that teachers are being increasingly micromanaged and scrutinised. We regularly have SLT from our academy, all on inflated salaries, wandering around our school on ‘learning walks’. They then haul the teachers in to tick them off for something or other. They are also obsessed with data. One class teacher I work with is under a great deal of scrutiny because her current class is weaker than the previous class and the data isn’t very good. Yet her teaching is no different to last year. Meanwhile, another teacher I worked with had her praises sung by SLT because one child had phenomenal scores on his NFER assessments. She isn’t a very good teacher and he’s just one of those children who would fly wherever he was

It is but even when it's not explicitly stated, it still happens in kind.

Our directed hours mean that we aren't contractually.obliged to stay in school after 3.45 at my school unless of meetings etc.

But it is very much frowned upon to leave then. It does, of course, mean that if you have managed to make an appointment (eg dentist, boiler service, plumber, even GP if you can get one!) you can leave but it is often made known that it has been 'noticed'.

It was made clear in my last school that leaving 'early' would impact on your opportunities for advancement. So, yes, you could leave school in your own unpaid time (maybe to pick up children and when you would be working again by 8pm) but, when meetings happened at the end of the year around subject leadership or TLR opportunities or being supported in doing an NPQ qualification etc, your 'lack of commitment' would be remembered.

Men in most sectors have historically risen through the ranks faster than their female colleagues, even in female-dominated industries like teaching and nursing, for the same old reasons of sexism. Women bear a penalty for having children; men see a boost to their careers. I once worked with a woman who had 2 young kids and was married to another teacher who actually worked closer to their home than she did, but she was called for every single illness or child-related problem. I remember it because for a period of about a term she didn’t get through one complete fortnight’s timetable without either having a day off for childcare or leaving early for childcare. I asked why her husband never took his turn and she said he didn’t have such an understanding head; but when they moved to work in the UAE it was he who took the assistant HT job and she who didn’t take a job at all. Their situation could have been just down to different HTs, but I can’t help feeling that there was also an element of sexist expectations.

As for autonomy, it’s still possible in some places, but the more corporate a place is, and the more non-teachers there are in SLT positions, in my experience the less respect for teachers there will be, and that shows up in pay and conditions.

MATs can also employ unqualified teachers, on a different, lower pay scale to those with QTS, and that annoys me: the job is identical, so how do they justify the lower pay? Either the unqualified teacher isn’t as good, in which case how do you justify employing them instead of a qualified teacher. Or they ARE doing just as good a job, in which case you should be paying them the same, or removing the need for teachers to have a postgraduate qualification.

Has anyone mentioned the cost of flights in the school holidays yet? Not just for leisure but for visiting relatives who live aboard

Well I never understood the argument on this because once you have dc we are all in the same boat…

But your dc aren't in school for that long really. We have 40 years of it! And the knock on effect to the patient friends who come with us. It's like a tax for being friends with a teacher.

Sorry, 45 years.

Most parents I know just pay the fine because it’s ££££s cheaper than going in the holidays 🙈

Absolutely. No one ever takes their children out of school for a holiday.

Gosh, this could revolutionise teachers' lives because none of them HAVE EVER thought of this...

But you have all summer off, Christmas
off, Easter off…I mean you can’t have it every way!

I know that's historically the case, but I'm still surprised that there are still schools where the whole SLT is still male. It's 2026 and there's been a big push to make sure represented at senior levels and in the time I've been working I've seen real change. Our local primary and secondary are both led by women, with a significant number of women represented in the SLT.

It's also disappointing to hear that non-teachers in managerial roles don't respect the professionals.

Why are you shocked that I am shocked? I'm sure you don't know much about the terms and conditions in my profession, although it is likely that you or a family member or friend has come in contact with it. I have kids in school and am active in the school community including interacting with teachers regularly, and I have friends that teach but what's being posted in this thread doesn't reflect my experience of teaching, and some of the things people are describing are shocking!

This has always been the way in the public sector. I think schools were immune to it initially as saw themselves as self managing villages but other professionals have had this for years.