To want to change careers from nursing into teaching for better work life balance

[TwinklyRoseTurtle]

I’m aware both are highly stressful careers, I’m quite senior in my role and would be taking roughly a 15K pay cut. However it keeps niggling in the back of mind, from posts I’ve seen this on previously I’ve seen it commented that teaching means taking work home- in my nursing role this is also very common- you never switch off even on days off. I’m finding the shift work increasingly difficult but not just that, I still like helping people it’s my favourite part of the job but I just feel like nursing is not for me anymore, I’ve still got a long career ahead of me and can’t deny the fact I would prefer Monday- Friday hours and all half terms off for childcare also. I’m interested in hearing from anyone else who has done this? Is it an unrealistic expectation for work/life balance?

It’s really not. It’s a joy and hard work and rewarding. What more do you want?

My senior and highly paid nurse friend recently moved into the private school sector to become the school matron/nurse (not sure of exact title). She works term time only (plus a couple of the inset days) and they matched her NHS pay (approx £60k). She never does anything remotely life and death, just dealing with bumps during rugby and giving meningitis vaccinations. She also has the opportunity to get stuck into project things like designing a mental health suite, first aid training for all teachers, giving assemblies etc. Someone may have mentioned this kind of role already, but it's worth thinking about.

I left midwifery and went into teaching science, health & social care at FE (college students).
I done a year PGCE and my placement was at college. I’ve no interest interest in secondary school and doing extra curricular after school events and playground duties etc. Teaching 6th form is very different and more laid back than schools.
I had 3 months holiday per year, earnt £45k. I enjoyed every Christmas with my family, enjoyed a full 6 weeks at summer and my subjects were mostly exam based. Once my scheme of work was completed it carries over from one year to the next with minor tweaks. The marking is the same and you get used to it so become quicker. The lessons stays the same each year, except updating with any new relevant literature which doesn’t take too long. A lot of my lessons were repeat as I had three classes all doing the same course, so less lesson planning overall.
It’s actually not too bad at all and we have support with pastoral care at FE level.
Decent salary, all key parts of the year off including bank holidays. I started teaching at 9:30 and finish at 4pm. I therefore made sure I got in at 8 and left at 5. This meant keeping all planning and marking at work and not having to bring it home. It’s how you prioritise your workload. But this will look different in schools as opposed to college.
I left for personal reasons having to become a full time carer. But I’m just about to return.
I enjoyed it more than I ever did the NHS and I had a better work-life balance.

Also just to add, I went in top of the pay scale and not as an NQT. The reason being I had 12 years industry experience and told them in my interview that the experience I brought would be invaluable to the students. And it was. I set up simulation suites, work experience placements, hands on practical skills in the lab etc. So you don’t even have to go in on the bottom rung.

I think you'd be crackers to get a job with school holidays only just at the point where within a few years you aren't tied to them.

I've not read all the posts, apologies, but what about something like Podiatry? Transferable skills, but there is the opportunity to do private practice.

Or aesthetics?

No teacher would claim to have a good work/home balance. On top of classroom hours, there is grading papers, lesson planning dealing with parents....my mother was a teacher for 40yrs. Yes, she had summer's off, but she worked until at least 5:30 every day in her classroom, and was grading papers every night once we were in bed. I don't know were parents get this idea teaching is easy or that they have lots of free time.

It isn't just the physical workload though. Before I quit, my evenings weren't spent marking, they were spent wondering how on earth I was going to support several children with SEND and no support the next morning, one of which was regularly violent.

I would happily write a report on an evening if there wasn't a constant level of stress and the persistent feeling you're failing attached to it.

OP, I think it’s worth looking into. Teaching is hard work but I have no doubt nursing is too. I work with a lot of teachers who think no one works as hard as teachers do and it just isn’t true, I’m sorry.

My colleague swapped to nursing from teaching for a better work life balance. She couldn’t believe all the spare time she now had!

Don’t forget you don’t take work home as a nurse. (Usually) unlike teaching.

@TheCheekyCyanHelpermy mum
was the same. The vast majority of evenings and weekends was taken up
with work.

Work life balance would be no better; I would go as far as saying it'll be worse. My teacher friends work far longer and harder than my NHS friends.
NHS friends get more £ too.

You really would be better off using your existing qualifications and diversifying into uni lecturing, college lecturing etc, plenty of nurses teach on other health related courses, Physio, OT, Medics etc. You could work in research, consultancy etc

Could you retrain to allied healthcare like speech and language or occupational therapy? They are more 9-5 and often work in schools and you'd keep your NHS pension i presume (although not sure how that works)

I know! I was told I talk absolute bollocks!
When quite a few of my friends who I went to school and dance school with are teachers (primary, secondary, deputy heads). Goodness knows why we all went into public sector jobs!
They have been in the profession a while (around 15-17 years).
We often talk about our experiences at work.

currently writing this when trying to catch up on uni work on my annual leave…..as the last time I done a module on this subject was 10 years ago

It's admirable to seek a career change if you need it.
But any training or course will ask why you want to do it at Admission, and you haven't exactly said anything convincing. Er, I might offer a variety of unrelated subjects... er, holidays look good... er, hopefully less work than my current job...

What makes you think you'd even be accepted for training?

My ex husband owns his own business he spent his evenings stressing that his clients hadn’t paid him and therefore he couldn’t pay his staff.
My dairy farming friends stress about TB testing milk prices the weather. I used to work with children’s social services I wouldn’t do that job for all the money in the world.I work with carers who are paid minimum wage and when one of their clients gets admitted into hospital they don’t get paid for that visit but don’t get another visit so there weekly money is reduced this means they may struggle to pay rent.
Im on AL a patient I’ve been looking after for months and who I’ve really got to know and is now end of life, last night I couldn’t sleep worrying about her not because I don’t think she’s receiving good care but because I care about her and her family she’s frightened so I contacted a colleague to find out how she is.
I could go on. Many jobs have high levels of stress many don’t leave the job behind when they walk in the front door, all over the country people in lots of different occupations will lie awake worrying about their work, it’s just different things that are causing then to be stressed. This is not a race to the bottom but work associated stress and bringing that stress worry home reflecting on your day and the nagging doubt that you didn’t do enough is not unique to teaching.

Have you thought about a safeguarding role or train as a best interests assessor?

No, it's not unique to teaching.

I still wouldn't recommend going from nursing to teaching though. My answer is still the same.

80% YABU speaks volumes.

I’m sure lots will have given views but here’s mine. As a teacher in a secondary school, I had 14 weeks ‘holiday’ a year. It seems perfect for childcare, if you work in the same authority and have the same dates off.. In practice, I marked and prepped during October half term. Christmas we had internal exams to mark and reports for all classes to write, more than a hundred students. February half term and the Easter holidays were spent marking A level course work and tailoring work to exam ‘prep’ in knowledge and techniques. The summer holidays were a bonus. Maybe 4 weeks off work but new set texts to read and plan lessons for. There are always courses to attend both Inset and externally. These require you to set work for those covering your classes. Weekends are spent marking-one day, at least.
The last time we had an official census I worked out that I averaged a 55-60 hour week. The pension is good but quite a large % of your salary goes in to it.

We have many of the same concerns as teachers. Half of the reason we're working until stupid o'clock every day is because of the amount of time we spend writing up safeguarding referrals. We have children trying to kill themselves in our schools. We pass on reports of our children being abused by their parents and then have no choice but to go home and lie awake at night feeling sick because you know that child is probably being physically or sexually abused that night while you're lying in your safe, comfy bed.

Teaching is exhausting because of the mental workload. As a secondary teacher you might see 150 children in a day. 5-10 of them are critically suicidal or disregulated to the point that you have to stare at them all lesson to make sure nobody lends them a sharpener, and then they leave your classroom to get it the next and you are crapping yourself that they're going to lock themselves into a toilet and hurt themselves in between. 20% of the children are bullies enabled by their parents and 20% of them are suffering depression because of bullying, and you have to listen to and correctly interpret every word that every child says in a crowded room to make sure none of that bullying is happening.

Having tried it and hated it I also wouldn’t recommend it either. 😀

These are good points, there is a lot of very high level safeguarding going on in schools.
I also think you are underestimating how drained you'd feel at the end of the day, but even after getting home you'd probably have to get yourself going enough to do several more hours of work. Even your days off and 'holiday' time will become loaded with the overbearing shadows of work that has to be done.

I’ve done exactly this- I was a nurse on a ward though so slightly different role but am now 6 years into teaching. I’m happy I made the change, lots of pros and cons to both jobs. I preferred the hours when I was a nurse 3/4 long days, flexibility for holidays and decent time off when you could request shifts etc but now the relentless 8-5 can be a bit of a slog, teaching is exhausting in a different way to nursing and I actually couldn’t cope without the holidays, it’s a very draining profession! However I enjoy my job and was absolutely over nursing by the time I left. I would really really recommend you keep your registration and pin though whatever you do, I’ve let mine go now and regret that. I get an immense amount of satisfaction from teaching and I think my years in nursing have given me some excellent skills which transfer to schools well, I don’t get flustered and there’s different levels of stress but my worst day in a school is a breeze in comparison to my worst days as a nurse which helps me find perspective.
i do sometimes wonder if I explored enough options within nursing and have friends that work within nursing doing different things who are happy.
I trained in secondary science- biology, and got paid for my pgce.

I ended up getting a PhD in nursing. Best of both worlds.

But this is normal for most professional jobs. This is what people who have only been teachers don’t get. All jobs have pressure, management, difficult service users, long hours, paperwork, admin, data collection. It’s not something exclusive to teaching.

I have also seen an awful lot of time wasting - chatting, full hour or half hour lunch breaks, morning break in the staff room getting drinks etc. in career one I didn’t ever have a single break. I always ate lunch at my desk. My days were at least 12 hour days and also worked at weekends and even up a ski lift or on a beach on holiday.

so teaching? It’s in some ways pretty relaxing. And I work in a highly deprived area. It’s just your reference points and what you consider to be long hours and tough work. I just don’t see teaching like that.