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Original poster

INSET DAYS...

224 replies

poppiesinaline · 20/02/2007 13:42

please tell me why they can't be held during school holidays?

I mean... teachers get enough time off after all...

I don't mind too much.... its quite nice having one off without the other... but for those parents that work, it must be a PITA.

I had this discussion with a friend of mine who is a teacher and she was at my suggestion that she should have to 'go to work for a day or two' during one of her many weeks off.

Discuss...

OP posts:
blackandwhitecat · 20/02/2007 18:18

Insect days is good. In this country we have much less non-contact time than other teachers. It would be much better if we had more time for prep/ marking and time built-in to the normal school week for ongoing training geared specifically for individual and departmental needs as well as whole school training rather than having these random days which very often inconvenience parents whose kids have to stay at home and teachers (who would rather be teaching and not doing INSET whose topic has been chosen by SMT and not themselves).

Tortington · 20/02/2007 20:00

my ds used to call them insect days too - he seriously seriously thought that they fumigated the school - but didn't quite know what fumigating was - or the word itself.

nappyaddict · 20/02/2007 20:10

at my school inset days were always at the end of a holiday. so we might go back a couple of days into the week as opposed to on a monday.

cat64 · 20/02/2007 20:32

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

nikkie · 20/02/2007 20:56

Was planning on keeping off the thread but if most county councils are like ours you can work another job for them and the pay all comes together and therefore only taxed once.

hana · 20/02/2007 20:56

many of our inset days are centered around special celebrations for non-christian religions, Eid and Ramadan, that sort of thing. the students would often be absent anyway, so it worked both ways

loopybear · 20/02/2007 21:02

Haven't read all the post but you'll mind most teachers actually go in during the holidays. We also regularly work eveinngs and weekends. INSET days are speciallist training days so they need to be spread throughout the year because of trainers being availble. Where possible INSETS are arranged to be at the beginning and end of holidays to help parents,

I arrive at school at 8.15 and work till 5 with children 9-3. I regulalry work in the evenings and for a few hours at the weekend. On average I work for 55 hours a week between classroom time and paperwork and preparation as well as curriculum repsonsibility. How many people would be willing to do that for £25000 a year (new qualified teachers earn far less) Many of us take less than half an hour for lunch.

fizzbuzz · 20/02/2007 21:23

I hardly ever have a lunch hour. Teach a practical subject and all kids want to come and finish things off at dinner time.

Very very draining....and on feet ALL day

jennifersofia · 20/02/2007 23:36

So you know, pay isn't that great - £23.5 p/a that is with London weighting. I think you will find that on the low end, especially with London house prices. There are teachers that cannot afford to live where they teach.
Also, I I don't actually know any of my teacher colleagues that don't work long hours and weekends. My norm is 11 hr days/ 6 days a week. For others, an average of 10 hr days. Would you really call that cushy?

Tortington · 20/02/2007 23:53

goodness me - how horrible for you - could you possibly re-train into something else? why on earth would one chose to work in such a horrid environment? is there little choice involved? i understand how difficult it is to go from one job to another.

did someone call it cushy?

all i see is teachers saying how hard they work.

Tortington · 20/02/2007 23:54

many people can't afford to live where they work btw. just thouht i would add that.

wheresthehamster · 21/02/2007 00:10

Do male teachers get slated in the same way for having 'cushy' jobs? Perhaps it's my perception but it always seems to be women slating women teachers.

Tortington · 21/02/2007 00:13

did someone say it was a cushy job?

wheresthehamster · 21/02/2007 00:24

By cushy I meant the assumption of others of 9 - 3 each day and 13 weeks holidays.

Tortington · 21/02/2007 00:26

i think everyone on this thread made that clear by about 2.30 this afternoon.

and i dont think anyone suggested otherwise, even if they had the balls - which i do but didn't suggest.

clerkKent · 21/02/2007 13:08

A man I know has just given up working in an investment bank (not as a banker) for a 6-figure salary to re-train as a Physics teacher. His last bonus and redundancy package would pay his salary as a teacher for the next decade.... so it is not for the money. Must be the long holidays then, and the 5 days training a year

UnquietDad · 21/02/2007 14:24

Oh, good, a teacher-bashing thread. Just what I need in current mood.

robbosmum · 21/02/2007 14:42

oh nooooo,,my hubby retrained to be a teacher, took a massive cut in wage and guess what...HE LOVES IT!!!!!!
i hate the wage cut but am relieved i dont have to worry about childcare and farming out my lo in the summer hols...she can go frog spawn hunting with dad, and for long walks,,, blah , blah ,blah, blah..
however,, the nights and weekends are not his own as he is marking or lesson planning, it wot good teachers do.we love our life

edam · 21/02/2007 15:52

I don't understand why teachers say they aren't paid for the school holidays. AFAIK and can gather from this thread, teachers are paid monthly like lots of other people. So how does this 'we aren't paid for the holidays' thing work out?

Hulababy · 21/02/2007 16:00

edam - it is just how the contract works for teaching. They get paid for xxx hours per year, or 195 days. Then they are expected to do whatever extra hours in order to complete the rest of their obligations - marking, prep, etc but number of hours unstipulated. It is the way it is worded, which is different from most contracts generally.

Hulababy · 21/02/2007 16:01

That is why supply teachers recieve a higher pay per day than teaching would work out too. Supply teachers daily pay included a holiday allowance amount in it.

Olihan · 21/02/2007 16:21

Edam, we receive a monthly salary but it's actually only for the 195 days we work.

Eg, Annual salary is 23k. A full time teacher in a permanent job will get that in 12 monthly payments. A supply teacher will still get 23k but divided by the days she works in a month. So in March a supply teacher would get £2595 but a permanent teacher would get £1916. In August a supply teacher will get no money at all but a permanent teacher would still get £1916. Does that make sense? I'm sure someone else will be (or has been, it's taken me ages to write this!) more lucid than me!

dadofmany · 24/02/2007 12:15

Boy someone hit a nerve with you teachers out there! I have to agree with original post, you could tag all the inset days say, at the end/beginning of the summer holidays, therefore it wouldnt distrubt their routine of education. Obviously im gutted for you guys going from 14 weeks holiday to 13 weeks holiday, when i have to live with 5.

nikkie · 24/02/2007 15:31

But that has been explained.All the new initiatives plus ongoing training has to be run by someone and those people can't be in every single school on the same day/2 days.
And Dadofmany are you paid for your holiday?as the teachers here have said they aren't!

dadofmany · 24/02/2007 17:37

Everyone gets paid for their holiday unless they are self employed.