Are there really people out there who feel this way about teachers?

[lossoflibido]

"Pre-kids, you would look at a teacher and think - low pay, low prestige, low aspirations. Now those same teachers have the upper hand - long paid holidays, final salary pension and a big say in your beloved child's future."

It's from timesonline.typepad.com/alphamummy/

I am a teacher and teach lowest ability at secondary school.
I am shouted at, abused, called every name under the sun and physically threatened.
But when one of my 'unteachables' goes to college because he passd my gcse its amazing.
Very rewarding job.
But emotionally draining when you have children at home.

i work in a secondary school, have nothing but admiration for our teachers

they have a tough job

I used to think "low paid" but our teaching relatives have explained how it is better now, especially if you become Head of Year or Subject etc.

I LOVE my kids teachers (at 2 separate schools). They are all so motivating and REALLY seem to want the best for our kids. Maybe I am extremely lucky, but every time I go to a school/parents meeting I want to hug them all

I've always thought that teachers were underpaid and overworked. And also that I could never be one - I don't have it in me.

I also had great respect for it as a profession. Still do.

But my mother and grandfather were both teachers, so perhaps I was always going to feel that way

By and large I have enormous respect for teachers. They have a tough job and every new government 'initiative' heaps yet more responsibility on them- with no extra 'powers' to enact them! eg "Today's yoof need discipline! Teachers have to instil discipline as the yoof aren't getting it at home!" But they have to do it in a kind, caring, sharing, non-confrontational, all-inclusive, non-judgemental way or they'll find themselves on the front page of the Daily Snail!

I still believe teaching to be a vocation. Of course, some haven't got that vocation, but a lot do! Personally after spending 2 hours dealing with a cub pack with 2 other adults in attendance, I need a stiff drink!

Yes, I do envy them their holidays- and yes, I do feel INSET days are a bit of a lurk but shouldn't the rest of us be campaigning for similar terms and conditions, not bagging them??!

Yes a lot of people think like that.

The ones who think money is the measure of how interesting/ clever/ virtuous you are.

Unfortunately, they're also the ones who rule the world.

Some people think of teachers like that but not many.

I am very happy with my pay, would do my job for less. I work very hard but because I am wired that way. I have great holidays and immense job sataisfaction, I have done other things and nothing compares.

"Performance-related pay" - good grief!

How the hell would you measure that? Teachers who get half of the class from hell to pass their GCSE at grade E have arguably got a better "result" than those who get As and A*s out of kids who were always going to get them anyway.

We do get an element of performance related pay, I was supposed to go through the threshold but couldnt for a number of reasons.

1. I gave up my exam class to take the "uncontrollable" students so all the well behaved ones could be taught together. This means I have no exam analysis, I knew that when I agreed to do it but thought it was more important the kids got there GCSE.

2)Any time I devote to filling in forms to get a rather paltry rise is taking my away from what I do best - teach.

I agree gaus that teaching is a vocation.

Oh, I know all about threshold and all that, but i think what people sometimes mean is pay by "results", i.e. exam results!!

It pisses me of sometimes when I see bone idle or frankly ineffective teachers earning the same or sometimes more as me. But then I give myself a good telling off as they probably dont enjoy their job and I doubt they get the buzz I do.

As I teach both top set year eleven groups this year and have one top set year ten next year I would quite like payment by results for those two years anyway.

Actually, it's quite easy to assess performance. Added-value is very easy to measure (GCSE grades versus the Midyis predictions, for example). Even if you team teach, you can use packages such as ResultsPlus to see how you did versus colleagues.

The value added things they do for primary seem to work quite well on a whole school basis. Certainly the primary that the children attended in England did a whole lot better once they started with those scores, and it did provide an incentive for improvement I think, as a couple of years later they were incredibly proud to be one of the top performers in the borough for improvements in their VA score. They would never have done very well before that as they have a large unit for children with moderate and severe behavioural problems, and their scores were included with all the other children. I don't know if they would work on a class basis though, but then I see no reason why a fantastic teacher shouldn't be rewarded better than a really not very good one.

The problem is that it then becomes even more obvious that there is variation, and if parents find that out, there would be major issues, as everyone would (even more than they do now) wants the good and not the poor teacher. I think that is one of the problems as a parent. It is very difficult to know if your child's teacher is any good, and that is always a worry.

My dh's parents thought he was at a good school, but when it got closed, and dh was moved to another school, the teachers there told the parents that all the children from the closed school were at least a year behind. dh caught up within a year, and thrived, but as the quality of your children's teachers matters a great deal, it is always going to worry parents, that maybe their child has got the poor teacher, and how would they know?

That kind of attitude (and worse) is prevalent on here:
From the (annoying) thread AIBU:to believe that teacher's children should be treated in the same way as other pupils

By MillyR on Sun 04-Jan-09 12:56:21
"....it does reinforce the stereotype that teaching is women's work; it is something mum's (sic)do because the holidays are long, the hours are the same as the kids so they don't need childcare, and mums are good with kids anyway. Who wants that stereotype for teachers? Mum's work equals low paid work for the whole profession."

I've never met a teacher who was particularly hard up - they seem to do ok to me. They work hard in term-time but do then get a decent length of time to recover - especially in the summer.

I'm a lawyer by profession, though I work for a legal publishers now, and despite the fat cat image of lawyers, there are lawyers doing legal aid work who earn very little.

We can all look at other professions and critise and say they have low aspirations or are out to con everyone or earn far too much but ultimately unless you have tried the job concerned, you're not in a position to judge.

I wouldn't want to try to teach 30 kids who don't want to learn so teachers get my respect for that!

Really helly? I've never met a teacher under 35 who isn't hard up.

those who cant, teach.

runs away

So will you be home-educating then, beanieb?

Ah yes beanieb, and the next line is
"And those who can't teach, administrate".

Feenie I used to work in an area of extremely high urban deprivation. The students had totally absorbed the idea that the more you are paid the more worth you have as a person (I blame Thatcher) They knew that the starting salary for a full time FE lecturer is £17,000 therefore, logically it means that lecturers have very little worth as a person.

The local drug dealers had a lot more respect from the students than we did. It made life very, very difficult.

Actually - I was home educated!
not for very long, but me and my brother and sister didn't go to the local school. We were taught by my mum in teh early 1970s. When we went to school we were apparently assessed by some kind of educational psychologist who said we were more advanced than our peers.

Don't know what happened there

Nope, it goes:

"Those who can't, teach
Those who can't teach become Ofsted inspectors."

I have complete admiration for teachers.

Most of them are fab ,a few have been bad and shouldn't be in the job ,but that's the same in any profession.

Think they deserve decent salary.

yes I think a lot of people think that

Which part is particularly offensive?

i obviously have respect for good teachers,and contempt for bad teachers.feel the same pre and post baby

like all professionals some are good, some are not.unfortunately we probably hear more about the minority eejits.the silent majority of teachers who are good are largely unrecognised

probably not as press worthy or generates such salacious headlines

much like nhs really,tend to only hear when someone stuffs up.rather than the good daily work done