Guest post: "We have no choice but to strike"

[MumsnetGuestPosts]

I don't like striking - I would much rather spend the day with my year six class. Unfortunately, like so many other teachers I know, I feel I have been left with no choice but to use strike action in an attempt to make the government understand the damage it is doing to our schools.

With this strike, the NUT is calling on Nicky Morgan to increase funding to schools and education, guarantee terms and conditions in all types of schools and resume negotiations on teacher contracts to allow workload to be addressed.

Funding cuts have already had, and will continue to have, a hugely negative impact on the quality of education our schools can provide. As a result of these cuts, many of my local secondary schools have had no choice but to restructure, losing support staff and teachers. The cuts have resulted in increased class sizes, certain subjects no longer being taught, and staff are completely overstretched. Sadly, huge numbers of the remaining teachers have decided to leave these schools – in some cases the profession.

Three of our local secondary schools each had 25 teachers resign at the end of May. The school I teach at would not be able to operate in the way it does without the invaluable contributions of every member of our team. The quality of what we provide is the result of years of hard work and investment. Our pupils need schools run by teams of committed, qualified and experienced teachers who can give them the start in life they deserve.

On top of this, although it was reported that the government made a U-turn on the forced academisation of schools, the reality is that plans to turn schools into academies are continuing, at an estimated cost of £1.3 billion - mainly spent on lawyers' fees and all from public money. At a time when our schools are already seeing huge funding cuts, it is completely irresponsible for money to be spent in this way. If this kind of money is available, why are we losing committed and experienced professionals from our schools? These plans illustrate just how wrong the government's priorities are.

For the first time in seven years as a teacher, decisions made by the Department for Education have made it impossible for me to meet the needs of my pupils. Changes to testing and assessment have been chaotic. What the government has expected me to teach has been too hard for many of my pupils and not useful for any of them. That isn't right and it isn't fair. No child should be made to feel they are failing. I have done my absolute best to ensure this isn't how any of my pupils feel, but the obsession with testing in our primary schools means many children end up stressed, believing they are not good enough, or put off learning completely.

And what is so frustrating about this situation is that there is a better way. This does not have to be how our schools operate. Schools need the space and time to properly prepare young people for the complicated world they are living in. Our schools should and can be places where every child can have their individual strengths recognised, can have their unique needs met, can feel excited about learning and can feel positive about themselves.

I hope that Nicky Morgan starts to take our concerns seriously. I hope she will start to properly engage with the reality of what is happening in our schools and how this is affecting our young people. By striking, I want to send a message to the government that my duty as a teacher is to the children I teach and that its role as a government is to work with teachers to make our schools the best they can be for children we serve.

[Jeremysfavouriteaunt]

It was not just about patient safety, it was about pay too (and rightly so).

[leccybill]

Teaching strikes (last one two years ago) are usually at the back of the summer term to minimise disruption and ensure exam classes have all finished.

[Glitterbug76]

Sorry Jeremysfavouriteaunt I can't change the fact that their was support for the doctors only giving my opinion pehaps you can come and speak to all the parents at school tommorow and make them feel that everything that they say is wrong to

[mrz]

I'm not sure where the idea that school is free childcare started but it's one the government have exploited. Teachers are not childminders!

[Glitterbug76]

Free child care !! Who mentioned that I was simply pointing out that my freind has had to pay £100 that she won't get back we also had to all find child care for an inset day 2 weeks ago as if training can't be incorporated think it's 16 weeks teachers are not teaching for !!!!! We have to if we are lucky enough to get training twice a year !!! Please show where I have ever said school is free child care bully !!!

[leccybill]

Inset data were taken out of teachers holidays. Children do 190 days a year, like they've always done.

[leccybill]

Days, sorry

[noblegiraffe]

It's ludicrous that your friend had to pay £100 for a day's childcare, that's ridiculously expensive. Most parents, luckily, have cheaper emergency childcare arrangements in place. However, childcare is not the responsibilty of teachers, the education of children is. This action was taken in order to try to put a halt to some incredibly damaging plans, and to draw attention to the appalling education policy of the current government which many feel is actively detrimental to the wellbeing and education of the children they are responsible for teaching.

[LineyReborn]

I sympathise with the teachers, as I said above, but I'd just like to make a point about fines and pupils being sent home.

Teachers would have massively more sympathy from many more parents if there wasn't so much hypocrisy floating around about missed days.

Yes the government is culpable for the whole fines / unauthorised absence debacle, but teachers are involved, too. It is the Head Teacher who chooses to trigger the fining process. That's the Head Teacher. I do personally have friends who have been fined for days missed by their child with SEN, because of the SEN, and this was a process set in train by the school's Head Teacher and SENCO. They are certainly not a credit to their profession.

There's a thread on MN right now about a boy who sent home from school by teachers for having a perfectly normal (to most people) haircut. So he's missing days at school against his own wishes and his mother's wishes.

[LineyReborn]

None of that's directed towards you, NobleGiraffe. You definitely are a credit to your profession and I wish my DC had had more teachers like you.

I agree with all your points about the damage the government is causing.

I was just trying to explain some parents' frustrations.

[HandbagCrab]

I had a term time holiday due to some shenanigans with time tabling last year (I'm currently a teacher) and I'm having pretty much the same holiday in the school holiday this year and it is costing £1200 more. I know not everyone can afford to but even with the fine it is substantially cheaper to just go for it and roll your eyes at the snotty letter you get. The headteacher is not allowed to authorise holidays anymore and the LA fines parents not the teachers.

The situation around term time holiday is like some of the issues that we are trying to sort out. Tedious bureaucracy, lack of flexibility, nonsensical rules imposed from above that have to be adhered to immediately otherwise threats of capability, ofsted, enforced academisation are paralysing the profession. Not that it will be a profession much longer with the route things are taking.

[leccybill]

My school doesn't have Headteacher, it has a Principal. Who doesn't teach.
But even he doesn't issue the fines. It is the local authority. Look, we just mark the registers and nag the children to attend well- and only because we have to.
I do not agree with fines- they are not a deterrent.
And yep, I'm paying £3k to go to Greece for a week in August. Ouch.

[BoneyBackJefferson]

Glitterbug
as if training can't be incorporated think it's 16 weeks teachers are not teaching for!

its not 16 weeks in an English state school.

[leccybill]

Argh- once again. Training is in the holidays!
Children do 190 days, like they always have. The 5 statutory Insets were taken out of the holidays.

[noblegiraffe]

Thanks Liney