Parents becoming teachers? Is it me or has Gove totally lost it?

[sogrownup]

How do you feel about going into school to cover for a teacher who is on strike? Is there anyone out there who believes that this is a sound idea.... I think it's madness!!

Sun

I halp out a few schools; the two my kids attend I am allowed to be alone with children. The other won't allow anyone to be alone except people employed by LEA or school- students tc not alone with kids ever,, and not even allowed in staff room. It's a school with huge social issues and I am assumimg a history of problems. I am the only volunteer they take, because I have specialised training, otherwise they are very closed. Even teachers not exempt- never allowed to close doors, for example.

Ah Blu

I have a palcement at a comp in Spetember to see how I would like to teach post-11; answer of course will be very much but I don't think i'd like the huge associated unemployment enough to take a punt on it, sorry (shame as I;d teach SEN but have to do straight PGCE first, and there are few SEN teachers with MA Autism locally)

As a teacher who isn't going on strike I am absolutely appalled at the statements Gove has been making over the last 2 weeks. He has first tried to paint us as glorified childcare, then he tried to get the teachers who are part of the unions to not go on strike and now he is telling parents that anyone can educate their kids. Finally he has shown his total contempt for the teaching profession, I truly do believe he is making these statements on his own as there are people at the DfE who are trying to gag him but he's obviously pulling ministerial rank.

As a parent I am scared for the future of state education, he is slowly selling off schools to create academies and Free Schools which he hasn't explained the true legal finality and impact on local communities to the Daily mail middle he is courting.

As a teacher I know that I am not going into school everyday to get rich,( I can't even afford to live within 10 miles of the school I teach at) my pension isn't going to make rich in my retirement either (i'll be on about £10k a year, but I go to school to contribute to creating the next generation of thinkers, doers and leaders of our country but Gove is making this impossible everyday. Morale within in schools is very very low at the moment (but we are good at hiding that from parents), we don't have the resources, time or energy to fight a public media war based on spin that the government can, we are more concerned with exams, educating and the kids coming though our doors each with an individual need.

We need the help and support of our parents, please we don't want bottles of wine and chocolates at the end of the year, a 'thank you' is worth so much more. Please, Please, Please appreciate the teachers out there educating your children and speak up for us, we need as many friends as possible!

@sun that's appalling. It seems we are all to be reduced to the 'lowest common denominator' form of employment then- and this is supposed to be a good thing?

Tbh I expect that if it's a well paid field your colleagues could look around for other jobs in better-performing companies? Whereas if you teach, there's no option; you'll be on the same pay and conditions wherever you go unless you secure a promotion.

I support the teachers.

I have been complaining to the head and the LEA about the teachers in our school not getting enough support.

I go in as a parent helper when I can.

I think teachers should be paid more.

Don not think all parents don't have a clue what goes on in the class room. We go in and help, and "see" a lot when we do!

Sorry forgot to say, that those of you in the private sector who are comparing our pension and pay conditions it's like apples and oranges. But all I will say is that I have friends who left the financial sector to become teachers nice comps in Oxford, both left within a year both acknowledged that the work is much harder.

Imagine teaching 5x1hour lessons a day each with approx 30 individual people, 5 different year groups (and if you think they are sitting there attentive hanging on to your every word watch youtube!), trying to get through a national curriculum and exam spec whilst responding to SEN, behaviour, lack of equipment, lack of sleep, inadequate resources and buildings falling down around your ears then please I would happily swap places with someone in the private sector managing a team of 10 people in one office aiming to complete 3 different tasks that you've got 3 months achieve - teachers aren't multi-taskers we're people managers, cheerleaders, resources managers, confidants, data analysts, administrators and in some cases nose wipers. Most of this is done without a proper lunch break as that's when kids want to tell you about ideas they've had, problems they are experiences, discipline matters or sometimes a staff meeting.

I honestly ask all parents to come and see a school in action on a real day (not a 'strike' day) and truly appreciate what we do in the class room - it's not how you remember it when you were there.

see I don't think this suggestion is painting teachers as glorified childcare, but like it or not, you are providing childcare as a side-product of educating the children and this is what will most inconvenience people and thereby make the strike effective if your labour is withdrawn for a day.

@sybilbeddows I pay my childminder £6 per hour to look after my daughter, I pay her whether it's holidays or she's ill (like today) or my childminder is off ill or on holiday. But I have to take a day off work to look after my daughter because she is my responsibility. Children are sent to school to be educated, if they are ill or school is closed it's the parent's responsibility just like it's mine.

Aren't our children inconvenient? Always getting in the way of our work - they're either ill or their teachers are on strike. I'm amazed we bother to have any. It's not as if they're useful - they can't even read or write properly.

I do support teachers but I wish they would stop banging on about being able to earn a lot more in the private sector. Stop moaning, do it then. I can tell you, there are lot of well qualified people in the private sector, not earning what you do to offset those who do earn more.

I have qualifications which are equal to a friend who is a director of a national company and one who is a chief examiner. I could easily say that's the job I could be being paid for and they are on 5x what I am. In reality though, some make it, some don't : that would be the same for any teacher leaving to work in the private arena.

Now, to the supporting teaches side; no way should parents take on this role. Teachers have followed a legal route to industrial action and no one - unless teachers who want to or are in different unions etc - should cross the picket line. If parents did, they'd make a complete hash up of it anyway. It might be fun for a day (if the children behaved, that is). I might try teaching Maths or exam technique from a different perspective and it might, possibly, be of help to a child or two. No way would they all make progress, and that's assuming they behave. I suspect, they wouldn't, and I'd find myself locked in the classroom or toilet, or some such clever wheeze they know about and I don't.

yes I know Michie. But the impact on the economy and on parents' lives if you go on strike is not because your kids won't get educated for a day, it's because parents will have to either take time off work or pay someone to look after their children. My dd is currently at school where she is not only being educated by the teachers, she is also being cared for.

Kez: the whole point is I don't want to earn more in the private sector. I am simply pointing out that as a public sector worker I am not 'useless', 'lazy', a 'whinger' etc simply because I don't want the (pretty paltry) deal I have now to be unilaterally changed.

"Imagine teaching 5x1hour lessons a day each with approx 30 individual people, 5 different year groups (and if you think they are sitting there attentive hanging on to your every word watch youtube!), trying to get through a national curriculum and exam spec whilst responding to SEN, behaviour, lack of equipment, lack of sleep, inadequate resources and buildings falling down around your ears"

So why aren't you striking about this instead of striking about protecting your bank balance pensions?

purits: errrrr...because it's the final straw??

anyway...surely public sector-haters should be glad teachers don't go on strike because of the dreadful actual working conditions of their employment...if they did, certain schools would never open at all

The final straw is your bank balance, not the kids' education?

Do any of the current Tory Cabinet members' children go to a state school?

Just wondering...

"should be glad teachers don't go on strike because of the dreadful actual working conditions"

Er, no. I'd rather that the job was done properly. Not that the job is done badly but with all the plucky public sector workers bravely battling against the odds

Cameron's and Gove's children go to carefully selected state schools in expensive bits of London AFAIK.

@purits, cos of course our jobs are sooooo easy and you'd do it better no doubt- if you could be bothered. Rubbish.

I think the final, final straw will come later, when they start trying to staff schools with 'volunteers' (presumably not you, as you've got more important things to do....bet your kids education isn't that important to you. And clearly not important enough that you want to pay their educators a decent wage....)

Its not just about money, pundits.

Its about value (aka Blu's post). If the teachers are not valued and do not feel valued, it becomes far harder for them to pass that sort of confidence and aspiration on to the children they educate.

If you value the children, you absolutely have to value those who teach them.

I do think valuing the parents (which include teachers, obviously) is also important - but one day's disruption/expense doesn't balance out years of stress and financial anxiety.

Do you know something? The problem all stems to the stupid idiots back in the day many many years ago who thought it was a good idea for the public sector to have unfunded pensions. And until such a time as some sort of fudge can be done where teachers et al start to pay their pension contributions somewhere that isn't directly into the coffers of the government of the day, this problem will crop up again and again. I do share the concern that the current changes offered may prove unfairly miserly, but maybe that's the risk you take for sticking with defined benefit systems that tomorrow's tax payer is having to underwrite in an increasingly uncertain world.

When the TPS was set up, it wasn't intended to be better than anything offered in the private sector. It was simply meant to offer the same. Pensions in the private sector have been turned on their heads in the last 10 years. It has nothing to do with the current financial crisis, and everything to do with the realisation that the old calculations no longer hold true. (Oh, and Gordon Brown deciding to tax the pension funds - that didn't exactly help the situation either.)

Of course teachers do an important job. Of course they deserve to be fairly and adequately renumerated. But what is the exact justification of them having a significantly more favourable pension scheme? Contrary to MN assumptions, most people working in the private sector are not fat-cat bankers. Or even lawyers or accountants for that matter. But they are just as key to our economy and our society as public sector workers. And with no private enterprise there wouldn't be a public sector anyway.

I do hope it can be resolved fairly in such a way as the teachers aren't excessively penalised - I have no interest of desire to see teachers screwed over. Equally I sincerely hope that the government doesn't give too much ground simply because we're all being held to ransom by the strike(s). My future is at stake too, after all.

This is going to be un-popular but I would go in and help if asked - not to teach, as I dont know what I am doing as far as thats concerned, or to be-little the great work most teachers do but to supervise and help families who need to work and cant afford there children not going.

If teacher want to strike and make their point then fair enough but I dont see why that means any willing person can help their children stay in school - when the fireman went on strike the army went in to help so as to not leave us without this vital service, school is a vital service and in my opnion not disrupting our children is also very important.

If I had to work this thursday I would not get paid for having the time off to look after my children so would appreciate other mums going in to help the school stay open.

Thing is, there are always going to be people who 'stiff upper lip' their way through life, and who can't tolerate humanity.

MNrs Mipp

I see no reason teachers should have a better pensiona s sucj- for me it's about having terms of contracts changed in such a manner.