Ouch! Keep banging my head against the glass ceiling

[Piggywaspushed]

I wanted to know if there was anyone else like me on MN who has been applying for secondary SLT jobs for as long as me (about 10 years...) and got nowhere. I must have applied for 40 jobs ( in a 35 miles radius). I have been shortlisted maybe 4 times (not including the four times I have been interviewed at my own school) : once for a DH post (I was thrilled but flummoxed!), the others for AHT posts and once for a post 200 miles away which I got cold feet about and now regret. Failed at interview every time. I find it v frustrating, as I am sometimes told I am not shortlisted because of lack of experience on other schools! Oh the irony! In my mid late forties now , I fear it is now too late. And I am very sad because I really have given over half my life to teaching, am a career teacher and have been told by many that I am a really good line manager and teachers who half know me often wonder why I have not got further.

All we hear about is the recruitment and retention crises but there is a real bottleneck to break into SLT. And , yet, on MN all I keep reading about is how shit a lot of SLTs are...which doesn't make sense as, in many cases, those people were appointed from fields of 40+ (unless it's my school, in which case they are often internal)

Anyone else in the same , or similar, boat want to share my pain? Or anyone else have any real insights into why some people make shortlists and other candidates, equally good (or better) on paper don't?

ps this is staffroom, please be gentle with me

oopsy

His book is indeed very good. And he is very quick to cite the work of others and not lay claim to their ideas as his own which I like.

not just saying that in case he reads this

Here he is talking about spamming MN with his blogs to influence the debate of ‘mummy bloggers’ twitter.com/teachertoolkit/status/947775953459142657

I heart Tom Sherrington. He’s a bit of a data nerd. Not read his Learning Rainforest book though, does anyone know if it’s any good?

I've read it (you may be surprised to hear!). I was a bit bored by it. I felt like he never gets to the point and has this analogy and just runs and runs with it.

But he has some good ideas. I prefer McGill : more practical and less bullshit.

Sherrington's book is aimed more at school leaders... oh, the irony! ... because it is more about system change.

Ah shame, I was hoping for more in-depth analysis about why Progress 8 is pants. When do you get time to do all this reading?!

I bet SLT aren’t half as well-read.

I know for a fact they aren't!

I am on the 50 Books Challenge thread and set myself my own challenge of reading one education book every month : it keeps me focused!

Slightly off topic, but I enjoy reading your debates and contributions to threads like this Piggy and Noble.

I was at the big maths conference last week (part self funded) and for me it was worth every penny and 4 days of my holiday. It just wouldn't be possible to get that range or quality of input from locally arranged CPD. I heard some amazing speakers and came away enthused with lots of new ideas to put into my own practice.

Since the demise of LAs, pretty much all training I come across is put on by commercial organisations - not only is it expensive, but there's no guarantee of quality - I've been on some absolute shockers! Because the conference last week was organised by the subject associations noone was trying to cream off a profit (as far as I could tell) so it was really good value for money.

My children are university age so I'm not needed for childcare in the holidays. For me, it was 4 days out of the holiday which were very well spent as I've now got a lot to reflect on. I can see why it would be much better if we could all get CPD of that quality in term time at our employer's expense, but in the current climate it just isn't going to happen. I'm hoping I can stick it out for however many years it takes for funding to swing back the other way so that schools are properly resourced to do the job.

I agree that courses can be very variable and profit making behemoths . Hopefully, I can persuade my school to do some sort of joint training day and bring in a good one.

And thanks for the compliment :) Much appreciated!

I was at the big maths conference last week

it looked fantastic!

It was noble!! Sooo much food for thought, and so much that was valuable I'm actually going through my notes properly and writing them up because I don't want to lose what I learnt by not reflecting on it. I'd offer to share my notes with you, but everything I went to was primary (with a heavy bias to EYFS/KS1) so I don't think they'd be any use to you at all!!