Anyone moved from leadership in an extremely deprived area to an affluent one?

[AnduinsGirl]

I'm fifteen years into my teaching career and deputy head in a large inner city school. The area we serve is extremely deprived with families in the absolute pits of poverty. I am non class based and spend my time predominantly sorting safeguarding issues. I have seen and heard things that have happened to our families that many people would not believe could occur in modern day Britain. I am immensely proud of our school, the good start we give our children and the support we give our families....but Im starting to feel I can't do it any more. I am constantly tired and tearful (welling up now ffs) and every day I feel an overwhelming sense of frustration, and I feel deep down that many of my pupils do not have bright futures. I am not a negative person and do my absolute best job I can - I hate feeling like this.
I always thought I would stay here for a good many years and eventually perhaps lead the school, but now I'm not so sure. I find myself scouring the jobs pages for roles in schools very much not like mine, and imagining how I would like to run these places. It makes me feel excited and positive - something I do not feel at the moment. But I feel horribly disloyal and guilty... I'm not so arrogant as to think I'm irreplaceable, but something feels wrong about moving from an area of such need to the opposite just for my own wants. I don't know, I'm just struggling at the moment. 😢 Any thoughts from people who have experienced anything similar? Sorry for the stilted sentences, not used to writing on phone!

I think if you need a change then do it, it's much preferable to burning out and the profession losing your skills altogether.

However, maybe consider that in the type of affluent school you are thinking of you would you swap your current exhaustions for new ones. You would be dealing with parents engaged in the 'perfect child' arms race who wanted a champagne education on lemonade money. They'd be baying for your blood if Arabella wasn't at greater-than-greater depth in everything ready for Y6 pre-tests and Edward wasn't having the same opportunities to play weekly fixtures in five different sports as he would be at the local prep. Same frustration in a new cloak.

I should think the affluent school would be very fortunate to get the benefit of all your experience. If your new role enabled you to help broaden the minds and outlook of the pupils that could only be good, surely?

And you shouldn’t feel either disloyal or guilty. If you can no longer give your best to your current school it would be wrong to stay. Besides - fifteen years! You probably need a change for your own personal growth.

I would say that you shouldn’t expect affluent schools to have fewer issues. I work in an affluent rural school and we get the same issues as inner city or new and different ways of messing up children.

We have many issues with drug, county lines drug rings, CSE, alcoholism, neglect etc. The only difference I that it can sometimes be harder to spot because the parents are generally articulate professionals. Doesn’t mean they don’t have dependency issues or a violent temper.

I did this a long time ago. Really enjoyed the easier aspects - and found much to be useful with. I went back again too and work less closely with safeguarding - I nearly cried today whilst talking to a child. It’s not the role for me any more - life is a balance.

I found my top end comp had largely pleasant parents and whilst there were many problems not at all to the extent of the inner city school.

Are you looking at jobs in independent schools AnduinsGirl?

I did this and found it incredibly hard. The parents at the affluent school were a nightmare! The things they complained about were just ridiculous. Their children could do no wrong and they fought against the school when we tried to build resilience and independence in their children.
I couldn’t get back to a ‘rougher’ area quick enough.

I do the safeguarding in a deprived school (amongst other tasks). A few years ago I was offered a role at a more affluent school but turned it down as I felt that I wouldn't be as much use as I was in my existing role. Three years on, I am exhausted, stressed, run down, and fed up. I would now jump at the opportunity to lighten my mental load.

Safeguarding is hard, especially in deprived areas, and the pressure relentless. If you need a change then go for it. As someone said above, it's better than burn-out. You can always return in a few years if you feel so inclined.

Best of luck.

The best I can say is to be aware that there's sometimes a misplaced belief that affluent or high performing or middle class schools seem to have fewer challenges. They don't. They just have different challenges, and often a different set of parental expectations (ranging from hugely supportive, to helicopter parents, to parents who'll flat our deny their child has done anything wrong or will try to brush issues under the carpet because they happen to other people's children).

Thank you so much for taking the time to reply and share thoughts and experiences; I really appreciate it. I'm not naive enough to believe affluent areas are problem-free, I have great sympathy for some of the difficult situations my teacher friends find themselves in at their schools. I think I'm just sick of things like the daily aggression from parents, and the useless LA who send us every refugee and asylum seeker in the area (who we genuinely gladly receive!) but give us no support or funding whatsoever. Complex SEND children also have zero support and funding. Sorry for the rant - I realise many schools are in rubbish situations. Just feeling a bit ground down.
Spar day No, not looking to move to the independent sector.

People saying that schools in affluent areas have problems but different ones 🤔 are being a bit niave imo the problem you describe really don’t occur in schools in my area. Still stressful in safeguarding but not in the same way. I wouldn’t think of leaving as being disloyal, I’d think of it as having ‘done your stint’ and good on you for that! Some jobs aren’t sustainable- and if you carry on till you break you won’t get any particular thanks.

Sittinonthefloor
I don't think it is naïve. Saying the challenges in the whole exist but are different doesn't mean there's no overlap, or no safeguarding issues in other schools.

Safeguarding issues happen in ever school, but if I think over the number of different types of safeguarding issues between different schools I've worked in, the trends in safeguarding concerns differ on a school level.

I've also worked with people in "nice high performing schools" who found it surprisingly difficult because they'd not really anticipated what goes into it and subconsciously thought it would be easier.

Agree with pp that schools in affluent areas bring different problems. These schools can also have funding issues as they get no pupil premium or extras due to their catchments. Students and parents may not be aggressive but they can be arrogant and patronising instead.

DH is a teacher and went from a school in a deprived area to an affluent school and was continually frustrated at the new school's lack of robust behaviour policy and inability to manage mental health issues and the drugs problem. To help their funding problems they started collecting waifs and strays but have no experience in providing appropriate pastoral support for them.

He's now moved to a poorer school again where he feels happier and that he's back to making more of a difference. It still has its issues, because that's education, but the school is better equipped for the challenges it has to deal with.

@Sittinonthefloor

Do you have experience of both settings?

I do. And my experience is that neglect and abuse isn’t a money thing or a class thing. Students in rural schools are being increasingly targeted by county lines drug gangs and CSE rings.

Four vulnerable boys were trafficked from a neighbours school in a leafy area to London. Children in these schools are often easier marks because the adults around them assume the area is safe and aren’t looking for the signs.

Don’t be naive enough the pretend it doesn’t happen.

I don’t think anyone has suggested that money means there are no safeguarding issues but I think your experience is unusual if you have found a similar level of concerns and referrals in a school with low PP compared to one with a high number of PP pupils.

I think it’s a bit naive to try and down play the link between poverty and safeguarding/ poor outcomes. We have a high number of looked after children - statistically they are massively more likely to experience adverse events. We have more parents in prison, more children from families involved in serious crime, and more children whose parents are addicts or deceased than my affluent school could have imagined. We have more parents with their own SEN needs and more who have needed SS support due to previous problems . We have pupils from war zones who have seen their families killed and who have EAL issues on top of everything else. Vulnerability is a risk for abuse and there are more vulnerable children in some schools.

The patterns in safeguarding will differ, but it the idea of different challenges is broader than safeguarding.
For example, having done both ends of the spectrum in the state system, I've worked with people who've expected an easy ride of it in a more middle class area, but they were naive and hadn't really considered what working in a high performing school would look like. The cohort didn't have table flipping, verbal abuse and the obvious consequences of poverty, but it had it's fair share of other issues and challenges. It wasn't an easier ride at all.

Interestingly when I talk to people who've only worked in more deprived areas or underperforming schools they increasingly have a very rose tinted view of life in other schools where everyone who really cares about children works in schools like theirs and anyone who works in average to middle income areas or in higher performing schools had it easier etc. You don't tend to get that attitude from people who've done both.

Actually, I’m going to have my last post deleted. I really don’t want to specifically talk about that incident.

Anyway, the thrust of it is- having recently worked in both a deprived-inner city school and an affluent market town school I can tell you that the safeguarding issues that arise are not that different. But they happen because of different aggravating factors.

I was shocked when I started at my current school when I found that issues cropping up were the same. It’s not naivety. It’s experience.

Belle, yes I have worked in a city state school & several different independent schools some boarding some not. Of course there are safeguarding issues in both and the issues overlap - but aren’t the same. I have many teacher friends in different schools & my children have been to a range of different schools, so I think I’m qualified to offer my opinion. The intensity and proportion of children affected are clearly different in different schools.

And what I’m saying is that my experience is different. I would imagine that affluent urban schools and independent schools have a very different demographic to affluent rural schools with large catchment areas.

This year we are dealing with an epidemic in both CSE trafficking and recruitment of students for county lines drug running. My schools is in a very wealthy area. On the outside it would not seem possible that these things are going on with the particular students affected.

The reason why I am angry with your assumptions @Sittinonthefloor is that it is exactly these attitudes that make pupils in schools like mine such targets. The adults (parents and teachers) have become relaxed over the years because the area is deemed ‘safe’. And that is now being taken advantage of by unscrupulous gangs.

Added to that, the students are often more naive and are geographically trapped so are easy to coax out with the promise of presents and alcohol.

Many of our more deprived students live in small clusters of housing association accommodation in tiny villages. During the summer holidays they are trapped in the village because there is no bus service or local shop. Most of the housing has gone for holiday lets and there are often very few other children to play with. Our safe guarding lead goes out to several of our children over the holidays to check if they have food because we know they are often left by their parents in houses without any food in them (but not because the parents can’t afford food).

All schools are different and have different challenges. Broad brush comparisons aren’t helpful. I think advice to the OP to move because she might find the safeguarding workload lighter is totally without merit and based on ignorant assumptions. Most of our teachers and parents would have very little idea that any of this is going on under their noses.

But sittinonthefloor what you're missing is what you may lose in intensity on certain safeguarding issues, you gain in other areas.

That's the point isn't it, that different schools have different challenges.

The problem is when some people (certainly some I trained with) seem to act like the challenges they experience are so much worse and difficult than the challenges of others in a different school, or worse, that people in a leafy high performing school have an easier life. It's almost as ridiculous form of professional martyrdom/competition of who cares the most, who works the most, who has the biggest challenges. Any time I meet someone with that mentality I just want to roll my eyes and walk away.

All schools have their pressures and challenges.

So what the OP can be certain if is to look carefully at the school. Safeguarding work is hard everywhere and whilst some of us found it much less overwhelming and intense in a more affluent school (and not because we were blind to the problems) others have not.

I think the structures in the school and the size and experience of the pastoral team make a big difference too as do individual demographics.

Currently I am working to support some staff who haven’t put themselves first. Put yourself first, change can be better because difference can be better. Listen to what your body is telling you. You obviously have tons to give - find somewhere that works for you again.

Not leadership but I work as a KS1 teacher in a very affluent area where most parents flounce off to the the private sector when they realise that they can’t micro-manage the school’s every move.

The parents are very very difficult to manage for example every year there is some drama stemming from the parent Whatsapp group where parents compare the reading levels that each child is on. They fight and fight for us teachers to raise their child up to the next reading band with no appreciation for the importance of securing comprehension, fluency etc before we do so.

One parent recently asked me to tell another parent to invite her daughter to her daughter’s sleepover because “it wasn’t fair”.
I have parents of year one children asking if they should get their child a private tutor several times a year.

A lot of the children in my class do extra curricular activities every night of the week and for most of the weekend. Just chilling at home with their parents is what they desperately need but no matter how much we recommend this, they carry on pushing pushing pushing.

They seem to have LOADS of time on their hands to be emailing the school back and forth all day long with little digs. (One parent complained because we have chalk boards on the playground and he thought it didn’t give the “air of an outstanding school” which we are and have been twice over, photos attached and everything!)

@absopugginglutely

Sadly, I recognise a lot of that too. We had a student decide their teacher was bullying them (for implementing the agree behaviour management procedure) and parents demanded they be moved to another group. Then all their friends wanted to move too and parents started a pretty vile campaign against the teacher. School were great about it and refused to countenance their batshittery.

It was all very ‘I need to speak to your manager. Do you know who I am?’

It was extremely stressful for all concerned.

You couldn’t pay me to work in an affluent school. I shit you not the parents in my kids school (affluent) class heads down thumbs up as abusive in the WhatsApp group. Forcing little Daisy’s head down is just not on!!... prepare for the parents to be rude, arrogant and passive aggressive in the more affluent schools. Safeguarding is less though .