Stretched?!

[Whatelsecouldibecalled]

Anyone else’s staffing stretched to absolute limits? Large ish secondary and we are being told to do cover left right and centre. Sometimes just simply told ‘there is no one’. on 13 occasions since September I’ve doubled classes up meaning teaching 50+ kids on my own. We have 5 senior leaders who teach 3 lessons a week. They do some cover but not lots. School simply will not buy in as they say they have no money. ‘Rarely cover policy’ totally ignored. The argument from school is if you’re ‘under capacity’ then you get cover no arguments. Eg if you have 4 periods of non contact a week on 25 lessons instead of 3 you are expected to do cover. This is regardless of workload pressures like mock marking, prepping for exams, or you know just planning preparing and assessing the other 21 hours you’re teaching.

Is this normal? It’s killing the staff. Everyone is absolutely knackered so sickness rates are worse which means cover loads are worse. Vicious cycle.

Is it like this everywhere?

I am a head of year (of 250 kids) and whilst i don't do that much cover every non contact is spent doing pastoral stuff. I can't remember the last time I marked in school. In fact my marking has gone to pot. SLT dont give a shit!

I am primary and we never use suppoly teachers. We have to cover any teacher sickness with TAs. We have had lots of support staff out sick this week so teachers have had to do lunch duty (which we are not paid for).

DH is in secondary and has 2 members of his department out long term sick. They are being covered by random teachers and he is having to set cover work for 4 or 5 different classes. These are GCSE and A-Level classes.

Cover is supposed to be in emergencies only and rare. If you are doing more than very, very occasional cover you should be getting your union involved. 12 a year would be too many. 12 in less than half a year is taking the piss.

@cardibach yep I know it should only be used in rare situations. That’s why I want to know what’s happening in other schools.

Union meeting tomorrow but just wanted a feel for others?

We have 5 senior leaders who teach 3 lessons a week

3 lessons a week!?

@DippyAvocado please say you're not in an academy. If you aren't, please get the union in. If you aren't they’re breaking the law. If you are , they can do what they like.

Fucking SLT slacking off again and main staff picking up the shit. Wankers. They should be covering not you doubling up! They get paid fuck loads and don't earn it sometimes in my opinion!

That's not normal. We are never asked to cover lessons at my school (academy), despite a lack of budget.

Same situation in our school - I've been on cover 11 times since September. Along with a few other teachers, my teaching hours are 'under capacity' and we have been told that therefore we can't refuse as the school can use any free lessons which aren't PPA as they wish. It's getting to a point where I just assume I won't get my free lessons on certain days as I will probably be used as cover. I teach a core subject, and am getting out at the end of the summer. Staff are leaving in their droves for many reasons, this being one of them.

Not normal. 21 periods teaching out of 25 is standard full time for us, not 'under'.
We have 3 assistant heads on 8 periods a week, and 2 deputies on 5.

Have done 1 emergency cover this year but that was voluntary for a ill colleague in my faculty - I'm HOF (on 18/25).

We get 2.5 PPA per week (i.e. 2 PPA on one week, 3 on the other), so I don't get taken for cover, but I have to actually teach, plan and mark for all the other teaching slots. At least you're only having to do the cover for the lesson(s) where you're under capacity, rather than the planning and marking as well for that lesson as well.

I think they are within their rights to do this TBH, as long as you don't go below 2.5 hours of PPA on average. It's shit and I think the amount of PPA that teachers are entitled to should be higher, but that's the way it is at the moment.

I work in a primary where every TA has just received a letter informing them they may lose their job. The 5 members of SLT, who have no teaching responsibilities, are safe in their jobs. We keep being told cuts need to be made but it's never from the top. We're not an academy, just a primary where a group of close friends have built themselves a cosy set up.

I work in a primary where every TA has just received a letter informing them they may lose their job.

That’s awful-are they planning on getting rid of all of them or just some?

The 5 members of SLT, who have no teaching responsibilities, are safe in their jobs

That’s even worse! What do they do all day long?

I presume it’s a massive school to have 5 non-teaching SLT?

Everyone at my school has the absolute minimum 10% ppa and we still get cover very occasionally. On the flip side, if the cover supervisors are available we sometimes get them to cover our lessons to give us an extra ppa.
It sounds like your school has a lot of staffing issues. Is that true?
I’ve never been asked to teach 50 students. How the fuck are you supposed to do that? Our classes are all 30-35 and that’s bad enough.
Even if you’re an academy you might be under the burgundy book (we are) so the unions can step in.

I'm surprised to hear TAs getting the boot although SLT make sure we know it's a possibility. No slacking for us! In my area primary TAs teach when teachers are sick, on courses, all-day meetings etc as well as PPA. And with no support themselves. For £10 per hour it's dirt cheap, hence my surprise in laying them off! 😱

My school does the same 😔 it’s exhausting. My SLT like to ignore that fact that I also work with another school in our MAT so am already giving up three free periods and an hour after school, taking me down to six frees a week. I have two TLRs and a core subject’s worth of marking. I’m looking for another job. I hate it. SLT are generally too busy to cover despite only teaching a max of six lessons a week

My school is not quite as bad as they would get in cover rather than "doubling up". However, teachers are regularly taken to cover. I'm an NQT and at capacity, so fortunately I can't be asked to cover.

The biggest problem is that most A-level teachers do at least one twilight (3-.4.30) teaching period a fortnight. They are supposed to have an extra free during the school day, and in theory can leave the site during this time (as if they were part time). However, this is really frequently used for cover as in my department, these are the only teachers with "spare capacity". I have never seen SLT do cover, although they do teach more than 3 lessons a week!

Last year, in one of my training schools, a number of teachers lost gained time to cover long term sickness as the school didn't want to pay for supply.

It's good that your union is coming in. That much cover is unacceptable. Doubling up classes is insane with one teacher. I would find it very stressful.

When I taught secondary I was always losing frees to cover and this was way back in 2002!

The amount of frees I got seems halcyon now though. I get 9.45 to 12 in primary. My old school used to let us take ppa as early leaving, that was fantastic.

Similar here. Academy, so fuck all we can do about it.
We're expected to cover even planned absences, and supply teachers are only called in for desperate times.
However, when I had to go home part way through a day (heavy bleeding due to a potential miscarriage), not only did my headteacher phone the doctor for me, he also covered the rest of my lessons (same specialism). Apart from 1 member of SLT, the others do end up taking cover.

I hate academies and what they are doing to erode teachers' working conditions. No wonder there's a recruitment crisis.

I was shocked to read a volunteer who had just completed a TA course was covering PPA. This is a KS1 fb group so actual teaching is involved. I like to think this is not becoming the norm and seems the ultimate shortchanging of teachers, TAs and children.

was shocked to read a volunteer who had just completed a TA course was covering PPA

It’s very much like that in my school.

My head has TAs who have never been on a TA course at all covering PPA as well as staff absence. We have a large deficit In our budget and can not afford supply. We have previous good jobshare teams split up and each now sharing classes with HLTAs so the classes get a teacher for 3 days and an HLTA for two, just to save money.

Meanwhile, the fantastic experienced part time jobsharing teachers want to increase their days to full time (as their children are now older) and they aren’t allowed as they are too expensive.