Anyone know the union stance on part time teachers during covid?

[Pamelaaaaa]

On our staffing rota all teachers are required in school exactly the same number of days each week, regardless of full time or part time. Some are part time and now in 100% of their usual days, some are in 80% of their usual days yet full time staff are only in 40% of their normal hours. Everyone also has online learning to respond to.

Given part time staff are not working longer than their usual hours I wonder if they are told you get over it, even though it feels hugely unfair full time staff are in less than half their usual hours and given 60% of the week at home.

I work part time 0.8 and am only expected to provide online learning on the days that I am contracted to work. Last time I made sure that I did no online marking on contacted parents, answered emails etc on the day I don't work.
We are not physically in school atm but I'm sure any of our part time staff would not be expected to be in school more than their contracted hours.

I work 0.6 fte over 3 set days and I had this issue in June-July when I was on the rota to cover the KW children. All teachers were required to work 3 days over 2 weeks. That was basically 50% of my hours. The other ft members of staff therefore did less than 50%.

And I had to go in on my non-working days! It wasn't fair, but as my dh was on furlough at home, I showed flexibility.

Since September I have been back to my usual 3 days thankfully. Now we are in lockdown again, my school gave done a one week on one week off rota for staff. So I will be in for my usual 3 days every fortnight. Other staff will do their usual 5 days, so it's fair imho.

It's so hard being part time and making sure things are worked out properly pro rata as you don't want to show yourself as unwilling 😬

@Pamelaaaaa

On our staffing rota all teachers are required in school exactly the same number of days each week, regardless of full time or part time. Some are part time and now in 100% of their usual days, some are in 80% of their usual days yet full time staff are only in 40% of their normal hours. Everyone also has online learning to respond to.

Given part time staff are not working longer than their usual hours I wonder if they are told you get over it, even though it feels hugely unfair full time staff are in less than half their usual hours and given 60% of the week at home.

Speak to your union. You are only liable for the actual days you would have taught, i.e. Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.

Thanks for the replies. The thing is we ARE only being asked in on our normal days and for our normal hours. But the fact 2 colleagues for example only work 2 days a week and are expected in on both those days yet full time staff are only expected in on 2 days seems massively unfair. Us part timers are being expected to teach in person and do all our online stuff while the children in school are getting on with tasks, yet full time staff are getting 3 days a week at home to do online stuff. But because we aren't actually being asked to work anything more than normal I'm not sure it's a problem. It means job shares who are effectively 1 person between them are actually in 4 days a week between them whereas other full timers are in 2.

I have emailed my union to clarify but I imagine they are very busy atm.

No this would one classed as discrimination against part time staff. If a full timer is doing 0.6 of their usual hours then you must be allowed to do 0.6 of your usual hours. You cannot treat part timers unfavourably compared to full timers and you school is doing just that- it's discrimination.

It has to be fair treatment across the board

Thanks Lynda. That's how I feel. I'm hoping the union will say the same and I can then present it to the school. It won't go down well!

Hi, I'm in a similar position. Did you sort it out?

So when are you supposed to respond to online learning? They can only ask you to do what is reasonable to do!

I teach 2 days per week.
During the first lockdown, all staff were in sch for 2 days each week.
There was some fuss about why ft and pt staff were in school for the same amount of time.
The bottom line was that NO ONE was asked to work in school any more than they were paid to. Heads can’t be expected to work out a rota based on who works 0.6 or 0.8 etc. In my opinion that would not be a good use of their time. We just have to get on with it.

I work 0.8 @so have Friday off. I don't even look at my online classroom on my day off so anything can wait till Monday- just as it would during normal time

123fuschia - that only makes sense though if the days in school are all you have to do. If you have to work in school and do work for children at home that is totally unreasonable, and would result in you working many more hours than you are paid for.