THE FIFIETH REPUBLIC!

[StaffRepFeistyClub]

You are most welcome to this school staff support thread to get us through stressful times. It is meant for school staff only – a sort of room of requirement. Baiters, haters, goaders, and bashers can jog on somewhere else.

If you are NOT staff and just have a general education query please start your own thread.

Do not give the staffroom password to others just in case it attracts the wrong sort

Other requirements for staff room entry include the ability to find the staff room, the ability to find a clean mug in the staff room, knowledge of the photocopier codes, and the ability to sniff out where the booze is stashed - Thirsty Tuesdays, Fizz Fridays now in operation.

[HarrietDVane]

@TheHoneyBadger Whinge away! It was unfair and unprofessional of your colleague to moan at you like that in front of others. They need to be clearer about their expectations: you're not psychic and they shouldn't expect you to be.

I work in a really cliquey place and I no longer feel as if I fit. The staff are now mostly much younger than me, owing to personnel changes, and because I'm a career changer, I have less experience than most of them. It's an odd situation and I get really paranoid about it.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this, but just know you're not alone.

[noblegiraffe]

She probably forgot your working days. Half my dept are part time so no one has any idea when anyone is in.

[HarrietDVane]

What they will need to learn is bladder and appetite control, manners and any form of resilience, just like last time.

Oh, this is so true! I am feeling exhausted just thinking about the needy, attention seeking behaviour that I'm going to be greeted with next week. Even the ones who've been in school all along will need to readjust as they've had so much more adult support.

[MsAwesomeDragon]

[quote phlebasconsidered]@RuleWithAWoodenFoot I have just made myself mighty unpopular with those in power by refusing to test straight away. No. Fucking. Point. They're 11 and they need ..... well, not a week of sodding tests and "wow"![/quote]
My dd is in year 6 and she really, really needs school to just be low key and calmly normal next week. She's anxious about going back to school and all the social expectations (plus getting back into appropriate sleep routines). A week of testing, or even a week of "fun" or pshe stuff would send her completely over the edge. She's already disappointed that her birthday will be spent at school rather than lockdown (because she doesn't want everyone to sing happy birthday to her, or to wear the birthday crown), so she needs lessons to just be normal, not wow, not tests, just normal.

I told my hod that I wouldn't be testing any of my classes in their first week back, and he agreed. He then tried to argue our point to the head, who overruled us and year 10 have mid year tests as scheduled in that first week back. The younger yeargroups aren't having their mid year tests because we are allowed a bit more departmental discretion about them.

[TheHoneyBadger]

Maybe Noble but when half of the subject is people forgetting you're not full time you'd think you'd check. I'm doing the same amount of remote provision (eg. responsibility for a year group) as full time colleagues. Any work that needs doing looks set to be divvied between the four of us (3 full time women and me) who are 'visible' History teachers. I can't get more hours because technically we have 6 history teachers but two of them are men with slt responsibility so obviously can't be expected to contribute anything.

I know I'm moaning but it is a piss take.

[MsAwesomeDragon]

Moan away honey. It really doesn't sound fair at all that you are doing as much of the remote provision as the ft staff. Are the SLT men doing some of that at least? Considering that they are teachers as well as SLT. (Not that our SLT seem to do much in the way of departmental stuff other than teaching their own classes)

[chocolateisavegetable]

Honey we most certainly do not think that about you. You are a valued part of our community - wise, logical, friendly, supportive. HOD sounds like hard work tbh.

[TheHoneyBadger]

Nothing MsDragon. I get they have responsibilities elsewhere but it would be nice if in return they'd get that I get paid about as much as a TA and on 2/5 of the money I should be doing 2/5 of the work.

[MsAwesomeDragon]

My department are scrupulously fair when dividing up tasks. That might just be because mathematicians automatically think in terms of proportions. But it's quite obvious that someone who is on 0.4 timetable should only be doing 0.4 of the work that a ft teacher is doing.

[TheHoneyBadger]

Thank you Chocolate. I hate how paranoid work can make me feel. I don't know if it's universal but in teaching I've felt like the better you do the more people are suspicious of or needing to keep you in your place.

This will sound arrogant and wanky I know but in my NQT year I got the highest number of A* and the highest percentage of grades a-c in my school despite having had some very neglected groups landed on me and being an NQT. You'd have thought that would be a good thing and you'd be appreciated but that wasn't the case.

I had a long break out of teaching and am older and wiser and have a lot of experience in and out of the classroom but it still feels the same in a way that doing well attracts negative rather than positive attention and I somehow get cast in the naughty child role

I start to feel like maybe I'm just a wanker and make people treat me poorly. According to my very cynical near 14yo the kids (surprisingly he says) like me and think I'm a good teacher and fair and funny and only the really naughty kids who I refuse to take shit from hate me. There may be a whole social etiquette that I'm missing out on that creates these issues but I just don't get why people aren't more open and normal and friendly and cooperative.

[Monkeytennis97]

Matt Hancock choking over his words about schools going back.

[SmileEachDay]

Nothing MsDragon. I get they have responsibilities elsewhere


That’s no excuse. One of my dept is SLT and she massively pulls her weight in terms of English.

I’m sorry you’re feeling shit Honey. What would help?

[RigaBalsam]

Honey I don't think that about you atball fwiw.
I think you are lovely.

[SmileEachDay]

people aren't more open and normal and friendly and cooperative

Lots of schools are. It doesn’t sound like yours is. Is a change of school an option?

[piggywaspushed]

I have never been part time. It sounds like you are often treated quite badly and demeaned too. It's like that John Agard poem : just because you do half a timetable doesn't make you half a person, or half as capable.

[WhenSheWasBad]

@Monkeytennis97

Matt Hancock choking over his words about schools going back.

I’ve missed it, what did he say?

Schools are safe?

[piggywaspushed]

Interesting:

At Education Questions,
@halfon4harlowMP
says Gov is "in danger of creating mask anarchy", because wearing face masks in secondary classrooms is "advisory guidance". Says heads are coming under "enormous pressure". "Is it not better to come down firmly on one side or another?"

Halfon does like his literary allusions!

[RigaBalsam]

He said this:-

Brazil variant cases won't stop schools reopening
Romilly Weeks at ITV asks: "Health secretary, you said that one of the ways to stop the spread of this new variant is to stay at home. And yet you're about to open schools and start the process of unlocking. How likely is it that this new variant could derail that process? And if I could ask Dr Hopkins as well, what is the likelihood that there are already many more than six cases of the new variant in the UK?
Matt Hancock says: "I do not think that there's any need to change the approach on schools for Monday because of this new variant. 
"And the reason we think that is that five of the six cases we have been in contact with, three in Scotland, where, of course, Public Health Scotland takes the lead, and two in England."

[SmileEachDay]

Piggy I was thinking about the “advice” you got re bigging yourself up.

Sounds dumb...but could you try doing it every morning, out loud into a mirror? The car is a good place to practice. Just tell yourself one solid good thing.

[TheHoneyBadger]

Thank you. I don't know what would help. Maybe getting back to school and dealing with the kids and remembering that's what it's all about will be enough.

I'm kind of sick of being disrespected though. It's a weird one where I'll assume people think I'm thick but then they'll say or do something that shows they don't think that at all. I think there's something about being clever but not performing a certain version of middle-classed'ness that disturbs people. Add female to the mix. I don't know but I'm bored of it.

[piggywaspushed]

This is all a tiny bit sinister:

schoolsweek.co.uk/williamson-government-looking-at-how-to-get-more-schools-into-multi-academy-trusts/

[WhenSheWasBad]

Matt Hancock says: "I do not think that there's any need to change the approach on schools for Monday because of this new variant

I just got a really vivid flashback to January “schools are safe” then Monday evening “no where is safe, lockdown till 8th March”

The thing that worries me about new variants is that we need shit hot track and trace to stop it spreading. We are crap at track and trace.
And we aren’t quarantining people when they fly in (well not properly to my mind).

[piggywaspushed]

So some children in Yemen have missed out on six years of education.

What has our government done? Cut the aid budget by 50%.

[phlebasconsidered]

@MsAwesomeDragon that just made me gird my loins and hold my rapier high!
My year 6 need what the need. I know. Not SLT. I WILL defend their right to a nice return to school with what they need which is not bloody sats papers.
I am so looking for a new job.

[piggywaspushed]

Btw pussycat, loving the new username!