How does progression on the Upper Pay Scale work in your school?

[desperate4spring]

I have been UPS1 for a number of years and have been happy with that as I have been on maternity leave during that time and only working a 0.4 contract.
I have however been taking on more leadership responsibilities (joint PSHCE lead) and am increasing my hours in September. Nobody has ever spoken to me about the prospect of progression on UPS and I wondered if there was a standard way of progressing or if it varied from school to school.

It varies. In my school, you need two successful appraisal cycles, then you write a letter which says "I've had two successful appraisal cycles and like to move up" and you do.

I'm not on UPS yet, but as I understand it where I work. You move up every 2 years subject to successfully passing the appraisal each year. There is an extra bit of the form that is just used for UPS appraisals to show how you are contributing in a UPS capacity.

I've been on UPS1 for more than half the years I've been teaching and not managed to move up yet 🤦🏻‍♀️ Have also only been working part time since before then, so assumed that was mainly why 🤷🏻‍♀️

@Meredusoleil have you requested to move up?

My place requires a letter of application evidencing reasons why.

Like your school.
You get stuck!

[quote MovingtoEssex]@Meredusoleil have you requested to move up?

My place requires a letter of application evidencing reasons why.[/quote]
No. They've made it very clear in performance management meetings that now I'm on UPS1 that's it. Plus, they never say I've met all my objectives on purpose. I've always 'partially met' one, so can't even ask to progress 😐

Our school’s pay policy states that you need to make it clear at the previous year’s PM of your intention to apply to move up e.g M6 to UPS1. Then the following year, prior to the PM, you’d write a letter of application detailing how you meet the UPS threshold etc and provide a file of evidence. Teachers on UPS must remain on the same scale before applying to proceed further e.g. UPS1 to UPS2.

• ...on the same UPS scale for 2 years before apply to progress further

I’ve always just asked during PM meeting - obviously with evidence of how I’ve met the targets & had wider school impact.

Partially met counts as met at ours in most cases.

At my school, meet all your appraisal targets, write a big letter of application indicating how you meet all teaching standards, make sure you have positive residuals on all exam classes.
They are quite fair about it, and whilst they do refuse some they allow others.

I hit M6 two years before our daughter was born. Went back full time but trying to manage the workload in a OFE primary plus subject leader stuff plus toddler means that it’ll be years before I’ll have chance to jump through the paperwork hoops for UPS 🤦🏻‍♀️

Other teachers in our school have had to give notification of intention at the beginning of PM cycles, then provide paperwork to show they’ve consistently met the criteria. Our SLT are very reasonable even though expensive teachers are crippling to a small school. I’ve heard lots of stories locally of almost UPS teachers being managed out….

School budgets are not great fans of UPS especially UPS 3. Staff are being expected to jump through more and more hoops.

And alas pay portability is no more.

You need to look at the pay policy.

Is it really that easy? What sort of targets do you have?

To get through to ours you have to "have created a change throughout the school that has created impact in a core subject".

Basically they have too many teachers that are too expensive and don't want part timers like me going through. Been on the top of MPS for about 8 years now. No chance of getting a TLR either.

I have the 2 school ones which are common to us all + one for each part of my role, so 4. One is data driven, which is fair, one is contribution to the ethos of the school, and the others are specific to my role.