Sixty-Eighth Republic - still under temporary guardianship…

[MrsHerculePoirot]

In the absence of staff and her fabulous thread titles and witty openers here is a 68th thread. The broom cupboard is overflowing so time for another Republic. Hopefully we hear from staff soon.

Stolen from previous threads…
'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 for school staff to let off steam.

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 non-staff as it attracts the wrong sort of crowd.

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.'

@DreamingofBrie they were quite intense on the phone call front. I had to be quite stern in the end that they could leave me alone please 🤣

Rule Some things have to be allocated to someone else if you're unwell and can't do it, or school need to remove some of the other stuff off your plate when you return so you can do it.
It's not good for staff wellbeing to have staff off work unwell worrying about work.

You'd think Covid would show how ridiculous some of the workload is on teachers, but some schools cant seem to help but pile on staff who are clearly unwell.

I must be feeling better. I've just organised my birthday weekend away for the end of January. Suddenly seemed urgent. Ha.

So much easier just planning and sorting out something that is about me, me, me...instead of having to consider other fussy bastards opinions.

Go Rule!

Yay for rule!!!

Go rule!

Sounds sensible Rule. (Birthdays st the end of January rock, eh?!

Is complete maths worth it?

You'd think Covid would show how ridiculous some of the workload is on teachers, but some schools cant seem to help but pile on staff who are clearly unwell.

Completely agree. And it’s horrific for the other staff having to pick up everything from absent/unwell/returning colleagues with absolutely no support from SLT. I may well be projecting here and it’s just my SLT being rubbish but so many staff at my school are at breaking point with staff absence so high and everyone else left to get on with it. And SLT just seem to have given up and hiding away in their remote offices.
No one is winning.
It’s just a complete disaster all round.
I. Am. So. Tired.

I had an extra 10 days off then half term too. I'm still exhausted- coming home and going to bed. It's left me with possible lung damage. I'm referred to chest clinic in a few weeks. School were actually fine about it. I got a gp note for the extra days past the official 10.

Just for balance in case others who haven’t been infected yet are reading with horror - but of course not to minimise the experiences described recently:

I was absolutely fine to go back after the ten days. No fatigue, nothing.

This disease is very unpredictable.

We all need to listen to our bodies.

Bless you phleb! Hope the lung clinic is helpful and you can reverse damage and build your stamina and energy back up.

I’ve been reading some bits on Twitter this morning from (or about) Alasdair Munro-the paediatrician who seems to like downplaying covid in children.

I just did a Google search on him and mumsnet to read what had been said about him (I was trying to find out what links he had to T4T) and there are loads of threads but every single one has a ‘damn, we can’t find that post’ message when I try to read it! Have they all been deleted? Or is it just my internet??

Does anyone know anything about him??

He definitely likes downplaying Covid in children. I saved these tweets a while ago after people were finally calling him out on it in case they were deleted (don’t know if they are still up)

And then some clever gaslighting from him when he has no answers

I don’t get his agenda?! Though I’ve never really understood why people (other than those who need schools as childcare) are such rabid supporters of Us4Them.

I haven't posted much on here but I'm wondering if anyone has had a similar experience. My headteacher told two of us to apply for UPS this year. She only told us in July this year but encouraged us to apply. We had to fill in a long document and submit lots of evidence.
Both our applications have been unsuccessful for reasons that she knew about in July (I don't want to be too outing but linked to ridiculous progress targets and other factors that she was aware of). She wants to have a meeting with us both separately to discuss how she can support us in submitting successful applications for next year. We had next to no support this year, all she did was send the form on the last day of the summer term at 3:00.
I feel really fed up and like I want to leave next year. She doesn't value all the extra work we have done for our subjects (intents included!) and it feels like such a waste of time when she knew she was going to say the applications were unsuccessful. Nervous about the meeting too.

So sorry Proud -this is far to common and despicable. I would mention to your union rep about the upcoming meeting. I don’t know what union you are in but NASUWT has good information on how to prepare for a meeting like this (scroll down to page 15).
www.nasuwt.org.uk/static/uploaded/2bfe9cbb-48c3-48b9-8ccae1a9d7ced5f5.pdf

I suspect I’ll be in a similar position soon proud. Nearly didn’t apply because I knew how frustrated and undervalued it would make me feel. You can actually appeal. Take a notepad and write down the exact reasons you are being denied and read them back to them to confirm that’s their reasoning. Let them know you are going to talk to your union to get advice as to whether you should be appealing. Also make sure you’ve printed off stpcd info and union advice on what ups is particularly that it isn’t meant to be about extra work.

My union has a local expert on pay who goes to a lot of meetings when people are denied pay progression. I suspect that's common.

"No reason not to give booster jabs to the under 50s" says Prof Neil Ferguson (yay)

However the decision will be left to the JCVI (boo)

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-59273273

Thanks for that link Chloe! I could highlight lots of it demonstrating just how poor my pm and appraisal has been and how many guidelines broken. I have saved it.

On the tiktok abuse - Tom Rogers who is a big edutweeter was a victim

www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-59264238

What happened - someone took a clip out of a remote lesson he taught and uploaded it to be mocked. 12,000 views.

Remember being told on here that teachers should have no concerns about remote lessons and that it was daft to suggest it might be an issue?

Thank you @ChloeDecker and @TheHoneyBadger. I'm debating whether to take the union rep or my line manager who is very fair (and knows how awful the head can be).
I'm just shattered. I don't want to go to the meeting, it is sandwiched between two long days of parent's evenings. It isn't even about the pay really, I just feel unappreciated. I am reluctant to leave because all the teachers are amazing to work with! It's just the headteacher...

Remember being told on here that teachers should have no concerns about remote lessons and that it was daft to suggest it might be an issue?

Oh yes, remember like it was yesterday!