Gained time to be used to cover teacher leaving at half-term

[Fossie]

A teacher in our department (secondary) is leaving at half-term and the school intends to cover his timetable with the gained time from the rest of the department. I’m not sure whether they are saying they can’t afford a supply teacher or can’t find one. Obviously there should be money available as we will not be paying the missing teacher.

I’m not sure what we can do about this. The head of department is taking up the rest of the A-level lessons and I know he will want to do his best for the pupils but I don’t feel this is fair.

I would at the very least want paying for taking on extra work and for this to be requested not demanded but I don’t expect that to happen.

For full disclosure, I am leaving at the end of term as is the head of department so I don’t think slt will have any reason to be nice. There are 3 other members of the department apart from those of us leaving. It’s a maths department.

Anyone faced this? Any suggestions?

Turned out everyone had worked out what everyone was going to get already anyway! So all went well. We also have a shared spreadsheet of tasks to do in gained time. This helps show the fairness of the various things I think so those picking up classes can see that those who aren't aren't just sat around drinking coffee. And obviously those picking up classes won't be expected to do any thing else from the list.

I don’t mean to put a downer on others @GrammarTeacher. Our department has already had to cover a different member of the department for the half-term up to Easter. The work was certainly not split evenly between the department. Again we were the only department to have had to do this.

The only way that's possible is if you have had people massively under allocation.

We've had a colleague several hours under who has now had to add to their timetable (so more planning and marking) because we've lost staff. It may not seem fair to them that they're the only one so far who's picked up extra, but they weren't complaining about all the extra time they've had all year up until that point 🤷‍♀️

We all share the planning and extra marking for the lessons which are still on cover, as well as parents evening appointments. What's the alternative, really?

In the previous half-term our trainee teacher taught in another school as part of her training. We didn’t get a swapped in trainee as promised and her, admittedly smaller number of classes were divided out to staff. Each could only teach one lesson and then set cover for the rest. It was not a great success.

The same situation exactly happened in another department. This department got a supply teacher for the whole half-term.

I am setting work as HoD for a maternity cover. I would be thrilled if we had managed to fill that post. Once the year 11 have left (and they are mostly mine) I will have to give up most of that time to cover year 10 classes who don't have a teacher at the moment. It's the way of the job market in MFL at the moment.

So you have gained one extra lesson, added a bit of work on to set cover and, presumably, are sharing the extra bit of marking for any big end of year exams.
Another department has been lucky to find someone for cover.

Many years back now I was a cover teacher for a while because it suited me. I may have planned a few lessons on a longer-term stint (I didn't have to - again, it suited me better than rocking up every day not knowing what I was doing), but I certainly didn't mark any work. Even during those times, the department told me how incredibly lucky they felt to have found a competent subject specialist. The calibre of supply staff these days is far worse from what I see now.

In the nicest way possible, you are looking at this the wrong way.

The reason you have gained a lesson is because you will have been under allocation beforehand - that means you have benefitted from extra time up until the point you were told to cover unless your school has reduced your PPA time to less than 10%.

You are jointly responsible for the results of any shared classes, so being fully responsible for setting decent cover works in your favour. And decent cover doesn't have to be arduous; it can and should be a case of "here's a text book, summarise the page and do these questions" for your own sake, that of the kids who will do the work regardless of what the rest of the class is up to and for the sake of the poor member of staff who may be out of their depth if asked to do a full-on lesson.

Most marking can be done in-class. It is a useful skill for the kids to learn how to navigate a mark scheme, so incorporate this as part of cover, get kids to swap their tests and peer-assess. Save for mocks, most end of topic tests are bullshit anyway and, at best, exam practice to prepare kids for the real thing, so their accuracy rarely matters. And by the time end of year mocks are rolling around you have gained time.

If you send photocopying to the reprographics/ admin team, your time should not be impacted by more than 10min a day by setting cover.

I'm not just speaking hypothetically here; I am currently responsible for doing exactly all that for 2 classes.

The same situation exactly happened in another department. This department got a supply teacher for the whole half-term.

What subject was that? Is the issue that your department is maths where there is a shortage of teachers? Even if they were willing to spend the money - are there maths teachers to be had?

Were you under allocation before?

We are not under allocation. Some have other roles (like head of year) so I think it is not so obvious if another lesson is added to their timetable. With the gained time after half-term we can take on more classes. It just seems unfair. Rant over. As you were.

We've been told we'll be picking up classes in gained time too. Our department is down teachers, it makes no sense for kids to continue having supply while I sit on my bum.