Career change questions

[Satsuma89]

I’d like some genuine advice, as teaching seems to have some different practices and I’d like to understand the reality.

I have a successful career in fin-tech, a degree in physics and a degree in mathematics. At 52, I have looked at teaching many years ago – but decided I wanted to earn much more, and this has been the case. Most jobs have a lot of pressure, and this is paid well (min £150k per year), but the long commuting, constant need to be cut-throat and the never ending cost-optimization of outsourcing has got to me – and after paying off the mortgage and children leaving home am wanting to start enjoying what I do more than necessarily earning so much.

When my children were attending 6th form, I found the excitement of you people so uplifting and the most enjoyable time in learning (A-Levels) myself so positive. I must admit prior to 6th form, I found my children’s teachers a very mixed bunch – the majority extremely positive, but a significant jaded minority uninterested, incompetent or uninspiring.

Reading MN makes teaching sound the worst job there is. I wonder how much of this is just that everyone likes to get their day to day annoyances expressed or whether the field is very mixed or truly nobody really enjoys teaching anymore.

Some things seem so different in teaching and I am a little concerned that as an experience ed problem solver I would previously just change things if something needed improving.

Areas I find difficult to understand:

• There are shortages of teachers with specialist degrees, but barriers are in place to take people from other industries and expect people to not be paid in transferring.
• Emphasis on roles and bands of par rather than paying the individual based on what other jobs they could alternatively do.
• Seemingly endless independent planning for lessons, where thousands of schools are teaching the same topics to the same syllabus.
• Expecting people to be a jack of all trades – in particular, in most STEM industries you wouldn’t expect subject matter experts to also be managing pastoral care.
• Outdated concepts – workplaces left professional dress codes 10+ years ago, and emphasis is on outcomes rather than rules. Schools from a little personal experience seem obsessed with uniform, paperwork, standardisation, unions, forcing students to do things they are not interested in, measurement – it’s as if instilling confidence in subjects students have an interest in so they can have successful careers is not the primary objective.
• Strange recruitment practices and notice periods.

Despite all of this I wonder whether I would really enjoy the fundamental role – but do have hesitation based on what is seemingly a closed system that very much fails to learn (irony) from the evolution and success of the wider world.

I am considering Mathematics, but would be happy to also support Physics or Chemistry.

Could any of you provide insight into real experiences of people moving into teaching from other successful careers and perspectives on how you found differences in approach? If you also have any comments on the benefits of different career-changer routes in, I would appreciate your thoughts.

I career changed from senior public sector roles into teaching, but not STEM subjects. I think the views you express are stronger for those from STEM backgrounds because you could earn thousands more by not becoming a teacher, so you have to really want to do it, if that makes sense?

I trained through the school direct salaried route and I was really lucky that my course was allied to a university so I had the benefit of the PGCE input to understand the ‘why’ rather than just the tactical ‘how’ you get when you’re entirely school based, e.g. through a SCITT. I took a huge pay cut (back then the salary for school direct was £15k) but my main outgoing was my mortgage, and again I was lucky - my mortgage co approved a payment holiday of a year while I trained. I also paid no council tax as I was technically a student and I lived alone at the time. I got a second job in hospitality for weekends which I carried on until the middle of my RQT year (looking back I don’t know how I did it). I also didn’t pay tuition fees and came out with no debt. It worked for me but I don’t know if the route still exists.

To address some of your queries…

First two bullet points: Yes there are barriers - a brilliant physicist doesn’t necessarily make a brilliant teacher. Financial barriers make sense too - why should a new teacher get paid more than one who has demonstrated their expertise, just because they used to earn more? Teaching is becoming less and less about the pay scales due to the shortages, and changes have been made so that good teachers can be recognised (e.g. you don’t have to wait until you’re at the top of the main scale to go to the upper scale - if you are decent you can apply to go through at any time). Particularly in your field, you could negotiate and things like recruitment and retention payments also exist.

Planning: centralised resources exist but it comes down to teacher choice and individuality of cohort. We have centrally planned units in our dept (by the head of department and I - possibly control freaks!) but teachers still need to flex them depending on the need of the class. That’s good, adaptive teaching. When you are a bit more experienced the planning is not ‘endless’.

Jack of all trades: potentially, yes. There is also the issue of good teachers being promoted into leadership when they’re actually not great at leadership because they’re different skill sets (and this is more noticeable when you’re a career changer and have experienced other fields). Increasingly schools have non teaching pastoral staff but I would argue that heads of year have a much better understanding of progress, students etc when they’ve actually got a teaching background. Partly this is the beauty of teaching though - you can choose the direction you want your career to take, and there is lots of training/support.

Outdated concepts: I don’t agree with all of those. You need to find a school that aligns with your values; find your ‘fit’.

Strange recruitment/notice periods: agreed but again there are reasons (safeguarding, continuity for exam classes etc).

The hardest thing about being a career changer is you have to bite your tongue on all of the above at times, at least until you’re through the training. It’s hard to go from being the leader to the mentee and accept that you’re not the expert. I found that quite hard!

@Fallulah

Really appreciate your candid and insightful reply. In many ways seeing your reply has helped a lot, as its given assurance that there is a balance.

I do understand your last point regarding being the hardest point - I've already gone through some of this in leaving a leadership role and joining a company as an advisor a couple of years ago, where I really had to bite my tongue - but also found it refreshing not having to be the expert.

Do you have a strong opinion whether PGCE+QTS has significant advantages over QTS only? I see you mentioned the b benefit of the 'input' but not whether you did the PGCE. I would be happy to do a SKE before training, but at 50+ wonder whether I really want the additional PGCE assessment work. On the other hand, do QTS training providers not provide the theory of teaching needed?

1. Emphasis on roles and bands of par rather than paying the individual based on what other jobs they could alternatively do.

Well no you don't pay people for the job they could do, you pay them for the job they are doing.

You might be able to do fin tech but we do not actually need that in teaching. In reality, teaching is a relatively accessible profession, we don't need you to be a genius, we need you to be secure in your subject knowledge, patient, firm and engaging with young people. Quite a lot of people have the skills required to be a teacher, which is why the pay is not as high as it is for very rare skilled jobs.

I do agree that teaching pay is too low but its never going to compete with finance & tech jobs.

I'm looking for advice, so don't want to de-rail the primary thing I'm looking for, but I thought there was a significant shortage of people entering teaching on key subjects - but if what you say is true, then I'm surprised as above?

• if there is no shortage of willing people to do a role, you need to pay at least the minimum that will keep a good supply of people to do the role and be attracted by it.

• If there is a scarcity of people who are willing to do the role, you need to pay enough that the next best alternative is less attractive - and its much cheaper to do this on an individual basis rather than on a blanket basis (as many in role are not able to take the same next best alternative).

I appreciate that if there is no shortages of people who have the skills and are willing, then I can understand your perspective - but just in case there is really a systemic shortage, then in my experience, if you don't want vacancies, then you pay for the person and not the role to overcome it.

In essence, you always need to be paying enough that there is a minimal gap between what the person could do and what they are currently doing - taking into account individual capabilities, benefits and circumstances.

I'm not suggesting schools could pay the same as all careers, but if there is a persistent shortage say of music teachers and there are a good cohort earning 50k more that would supply enough people, they might need to pay 30k more to some people who have already got different roles to attract them to consider it.

Thanks for the insight though - it matches what many HR people say in teams that couldn't fill their technology teams a couple of years ago, but those that could often took the individual approach. At the moment a number of RIFs are causing salaries to come down again.

Putting all this aside, is it true there is an acute shortage in maths, physics, chemistry, and do career changers generally fit in or is the change often too much?

I didn’t do the PGCE, no - the salaried trainees were given the option but as we all had higher timetable loads than the PGCE trainees, we didn’t do it (they went in over Easter/Christmas break for specific assignment stuff). The only time I was told only having QTS would disadvantage me is if I wanted to teach outside England (I don’t) or if I wanted to do a masters (I’ve just finished one and it would only have exempted me from one of the modules).

Entirely school based training (SCITT) varies - some trainees are released to universities for theory/research input and others are done entirely by local schools and very subject/tactically based. I’m not saying either is better but personally I valued the way my course worked. That said I’ve just mentored someone already employed with us as an unqualified teacher to QTS whose theoretical element was entirely online with occasional tutor visits, and I was impressed how rigorous the content and assessment process was.

I am a STEM based career changer, ( been teaching 17 years) and actually there are several of us in my department, and everyone fits in well, though I agree with a PP that having to bite your tongue was initially one of the biggest challenges, I don’t bother so much now. The pay issue is a national thing, individual schools don’t have the money mostly to vary from it, even in shortage subjects. Yes there are plenty of vacancies in most parts of England ( I gather much less so in N. Ireland and Scotland) in all the subjects you mentioned, you should have no issue getting a job.

I’m leaving teaching in 2 weeks after teaching for 20 years. I would strongly advise against a career change into teaching for many reasons.
There isn’t a teacher recruitment crisis there’s a retention crisis. There’s a group on Facebook for those wanting to exit teaching that you might want to join to have a look at before making a decision. Things are pretty horrendous at the moment. I read a post on there recently about a headteacher bragging about how she was going to ‘get rid’ of all the teachers over the age of 50. Many others came on to say that this had happened to them. At 52, ageism might be an issue for you. Your previous role does sound stressful but I’m not sure you’re fully prepared for the stress and demands of teaching for much less pay. You mentioned enjoying seeing A level students engage with learning. However, this is very different to teaching a challenging key stage 3 class who couldn’t give a shit about science. You will have to teach generic science to these classes as well. Behaviour is horrific in most schools at the moment and there are very few consequences. There is a culture of blaming the teachers, ‘ it must be your fault if the class doesn’t engage in science because the 22 year old PE teacher doesn’t have an issue with them in their lessons’ I’m sure you get the idea. Make sure you do your research. I can’t think of one person I trained with 20 years ago who is still actually teaching. That should tell you all you need to know.

@Satsuma89
Putting all this aside, is it true there is an acute shortage in maths, physics, chemistry, and do career changers generally fit in or is the change often too much?

I am teach a secondary shortage subject. It is true that there is a shortage of maths and physics teachers. However, due to discrimination that exists towards older teachers, I’ve witnessed schools employing younger PE or history teachers for maths and science roles over more experienced teachers with experience or qualifications in maths or science. When I started teaching 20 years ago, there was a wide range of age and experience but now most schools are predominantly staffed by utmost under 40. Any career changers I’ve known have also found it difficult to adjust to the way that they are spoken to like children by some members of senior management. I would not recommend teaching as a career to anyone but if you really are keen then I think it’s essential to spend time in a school volunteering beforehand. I really feel sorry for anyone lured in by these ridiculous and unrealistic ‘get into teaching’ adverts. The days of enthusiastic children sat there listening intently to what the teacher is saying are long gone.