Did you agree with the Strike today?

rossk26 said:
On the other hand, I get massively wound up by teachers claiming sympathy for the hours of extra work they do on top of their teaching work. If you are doing 3-5 hours on top each day, then you are terrible at planning your workload, I have no sympathy for you.

You get ample holiday allowance to more than make up for the extra few hours a week (not a day), that is required for lesson planning and marking. Not to mention you get breaks in your teaching day for lesson planning allowance as well.

Stop the moaning, and I'll support you.
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That's your opinion and I respect that, but you either don't know any teachers, or the ones you do know teach a less important subject or are just not passionate about their job. You think that lesson planning and marking is the only thing that is done outside of teaching a class??? :rolleyes:
 
I'm a parent and I really am not sure why teachers are striking again, so the message has not got across to me. I also would not expect the school to try to get the message across to my children as I would see that as indoctrination. Explain the reasons to the parents and let the parents explain to their kids.

It has massively inconvenienced me, again. I have recently changed jobs because my old job was less suitable (like normal people do, apart from teachers it seems) and both my wife and myself are in companies going through redundancies. So neither of us are able to take time off to look after our child who is affected. Therefore we have had to ask family to choke across from the other side off London to look after him.

So being in the private sector we have no job security like teachers, have massively less time
off, work around 9 to 10 hours a day minimum each day with a 3 hour daily commute. Given that I really have no idea why they are striking and the inconvenience caused to me and my family again I can't support the strike. If the teachers had tried to get their point across to me and taken action in a less disruptive way then I may support them. Until then, just get back to work and stop acting like the children you are supposed to be teaching.
 
rossk26 said:
To put my 2pence in.

I don't agree with the proposed actions from the government. The teaching system works, and it shouldn't be altered.

On the other hand, I get massively wound up by teachers claiming sympathy for the hours of extra work they do on top of their teaching work. If you are doing 3-5 hours on top each day, then you are terrible at planning your workload, I have no sympathy for you.

You get ample holiday allowance to more than make up for the extra few hours a week (not a day), that is required for lesson planning and marking. Not to mention you get breaks in your teaching day for lesson planning allowance as well.

Stop the moaning, and I'll support you.
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LOL - If only you knew the reality!

Back on topic I totally support the teachers striking Gove's 'reforms' are no more than the random actions of a fool who knows nothing about what he's talking about and spends his entire time harking back to a golden era that never existed.

Yes teachers are well paid and have a generous pension and holiday allowance but saying they shouldn't strike when something threatens those conditions because 'everyone else got shafted on pensions' is madness we shouldn't be supporting a race to the bottom to prop up big business and bloated government.
 
It's difficult because teaching covers so many different areas and age ranges.

The pressures on a primary school teacher are different to that of secondary, FE and HE.

From a secondary school point of view, I would like to see the teacher that can plan and mark a 90% timetable to an 'outsanding' standard in the 10% of PPA time they are allocated.

Not to mention all of the other administration and extra-ciricular activity that goes on.

Lessons are no longer delivered by copying out pages from an exercise book. They take time and creativity to produce and implement in a way that engages and interests students.

One of the (un)expected consequences of performance related pay is that teachers are going to have even more admin to cover their backs when it comes to salary negotiations.

Now I'm not suggesting accountability is a bad thing but the level of detail that's going to be required is excruciating and it will result in less time focused on the kids.
 
Hades said:
So being in the private sector we have no job security like teachers, have massively less time off, work around 9 to 10 hours a day minimum each day with a 3 hour daily commute.
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To use the age-old argument so often touted against teachers – it sounds like you should find a different job.

After all, it's really easy (or so we're led to believe).
 
molinari said:
That's your opinion and I respect that, but you either don't know any teachers, or the ones you do know teach a less important subject or are just not passionate about their job. You think that lesson planning and marking is the only thing that is done outside of teaching a class??? :rolleyes:
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I know several teachers, 2 primary school teachers and 3 secondary school PE and RS teachers.

I leave work at the same time, and quite often arrive home at the same time. Sometimes they beat me as technically they can leave the school from 1600.

Granted they may have some paperwork to do, or lesson planning. But generally they say, if you are on the ball this will amount to a couple hours a week during term time. The majority of lesson planning and paperwork is often before the school term, and when ofsted are visiting.

I get 22 days + 8 bank holidays a year, therefore I work 230 days a year, or 1725 hours. A typical teacher works 195 days a year, or 1462 hours. That leaves 263 hours of "extra time" outside of school hours to make up in my eyes.
 
rossk26 said:
To put my 2pence in.

I don't agree with the proposed actions from the government. The teaching system works, and it shouldn't be altered.

On the other hand, I get massively wound up by teachers claiming sympathy for the hours of extra work they do on top of their teaching work. If you are doing 3-5 hours on top each day, then you are terrible at planning your workload, I have no sympathy for you.

You get ample holiday allowance to more than make up for the extra few hours a week (not a day), that is required for lesson planning and marking. Not to mention you get breaks in your teaching day for lesson planning allowance as well.

Stop the moaning, and I'll support you.
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I used to agree, but having dated 2 teachers now... both secondary school teachers I can promise you that the work load is ridiculous. The problem is that unless the school is well off then most teachers will have no assistant, so all jobs have to be done by them. Actual classroom face to face teaching accounts for only about half the actual workload required.

Apart from lesson planning, you have performance and actions plans for EVERY child... you have to sort out problem with disruptive pupils, which can be a nightmare... calling parents, meeting parents... who are often as obnoxious as their spawn!

In an average day they were in at approx. 7.30- 8.00 am just so that they had time to get things sorted for 9am start of the day.... the school day for pupils ends at approx. 3.30 but for teachers its at least 6pm at the very earliest you can get out, as you need to set up tomorrows work, photocopy and mark and so on.... if you left early you would either HAVE to do it at home or in the morning.

Now don't get me wrong they do have more holidays but if my two ex's are any indication of the profession a lot of that time was spent producing next terms lesson plans, research and correlating guidelines to make sure you were not missing anything out. The lesson plans don't just pop up out of nowhere and in all but the very worst schools its something that seems to change year on year.

I used to share the sentiment that teachers only worked 9 till 4 and got loads of holidays and must be lazy...... my eyes were opened and I would now defend them... for hours at least. And don't make the mistake of blanketing them all together, a PE teacher has it easy compared to a core subject teacher.... plus quite often teachers have to fill in for sick staff, do extra activities and so on, yet still are required to do their normal job with no allowances made for time to prepare.

yes we all have to fill in for others but usually its a case of can you work overtime? not can you do youre job and his job at the same time please.... ok for answering a phone but not when its teaching two classes!
 
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I'm not buying the sympathy card at all.

I gym with a teacher, we are both in the gym at 5:30pm weekdays.

Like I said in my OP, I fully support the strike, and the governments plans are stupid. The system works, and the education is good. Don't change it. I already think teachers get paid pennies for the job they do (especially primary school teachers).
 
I work in an outstanding secondary school, though not as a teacher. We struggle to recruit teachers - because there is a shortage of them, at least in this area. We even recruit teachers from Ireland and this year, Canada just to fill the gaps.

So when there's a shortage of teachers, what is the appropriate response from government? Attack teachers pay, pensions and working conditions - all at the same time? Genius.

And then you see some of the suggestions in here that good, qualified teachers should leave the profession if they don't like it? I don't see how that's going to help anyone.
 
The way things are going with teachers, posties, council workers etc., this could turn into a rebirth of the "winter of discontent."
 
All the parents should write letters to the school fining them for taking a day off in term time. :p They seem very happy to do this when its the other way around.

Lucky for us my daughters school wasn't affected at all so didn't impact us.
 
Dugganator said:
All the parents should write letters to the school fining them for taking a day off in term time. :p They seem very happy to do this when its the other way around.

Lucky for us my daughters school wasn't affected at all so didn't impact us.
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Any teacher on strike is forfeiting a day's pay so technically this is actually happening. :p
 
No. I disagree with teachers striking in the same way I disagree with firefights striking.

Irish_Tom said:
Any teacher on strike is forfeiting a day's pay so technically this is actually happening. :p
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That cost should be passed to the parents.
 
Gilly said:
No. I disagree with teachers striking in the same way I disagree with firefights striking.



That cost should be passed to the parents.
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Any profession that is so important that it shouldn't be striking, should have it's pay/pension etc defended by law so that they don't need to keep striking.
 
chriscubed said:
Any profession that is so important that it shouldn't be striking, should have it's pay/pension etc defended by law so that they don't need to keep striking.
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So that if the economy collapses we are required by law to continue funding something that we cannot afford?

Brilliant idea.
 
Irish_Tom said:
To use the age-old argument so often touted against teachers – it sounds like you should find a different job.
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Race to the bottom - it's the trendy thing don't you know. And boy, some people are really in it to win!

The way things are going with teachers, posties, council workers etc., this could turn into a rebirth of the "winter of discontent."
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Fingers crossed.

But even union members are apathetic these days - workers rights and T&C's will get hammered plenty more before people finally snap and stand up and do something about it. You only have to look at the sheer number of "be thankful you've got a job" or "I have no job security" or "I don't have a good pension" posts on here to see how many people like being a doormat.
 
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