Teachers' pay strike.

Urmstongran

I said upthread our daughter is on £45k p.a. (full time) - upper pay scale as 17y.

She is on strike tomorrow. The Y1 & Y2 classes are closed as those teachers are in the NEU.

I’ve just texted her to ask whether our grandchildren will be off school tomorrow from their school and she texted back “Not heard anything yet!!”

Thank you for answering, I missed it.

Joseanne

^Teachers if they strike should state it is on the children's behalf not for more salary.^
I agree Yammy, and that is exactly the reason why I started this thread, nothing to do with teachers' greed, though it can wrongly be perceived as such.
They will be seen as looking after themselves not most importantly the children.
Indeed. So why don't the unions realise that it would make more sense if their rhetoric and demands were not all centered on more pay?

Because nobody would believe it. Teachers not worried about finance may well be more at ease at work, though implying they aren’t doing a good job isn’t either kind or totally accurate.
Let’s tell parents the teachers are striking for the children’s benefit not so they get more money to make up the shortfall in their salary. Obviously nurses are striking to improve things for the patients, not because they haven’t enough to live on.
Experienced teachers have had a 13% fall in the value of their wages over the last few years . (ECTs only a 5%fall.)
^Sorry, but I’m supporting the strike because teachers need the money, particularly experienced teachers whose children are teenagers or starting Uni or who have moved back home because they can’t get work or afford a house!
It will benefit the children, in a roundabout way, but the strike you’re asking for is one where teachers refuse to teach unless the Government puts more money into school.
On strike you don’t get paid. So that would be asking teachers to manage without pay and be faced with enraged parents who have to take time off work to look after their children.
I’m not sure anybody whether a teacher or not, would be that altruistic.

I know she is not highly regarded by many as a Headteacher, nor is the journalist popular, but I found this article at the weekend interesting, and where I was coming from in this thread.
www.google.com/amp/s/www.dailymail.co.uk/columnists/article-11687697/amp/SARAH-VINE-Theres-one-group-teachers-deserve-money-Katharine-Birbalsingh-right.html

Teachers are contracted to work 39 weeks which is 195 days. They teach for 190 days and the remaining 5 days are used as Inset, or training days, which are compulsory. They were instituted c. 1987 as a result of a NUT led strike in return for a £2000 pay rise, plus other concessions.
I fear these strikes will result in more concessions being wrung out of teachers. They need to attack the impositions placed on them within schools, generally brought in by academies run by businessmen concerned with profit, and use the unions' extensive knowledge to resist the unrealistic workloads demanded, not by the Government but by headteachers and academy managers, for the purpose of self-aggrandisement, (and more money, which no-one hears about.)
I am aware some teachers hope these strikes will bring down the Government, rather than improve conditions for teachers.
Be careful what you wish for.

Joseanne

I know she is not highly regarded by many as a Headteacher, nor is the journalist popular, but I found this article at the weekend interesting, and where I was coming from in this thread.
www.google.com/amp/s/www.dailymail.co.uk/columnists/article-11687697/amp/SARAH-VINE-Theres-one-group-teachers-deserve-money-Katharine-Birbalsingh-right.html

I did look Joseanne
I got to
'I feel for teachers, as life can be very hard in the classroom because of poor behaviour, insane amounts of bureaucracy and because they can work very hard and feel a lack of purpose as they're not necessarily seeing the impact of their work,' she said
I'd heard on social media she'd said that but could find no-one to agree with her except on the "insane amounts of bureaucracy" which as the Head of a free school she can do something about.

Vine then says that"as schools were seemingly delighted to use Covid as an excuse to close their doors". A vile slur.
and
"It'll be the usual suspects on the picket line: people who make excuses for their own failures.... Meanwhile, that ever-dwindling pool of good teachers will do their best to keep the school open"

Hateful stuff from the ex-wife of an Education Secretary

If you pay subs to your union and the majority vote to strike, then, in my opinion, you strike. End of.

I agree Urmstongran

My son in law went to university as a mature student, got a degree and did teacher training. He's been teaching for some years now but has given it up for a job in engineering. His salary is £2,000 a year more, and will go up again this year. The added bonus is that there is no homework to mark or lessons to prepare when he gets home. He is still being offered teaching jobs and turning them down. It won't be that many years till he retires and he's had enough of the stress.

As a former primary school DHT, I will always remember my Father in law who lived ‘up North’ asking when visiting here with MIL, why I was so late home (6.30pm after a long SLT meeting) and then having to continue to work after dinner ( which husband/MIL had got ready).
FIL then hoped I was claiming overtime re normal office hours (🤣) and was aghast when I said such a thing didn’t exist- there is no overtime in education!
That was back in 2012-13ish- I retired in 2017 2 years early than expected.
Too tired to continue in a job where the children, their learning and their individual needs, due to government demands and pressures ( yes, I blame you Michael Gove, and your 2014 reforms) no longer came first. I’d had enough- it’s not about money really, it’s about conditions same as the nurses and other public servants, who are expected to do more without investment and support. Rant over- no teacher wants to strike but now it is a last resort.