[Closed] NEW Teachers pay.. one for TJ

Agreed.

TJ is on holiday just now though, taking a well earned break from internet-arguning. I'm off next fortnight too.

😀

McCrone backlash. The last major reform of teachers T&Cs (in Scotland) resulted in a whole lot of additional expense and little in the way of improvements to education.

I agree. Who's going to teach our children to use apostrophes? 😉

with two kids in primary school i previously believed that teachers were okay nice perks over paid but doing a decent job.
now i ve seen the other side half the teachers arent fit to work with chidren never mind teach them the see saw in quality of teaching of my eldest is frankly unbelievable. ( at the end of year two her teacher couldnt identify her during the parents evening!) in year three mrs jones was inspiring and the kid progressed massively then this year she has stood still as the schools aim is to achive average standards for all and not to encourage learning for those more able. the pay is good for the journey men the perks are excellent thier review and development is non existant job for life.

An unbelievable idea. Whoever thought that one up should be sacked.

[i]thier eview and development is non existant job for life.[/i]

You'd be surprised how many teachers are sacked for competency reasons. It doens't mean there aren't poor teachers but it's becoming a lot harder for them to keep their heads down and hide in the system.

It's not really explained why they are cutting the pay of recent graduates other than as a way of saving money. There seems to be no real attempt to say 'Well, we won't put you in sole charge of a class of 32 kids for the first couple of years as you'll still be training' or anything - they'll be expected to be a class teacher from day one, just on half the money they get now.

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I can't speak about your individual case totalshell but good pay and excellent perks? The pay is no way good and the only perk I can think of is the summer holiday which when they hours worked are pulled together it ends up evens to a "normal" job.

I used to think that teacher were well paid, had short hours and great holidays...until I moved in with one.

I work long hours but my GF works an astonishing amount. Most of Sunday is spent planning every weekend, she just had half term and spent most of it writing reports and the last 2 weeks of the summer holidays are spent sorting things out for next year.

Yes, they get great holidays but the pay is only OK and the stress she gets from both kids and parents is huge, seemingly more than my supposedly stressful job.

So yes, the above idea is stupid, unworkable and likely will not see the light of day anyway.

I spent the last eighteen years of my life living in a town with a financial backbone based around the large teaching university situated within it..

by and large I wouldn't have wanted my kids anywhere near the muppets that passed through the college gates..

I know that generally most university students who have passed straight from school to college to uni are naive idealistic semi literate ****less halfwits with a cringeworthy misplaced arrogance that makes the skin crawl.. but this teaching lot seemed particularly slow..

maybe a substantial salary increase would tempt some of the higher achievers into the profession..?

Don't agree with the Scottish proposal, if they didn't look good enough to be paid full wage, the Uni should have failed them on the course.

But, since when has £21588 been usury? How many other posts automatically move you up a pay scale every year? So after 5 years of scraping by you reach £31552. Apply for threshold (you have to be pretty bad not to get it) and that gives you a bump to the upper pay scale, usually stepping up every two years (not automatic, but usual), so in another 5 years you are at £36756. Add TLR (Teachin and learning responsibilty, basically some management role) and there's another £3k. Deputy head of a medium primary will be around £45K, head £55K+

Head of my daughters secondary is on £152254.

Now I know £22K won't go far if you're in an expensive part of the country, but the qualification is national, and respected abroad. At our primary all the last batch of newly qualified teachers have bought their own houses and drive newish cars and have loooooooong holidays.

As for there being so much work, I've always been amazed how schools, despite having a national curriculum, insist on reinventing not only the wheel, but the horse, cart, nut and bolt in lesson planning. There are masses of good quality off the shelf resources out there.

Rondo, that may just be the funniest thing I have seen all day! 🙂

As a teacher, (Prepares desk to hide behind) like any other profession there are plenty of useless types who are good at talking the talk, but don't put the hours in, or have the ability to relate to kids. The job does demand an unusual ability to juggle administration, subject knowledge and relating to people, a fair amount of whom are actively working against you. (Kids!)

As far as the money is concerned, it's pretty good really, but if i compare my salary after 10 years of teaching with that of my colleagues who have gone into business/private sector jobs, then there is nothing like the progression, for a similar level of qualification, application, etc.

Strangely teaching must be one of the few classroom taught subjects, where you have little need or experience of the people you are going to interact with, one day youre a child at school, next day youre an adult at uni, being taught behind a desk, then suddenly youre in front of the desk, possibly without any real work experience, of industry, shop or office, talking to kids and following a prepared script written(curriculum) by someone who has followed the same road.

Thankfully doctors , train and bus drivers have real hands on experience before thrown in front of the general public.

project - you know that student teachers do teaching practice when still stufying and that if they don't succeed they don't qualify? I can't see that a trainee Doctor does anything different really?

Most teachers have spent their lives in education. Form Primary, secondary, through college and Uni. Not one day is spent in the real world and it doesn't half show.

I'm a governor at my son's school and I'm frequently astonsihed by the lack of awareness shown by most teachers. And they nearly all have a problem talking to adults; because they don't respond like children.

The best one in the school spent 10 years as a rozzer and you can tell the difference. The reason he retrained? Less hours and more holidays.

project 1 year of on the job training

The way I read it

Current situation
1 year work experience during last year of teacher training - unpaid
1 year probation - full time salary

New Proposals
1 year work experience during last year of teacher training - 0.5 full time salary
1 year probation - 0.5 full time salary

Surely the net pay is the same at the end of the day?

Ah but during teacher training said student will have access to halls of residence/ possible grants/ student loans, basically to finance themselves as students. Once they get Qualified Teacher Status, you expect full time wage. If they want to expand the teacher training an extra year, fair enough, but not to do proper job for half wages. 1 year probation is plenty to weed out the no-hopers and give the tryers enough pointers to become at least decent if not good.

Teaching would be much better if all you people who complained about it went and did it yourself. You want to criticise folk for this and not being in the real world then why not walk the walk and enter this well paid PT profession where even useless teachers thrive?
The copper - presumably Ofsted reflects this as well or are you just saying you get on better with him? You must have poor recruitment guidelines and management if thebest teacher is someone motivated only by the hours is the best amongst them.
Dont worry it will be about 7 om before the teachers can actually reply as they are working a bit harder than us right now.
Serioulsy go and try it and see how easy it is. I would miss all my dinner if I was to spend it rebuting all the misconceptions /lies on here so far.

You eat dinner at 13:00?

Teaching would be much better if all you people who complained about it went and did it yourself.

Have you seen the spelling and grammar of the anti-teacher posters?

Serioulsy go and try it and see how easy it is.

You're never a teacher...surely

I wouldn't be a teacher for a gold pig.

Every teacher I know is an alcoholic on the verge of a nervous breakdown caused by overwork and stress.

i'd love to be a teacher, but it'll have to be teaching people in the care setting. i'm too damn sexy to risk teaching anyone under the age of 18... hormonal teenage girls would be all over me then make accusations when i refuse to go along with their advances.

it's hard work being sexy, and it's hard work being a teacher.... impossible to be both.

Lunge and darren +1

It never fails to amaze me the number of people that think teachers are overpaid with too long holidays that when asked if they would do the job themselves, no chance. Many parents I know struggle to cope with their own children let alone a class or classes of 28 from 9am-4pm. No, I'm not a teacher. Bad ones should be found out and either assisted to improve or given the heave, like any other profession. I'm sure all of you do your jobs supremely well and are surrounded by other who also do so. I do however think that you should be able to go straight from university to teacher training, some wider life experience should be a pre-requisite.

[i]it's hard work being sexy, and it's hard work being a teacher.... impossible to be both[/i]

My wife manages to. As a woman she can multi-task, though 😉

wwaswas......pics or it didnt happen.

Every teacher I know is an alcoholic on the verge of a nervous breakdown caused by overwork and stress.

Just think how hard they would find it in other walks of life. Teaching has its hard points and its good points, but its one of the "special" careers where they are constantly bombarded with a message of how hard their chosen career is.
Although I do have sympathy with them dealing with parents, especially those who think its the teachers fault that their little darlings aren't zooming ahead of all the other geniuses.

As far as I can see, the professions most suited to idle loafing are medicine and dentistry. The least challenging is law, and the most under-respected is teaching (in all its forms).

Not everyone has much interraction with (medical) doctors or dentists, unless you're unlucky. Same for lawyers.

But everyone has been in education and, as far as I can tell, colours their view of teachers based on their childhood biases and prejudices.

Should I change profession, teaching would appeal (don't mind the long hours), but the pay is terrible compared with other professions, particularly those which provide so little to society.

How many other posts automatically move you up a pay scale every year?

I wish I worked at that school. Here I have to hit targets within and outisde the classroom to get moved up a paygrade.

Oops, have I shattered another teacher illusion?

if parents are like the growdups on STW then i bow down to all teachers everywhere.

frankly its largely irrelevant what they get paid you cant even get a job atm ....

my missus is a teacher - secondary geography puts in the hours - does loads of extra curricular - runs the DOE at the school and things like that.

4 interviews for jobs - only another 4/5 positions to apply for for this year and most are not even full time - none are perminant.

Crap situation !

So after 5 years of scraping by you reach £31552..........so in another 5 years you are at £36756

Or you could get a 'real job' and earn that in under 3 years? I looked at teaching when I was graduating, seemed OK, hours looked long but were flexible (you could do 9:00-3:15, and do the planning some other time), money was OK. Looking at it again when work was announcing redundancies and it would barely have paid the rent!

Well Quirrel I'll not quote the whole of the Blue Book as I'm sure you've read it cover to cover, but quoting from TES

Classroom teachers start on the main pay scale, usually on point M1 although other teaching experience may push them higher up the scale. Schools may also award discretionary points for other relevant experience. Each school’s pay policy should explain how these points are awarded.

Teachers are awarded a pay rise when the pay scales and allowances are updated. Each September, teachers on the main pay scale move to the next point on the scale, subject to satisfactory performance, and may even advance by two points if their performance is excellent.

Qualified teachers who reach the top of the main pay scale can apply to be assessed against eight national standards and if they meet the standards, cross the ‘threshold’ to the upper pay scale. The threshold provides an opportunity for good classroom teachers to progress from M6 to a higher salary range.

Teachers on the upper pay scale receive the usual salary rise when the pay scales are up-rated. However, progression on the upper pay scale is performance based and governing bodies make the decisions on progression, based on recommendations from heads. Teachers don’t normally move through the upper pay scale more frequently than every two years.

Hitting targets is a normal part of satisfactory performance in most jobs.

Hitting targets is a normal part of satisfactory performance in most jobs.

So it's not automatic, as said by another poster.

Or you could get a 'real job' and earn that in under 3 years?

Really! where? I know very few people who earn £31552, and my peer group are mostly in their 40's

Don't agree with the Scottish proposal, if they didn't look good enough to be paid full wage, the Uni should have failed them on the course.

You'd have to stop people paying for their course then, when people pay to do a course they have a lot more leverage over whether the uni fails them or not. "you didn't teach me well enough, I'm taking you to court". And no, that's not unlikely. However even in the slightly less direct form of the uni feeling it needs to improve its pass rates to get better intake, paying for education is corrosive.

Just thought i'd clear something up about state teachers (teachers in private schools and academies have completely different contracts):

Teachers don't get holidays.

Holiday entitlement is an allocation of days/hours that an employee can request to take and still be paid. Teachers don't have that luxury - they are contracted to work 196 days a year from 8.45am until 3.30pm. They often work much longer hours and will often be marking/planning over the weekend and non-term time breaks.

Imagine your current job but you're expected to be at work half an hour before your contract says and then work through until about an hour and a half after your contract says for no extra pay and no amount of time of in lieu - that's similar to the job a teacher has, not to mention a lot of the parents expect the school to be a day care facility to look after the kids when the parents can't (or doesn't want to) cope with their own kids.

I wouldn't be a teacher in a state school for all the tea in China, and private schools/academies are even worse.

Err...

Imagine your current job but you're expected to be at work half an hour before your contract says and then work through until about an hour and a half after your contract says for no extra pay and no amount of time of in lieu

What, like many people in the private sector?
(I'm not getting at teachers, who do something I couldn't, but what's been quoted above is the conditions I've worked under (and I'm sure is fairly typical) in the private sector.)

I've done 36 hours straight on a few occasions. I spent 4-5 hours a day commuting to client sites on top of my normal hours for years. It's normal when you have a job.

ebygomm - Member
The way I read it
Current situation
1 year work experience during last year of teacher training - unpaid
1 year probation - full time salary
New Proposals
1 year work experience during last year of teacher training - 0.5 full time salary
1 year probation - 0.5 full time salary
Surely the net pay is the same at the end of the day?

Gross pay is the same overall, but won't net pay actually be higher as in both years the teacher will only be paying income tax on a few thousand pounds of earnings over the personal allowance?

its not like that though. Current PGCE (most common teacher training program) is a 1 year course for people holding degrees. the course is roughly 85% school time, and 15% uni time. You get a payment for doing the course, its typically 2-5k after you take off tuition fees. some of the courses are 4 weeks uni followed by 15 weeks school, some are 4 or 5 days in school each week, with 0 or 1 day in uni. after the pgce year you have to do a year before you're 'fully' qualified.

If you'd only get 10k for 2 years, I can't see many degree qualified people taking up the option..

It might not be called holiday but it's still time not working.

Lets assume a teacher gets 13 weeks 'out of term time', whilst a conventional job gets 5 weeks holiday. Bung in an extra week of bank holidays (estimate).

That means that the teacher works 38 weeks of the year, Mr/Mrs conventional works 46 weeks of the year.

Therefore, if they were being paid the same yearly salary, the teacher would need to work ~21% more hours to be paid the same hourly rate as Mr/Mrs Conventional. If Mr/Mrs Conventional worked a ~40hr week, Teacher would have to work a 48hr week.

For all I know this could be the case. Inset days etc. would reduce this.

Not sure why I did this.

Really! where? I know very few people who earn £31552, and my peer group are mostly in their 40's

Engineering (anything to do with oil, petrochems, or less desirable parts of the world)

You are making the assumption that teachers don't do any work out of term.

poppa, 48 hour week? No chance. Miss lunge is a year 2 primary teacher, she is at school 8pm at the latest and leaves around 6pm (9 hours ish) and will do a minimum of 4 hours each Sunday so 49 ish hours per week. On top of this you can add 4 hours each day on each of the half terms and the same for the last 2 weeks of summer.

I work in recruitment and my hours are long but she easily work longer hours. More stress too, lots more.

Yoiks! There you go then, it seems that even the longer holidays don't compensate for the workload.

I've done 36 hours straight on a few occasions. I spent 4-5 hours a day commuting to client sites on top of my normal hours for years. It's normal when you have a job.

What kind of job? I know lots of people who work in the private sector, and when I've worked in the private sector I never worked an hour I didn't get paid for.

What kind of job? I know lots of people who work in the private sector, and when I've worked in the private sector I never worked an hour I didn't get paid for.

You're a freelancer though presumably - completely different scenario, and freelance fees are normally pretty good to take into account all that.

You're a freelancer though presumably - completely different scenario, and freelance fees are normally pretty good to take into account all that

At one time I spent half my life on a plane or in airports which a lot of my friends still do.

I should stress I'm not complaining. Quite the opposite. I just think anyone suggesting that work is a 9:00-5:00 thing is an idle git. 🙂

What kind of job?

If we're getting into "how long I've spent at work" willy waving, you'd have to go a long way to beat transactional lawyers. I've done over 40 hours straight on more than one occasion.

Which is one reason why I'm no longer a transactional lawyer....

You must have a very tired willy.

No. Never have been. I know a few, but they're a minority.

But presumably you only do those extra hours etc because you are getting paid enough that it seems worthwhile - otherwise it's just being exploited. I would venture that software consultants and (transactional lawyers) are generally getting paid way above the average salary.

But presumably you only do those extra hours etc because you are getting paid enough that it seems worthwhile. I would venture that software consultants and (transactional lawyers) are generally getting paid way above the average salary.

*Write your own punchline.

Seems as if teachers always rap on about how many hours they work at weekends and at night, and usually in the over long holidays.

Perhaps work a normal 39 hour week, and spread the work out properley.

I should stress I'm not complaining. Quite the opposite. I just think anyone suggesting that work is a 9:00-5:00 thing is an idle git.

Or they have their priorities straight...

Or they have their priorities straight...

Most of my Wife's family are teachers. They do work very hard, but still manage a lot more free time than I ever do. I wouldn't want to do their job, and don't begrudge them that extra time, but you compare what they do and my wife's hours, salary and work conditions in social work and I know which I'd rather do. How about 50-60 hour weeks (and no long school holidays) dealing with people who really don't want you there, for £26K a year.

I should stress I'm not complaining. Quite the opposite. I just think anyone suggesting that work is a 9:00-5:00 thing is an idle git.

Or Belgian 😀

Seems as if teachers always rap on about how many hours they work at weekends and at night, and usually in the over long holidays.

Perhaps work a normal 39 hour week, and spread the work out properley.

Because it usually isn't possible - the school admin / team discussion demands etc. mean that often meetings are scheduled for when the rooms are clear of children. This means 3:30 ish on - most (decent) teachers I know work 8:00 ish till 17:00 ish without plannig, so this ends up getting done in the evenings or weekends. Likewise classroom prep over the holidays eats a few weeks a year.

Admittedly I only know primary. There are good and bad teachers like every wlak of life - bu the good ones always seem almost consumed by their work. I haven't got the backbone for that 🙂

poppa - Member
It might not be called holiday but it's still time not working.

Lets assume a teacher gets 13 weeks 'out of term time', whilst a conventional job gets 5 weeks holiday. Bung in an extra week of bank holidays (estimate).

That means that the teacher works 38 weeks of the year, Mr/Mrs conventional works 46 weeks of the year.

Therefore, if they were being paid the same yearly salary, the teacher would need to work ~21% more hours to be paid the same hourly rate as Mr/Mrs Conventional. If Mr/Mrs Conventional worked a ~40hr week, Teacher would have to work a 48hr week.

For all I know this could be the case. Inset days etc. would reduce this.

Not sure why I did this.

I would say the teacher I know (including one I have lived with for several years) the only real time not working was some of the summer holidays. So more like the order of 5 - 6 weeks and the working week would quiet if it was only 48hr per week.

What is involved in planning then? For a secondary school teacher, surely the curriculum doesnt change much from one year to the next. I would have thought only the first couple of years would necessitate planning. Asking as I'm interested in teaching but I've heard conflicting things from different people.

What is involved in planning then? For a secondary school teacher, surely the curriculum doesnt change much from one year to the next. I would have thought only the first couple of years would necessitate planning. Asking as I'm interested in teaching but I've heard conflicting things from different people.

No no no no no!

You have to consider the individuals in your class from year to year and what types of lessons will allow you to get the best out of them. Even teaching the same lesson to 2 or 3 classes it will invariably change depending on what the classes are like as groups/individuals.

I like having discussions about teaching, I see a lot of people playing the "long out of hours' card for sympathy and the other side saying 'too many holidays'. But (and I am a teacher) there are no real secrets surrounding teaching - the workload and holiday time are well documented. I do it because I'm good at it and i enjoy it. Simple fact is, that you definitely need to be committed to the job as any weaknesses are soon found out.

I don't usually bite, but am going to this time.

I became a teacher at 35ish after 10 years in the public and private sectors. The change has been great and it was right for me, but I simply work harder now than in any previous job. It seems that people in most jobs work really hard these days, but there seem to be some grossly ignorant generalisations about the life of a teacher. I'm not having a moan as I'm really happy, but teachers work hard too!

I'm in a private school now (again my choice), but I'm at school for these hours;
8am to 7pm Mon, Tues, Wed and Fri;
8am - 10pm Thurs (just about to do my boarding duty now);
8am-1pm on Saturdays.
Once home I usually work 1 hour each evening (marking etc) and a couple of hours on a Sunday. So I'm in school for a minimum of 65 hours per week and do about another 6 hours of work at home.
In addition, there is typically a further evening event at least once per week and I'm away on trips about 10 weekends of the year. I do get lovely long holidays, but guess I work 1-2 days a week on average out of term. Sure there are other people that work longer hours, but I do feel that I'm earning my pay.

As for the money, well I'm happy with it, but all my class mates from Uni earn more, some of them much, much more.

And for richwales, the GCSE and A level courses change with surprising frequency. I don't think that I've had a year in teaching without some kind of change, so the planning doesn't go away, you just get better at it.

Right, I'm off to the boarding house now to try and write some reports while getting 40 teenage boys to do their homework. Happy days!

For a secondary school teacher, surely the curriculum doesnt change much from one year to the next. I would have thought only the first couple of years would necessitate

exam syllabuses change usually quite significantly every 5 years so thats GCSE and A-level and the KS3 science stuff recently got changed to something Gove hates, so......

anyway I work from 7.30 till 4.30-5.30 most days, cant be bothered to work that out, extra couple of hours at weekends.

As for all these rubbish teachers, well I've seen a few but what i can say is if you are rubbish its THE WORST job in the world, most of them pack it in pretty quick.

The qualification we teach (Applied A level) has existed for 4 years or so. It disappears completely in 2013, and it's only been around that long because it was given an extension. It's currently on it's 4th issue, with minor changes made each time.

A levels in their current form started in 2000. They've had a major revamp once since then too.

RichT what are the advantages of working at a private school?

all my class mates from Uni earn more, some of them much, much more

"working only the 9-5 is idle" ... fack that - only do more when they pay me more ....
the missus is doing a 60 hr week - but she loves the job just finds it very time consuming !

Longer hols, housing in some cases, great food, nice kids and colleagues, discount on fees if you have kids, nice working environment, facilities and good support from management. All the staff are also involved in sports and activities of some kind and I really enjoy this. I'm involved in canoeing, cycling and DofE. School trips are also great, I'm off to Snowdonia in a couple of weeks for Gold DofE, then a bike tour (road) at the start of the holidays and a trip to Iceland at the end of August. There is a bike tour every year, last year the boys did LEJOG, which was a great trip (sadly I only did a few days due to family commitments).

If the pay, perks and conditions are so great why are we struggling to attract applicants to a pretty decent school (50-60% A-C), with a £30mill new building due to complete next year, 12 miles from 'Britain's favourite view', and you look straight up the Ennerdale Valley from the window?

It's a good job - fair pay and conditions, hard work, but making a difference to kids who, if you give half a toss and treat them fairly, look up to you for it. There's stress, frustration and job satisfaction in about equal measure - the first two come mainly from the adults involved in the system.

RichT, did you go to a private school yourself, not trying to be funny but I'd rather stick pins in my eyes than do what you do.

Just finishing my probationary year, and would probably have given up if I'd had to live on 10.5k for the year (less than I earned working in a cafe).

Teaching is more work than you'd suspect (moreso in primary I suspect), but the pay & conditions at the moment are pretty fair.

There's no way those proposals would make it through though, largely because there's no real benefit in doing it that way. I suspect the proposers are just thinking out loud and once the details have been bashed out they'll realise it's nonsense.

Yes. I guess about half the staff here did, but it is a real mix.

I reckon teaching is good pay and conditions. I looked in to it 10 hrs ago. Many of my relatives teach and said I must be mad - long hours etc. When I told them I was doing 70 - 120 hrs per week for 18 k (at the time) they shut up....

Mrs rkk01 has recently retrained as a special needs teacher. Works very hard, demanding role, but deeply rewarding. She doesn't understand why some colleagues moan about pay. Averaged out over the working year pay is good.