[The_Great_One]

Where do all of these people find the time to strike. In my job were too busy to go on strike.

[alex5455]

perhaps if they were given fair pay and conditions they wouldnt feel the need to strike?

[The_Great_One]

(Original post by alex5455)
perhaps if they were given fair pay and conditions they wouldnt feel the need to strike?

They dont even know the meaning of the word fair. Try having a job where you dont get paid when youre on the sick.

[alex5455]

(Original post by The_Great_One)
They dont even know the meaning of the word fair. Try having a job where you dont get paid when youre on the sick.

yes they do, they have had pensions slashed, wages frozen and no signs of any help from government in a time of record inflation and cost of living increases, they are being treated utterly unfairly and are perfectly right to strike.

[warp2125]

TBH I think we are so used to them going on strike that it has lost the impact it once had.

[meenu89]

Be interesting to see what Milibands' position on this will be.

[A Mysterious Lord]

Teachers going on strike when they get all those holidays

[doggyfizzel]

Tbh I can see why they are doing it. They are on a pay freeze which in reality is a pay cut. Prices of essentials are rising, things like food, energy, petrol and transport. It is hard for people to cut back on these things, so people are taking a drop in quality of life. Many people signed up to public sector jobs, taking a lower salary in exchange for job security and a top notch pension. Now the security is gone, the pensions are gone, and they are also saying take a pay freeze.


For me the real problem is, the public sector is too large. The layers of bureaucrats and admin staff are still to thick. That need to be addressed. Not to mention the coalition have completely failed to restart our economy. We've cut too hard, so people have suffered, the economy is stagnant, and the deficit has still risen.

[The_Great_One]

They obviously havent got much work to do if they can find time to strike. Maybe the government needs to increase their work load so they dont have any time to strike like normal hard working people who dont get six weeks off in the summer.

[alex5455]

(Original post by The_Great_One)
They obviously havent got much work to do if they can find time to strike. Maybe the government needs to increase their work load so they dont have any time to strike like normal hard working people who dont get six weeks off in the summer.

why dont you go and look up what a strike is? you clearly dont understand if you think workload affects it

[pickup]

(Original post by A Mysterious Lord)
Teachers going on strike when they get all those holidays

Teachers don't just work in term time / when they're in a classroom. It's pretty hectic in term time and lots of the necessary background reading, meetings and courses have to be done when the pupils are on holiday. You can't just roll up and teach without doing a lot of preparation as anyone who's ever been in front of a class will know.

[TimHuak]

(Original post by pickup)
Teachers don't just work in term time / when they're in a classroom. It's pretty hectic in term time and lots of the necessary background reading, meetings and courses have to be done when the pupils are on holiday. You can't just roll up and teach without doing a lot of preparation as anyone who's ever been in front of a class will know.

lmao

[Sophrosyne_1]

As a former teacher, I can inform you that teachers do not "get 6 weeks off in the summer". The holiday period is about 5 weeks long but during that time they will spend roughly a week at the beginning of that time clearing classrooms, organising resources and generally tidying up in readiness for the new year. The final 2-3 weeks are spent planning lessons, preparing the classroom, creating resources and so on. In my first few years of teaching I worked out how much I was getting paid per hour I worked. It was less than £2. Teachers do not need their workload to be increased any further and have a right to complain about pay and conditions.

[nju]

(Original post by Sophrosyne_1)
As a former teacher, I can inform you that teachers do not "get 6 weeks off in the summer". The holiday period is about 5 weeks long but during that time they will spend roughly a week at the beginning of that time clearing classrooms, organising resources and generally tidying up in readiness for the new year. The final 2-3 weeks are spent planning lessons, preparing the classroom, creating resources and so on. In my first few years of teaching I worked out how much I was getting paid per hour I worked. It was less than £2. Teachers do not need their workload to be increased any further and have a right to complain about pay and conditions.

How come your salary was below the national minimum wage?

[The_Great_One]

(Original post by Sophrosyne_1)
As a former teacher, I can inform you that teachers do not "get 6 weeks off in the summer". The holiday period is about 5 weeks long but during that time they will spend roughly a week at the beginning of that time clearing classrooms, organising resources and generally tidying up in readiness for the new year. The final 2-3 weeks are spent planning lessons, preparing the classroom, creating resources and so on. In my first few years of teaching I worked out how much I was getting paid per hour I worked. It was less than £2. Teachers do not need their workload to be increased any further and have a right to complain about pay and conditions.

My heart bleeds for you. Its called work if they dont like it why dont they find another job. You cant have your cake and eat it. You cant expect to work less and get paid more than everyone else why do you think our schools are some of the worst in the world?

[kka25]

(Original post by warp2125)
TBH I think we are so used to them going on strike that it has lost the impact it once had.

This.

(Original post by doggyfizzel)
Tbh I can see why they are doing it. They are on a pay freeze which in reality is a pay cut. Prices of essentials are rising, things like food, energy, petrol and transport. It is hard for people to cut back on these things, so people are taking a drop in quality of life. Many people signed up to public sector jobs, taking a lower salary in exchange for job security and a top notch pension. Now the security is gone, the pensions are gone, and they are also saying take a pay freeze.

Also this.

[TimHuak]

(Original post by Sophrosyne_1)
As a former teacher, I can inform you that teachers do not "get 6 weeks off in the summer". The holiday period is about 5 weeks long but during that time they will spend roughly a week at the beginning of that time clearing classrooms, organising resources and generally tidying up in readiness for the new year. The final 2-3 weeks are spent planning lessons, preparing the classroom, creating resources and so on. In my first few years of teaching I worked out how much I was getting paid per hour I worked. It was less than £2. Teachers do not need their workload to be increased any further and have a right to complain about pay and conditions.

wow tidying up

sounds rough

[The_Great_One]

(Original post by TimHuak)
wow tidying up

sounds rough

Its because she got her hands dirty, she had just finished painting her finger nails and she had to move some dirty cups from A to B.

[Sophrosyne_1]

(Original post by nju)
How come your salary was below the national minimum wage?

When you are paid a set salary it doesn't alter according to how many hours you work. Teachers' salaries are predicated on a set number of hours per year but it is a number which most regularly exceed therefore it is possible to work for an amount which works out at less than the minimum wage.

With regards to the idea that "if you don't like it, you should get another job" that's exactly what I did. I now work in a variety of education settings and am studying for a PhD. However, I think it is sad that thousands of very able, well qualified and talented teachers are leaving the profession in droves because of a combination of heavy workload, poor working conditions and low wages.

I think I could have just about dealt with the pay if teachers were given a little more respect in society as a whole; after all, I got into teaching because I am passionate about improving the life chances of young people and widening their horizons through learning, not to make bundles of cash. But when you are exhausted after a day of teaching (which also entailed having to physically restrain violent pupils on a very regular basis) and your profession is constantly lambasted by the government and media, it all becomes too much to take.

To those who think teaching is an easy option, you should really try a week working in a school in a deprived area of one of our big cities before you make ill-informed comments about long holidays and finishing work at 3.

[Sophrosyne_1]

(Original post by The_Great_One)
Its because she got her hands dirty, she had just finished painting her finger nails and she had to move some dirty cups from A to B.

I'm guessing you haven't spent much time working in schools. The "tidying up" we do entails sorting pretty much everything which the children have produced over the course of an academic year (in a class of 30 children, that amounts to lots of work), removing wall displays, shifting tables and chairs, changing labels on trays and coat-pegs and sometimes moving everything which we keep in school (books, resources, etc) between classrooms. That might not sound like much work to you, but in some cases it took me over a week to get everything done. I never minded doing it because it meant my classroom was prepared for the new academic year but I think many people under estimate how many of these extra jobs (which teachers aren't actually contracted to do) teachers undertake in addition to short, medium and long-term lesson planning (every lesson planned, written up and handed in to the management team at the beginning of every week), assessment, marking and actual teaching. Oh, and let's not forget the time spent restraining violent pupils, dealing with bullying and arguments which break out at dinner time but spill over in to lessons and the myriad of other tasks that present themselves every day.

And yes, I did get my hands dirty. I even broke up a fight in order to prevent pupils doing real damage to one another when I was 7 months pregnant. I wonder what it is that you do for a living that makes you feel so very superior.