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Staffroom confidential (CONTINUED FROM PAGE 44)

Teachers’ tips

Last issue Debbie asked if she should consider doing supply work while living in the north west for 18 months.

Try a new challenge

I had been a mainstream 11-18 science teacher for 17 years, but left because I was disillusioned. After a year of enjoyable and rewarding voluntary work, I found myself missing the students.

I decided to start doing supply work, simply to do what I enjoyed best, without any of the politics or back-biting. After a couple of weeks I went to a school for pupils with extreme behavioural difficulties for a day’s casual work. This was something I would have normally given a wide berth, but as it was only a day’s casual supply I felt I had nothing to lose. It turned out to be a completely different world, and I loved every minute.

On my second day there I was offered a full-time job. Sadly the agency slapped a £7k ‘finders’ fee’ on the school and the deal fell through. But I stayed there for two very enjoyable terms and vowed never to teach in mainstream again.

In October I landed my current job, teaching science in an autistic unit within a mainstream school. It’s wonderful, and I feel grateful to have found such a special and rewarding position.

There is a world of opportunities out there. Sometimes in the classroom we get blinkered as to what we are capable of. My advice to Debbie is to do some supply work and find those new challenges – who knows where it might lead?

Michelle, Tyne and Wear

Avoid umbrellas

Debbie might find the supply situation in the north west similar to that on the south coast. There are no longer any county supply registers, and contracts with individual schools are hard to come by.

Most teachers therefore rely on supply agencies to get work, at much reduced rates of pay, ranging from about £90 per day to £115. Some agencies have set local rates. Others have variable rates for new recruits and established staff. Some negotiate starting pay individually. This means a maximum possible gross of £17K to £22K a year. In reality, there is not that much work about.

The latest development to avoid is agencies transferring payroll arrangements to ‘umbrella companies’, often with no option for teachers to continue under the normal PAYE system. The change was posited as a chance to increase take-home pay by claiming for mileage, meals and work-related expenses, all to be offset against income tax. However, the real advantage is to the agencies, which no longer have to pay employers’ National Insurance (NI). Instead the teacher pays both employer’s and employee’s NI contributions. On top of that, the payroll processing incurs a fee of at least 4 per cent of gross pay.

Name supplied

Next issue

One term into my first teaching post, I’m absolutely exhausted. Work seems to take over all my evenings and weekends and eats into the holidays. How do other teachers manage to have some kind of work-life balance? And will things get easier when I’m no longer an NQT?

Emma, by email


Reader's rant

Teacher stress - it’s a health and safety issue

A number of recent surveys highlight that most teachers still work in excess of 50 hours per week. It is obvious that long hours and unreasonable demands on employees only serve to increase stress and impact negatively on productivity.

When expectations placed upon teachers are viewed in the light of health and safety legislation it can be seen that teachers are among, if not the, most ill-treated professionals in the country. Research conducted by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found teaching to be the most stressful profession in the UK. Stress among teachers is more than double the national average, and is the predominant cause of work-related illness in the education sector.

The statistics become even more worrying when retirement figures are taken into account. Around half of teachers retiring on grounds of ill-health have been diagnosed with stress/psychiatric illness. Then there’s the suicide rate, which for teachers is 40 per cent higher than the rest of the population in England and Wales.

The HSE describes stress as ‘the adverse reaction people have to excessive pressure’. Contrary to popular belief, no amount of stress is ‘good for you’.

To encourage employers of teachers to take the issue of stress seriously, much more needs to be made of health and safety legislation. The Health and Safety at Work Act places an obligation on employers ‘to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all employees’. Employers therefore have a legal duty to remove and help employees avoid the causes of stress.

Schools that have not yet carried out a stress audit should do so. Health and safety representatives have a legal right to conduct such an assessment and should contact their local NUT division/association for advice on how to do so.

The figures quoted in this article (which are by no means exhaustive) show that the government and local authorities are ignoring their responsibilities under health and safety legislation regarding stress among teachers.

Nick Soteri, London


Send your contributions for A funny thing happened, The things pupils say, Teachers’ tips and Reader’s rant to: The Teacher, NUT, Hamilton House, Mabledon Place, London WC1H 9BD or email them to teacher@nut.org.uk. Deadline for next issue: 25 January. Please include your contact details.