Any teachers in the house?

Aww you poor thing. I've not had a pay rise in nearly 4 years and I'm not getting one again this year.
By the time it comes round I'm probably going to have to work until mid 70's!

I know... I'm going to go on strike.
Oh no wait. I'll lose my job. Maybe not.

Don't know how good you've got it.
Maybe I'll get a job in the public sector and then moan when I dont get a pay rise.

£10 an hour with 3 months off a year? Damn. I'll take that job.

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by Jackie_Black

we'll be actually earning less next year than this year.

Boo-hoo, I had to take about a £4k pay-cut having been made redundant twice last year.

*looks for the smallest violin in the world playing just for you smiley*

ha, wasn't expecting a great deal of sympathy. But you have to try everything you can to get the best deal. I know you lot just love to throw up every counter argument under the sun and that's fair enough but you have to at least moan about it or the government will only continue to make things worse. The press have managed to cover it in a way which makes us all look like ****s anyway so i expect a lot of internet teacher hate to come out in the coming months.

I'm going to play my own violin though cos no one gives a **** and as usual everyone is worse off.

Originally Posted by Reeder

Aww you poor thing. I've not had a pay rise in nearly 4 years and I'm not getting one again this year.
By the time it comes round I'm probably going to have to work until mid 70's!

I know... I'm going to go on strike.
Oh no wait. I'll lose my job. Maybe not.

Don't know how good you've got it.
Maybe I'll get a job in the public sector and then moan when I dont get a pay rise.

£10 an hour with 3 months off a year? Damn. I'll take that job.

You do sit on Facebook and the org all day, wind yer neck in

[SoulKiss]

Originally Posted by Jackie_Black

ha, wasn't expecting a great deal of sympathy. But you have to try everything you can to get the best deal. I know you lot just love to throw up every counter argument under the sun and that's fair enough but you have to at least moan about it or the government will only continue to make things worse. The press have managed to cover it in a way which makes us all look like ****s anyway so i expect a lot of internet teacher hate to come out in the coming months.

I'm going to play my own violin though cos no one gives a **** and as usual everyone is worse off.

Its not "Teacher Hate".

Its just a "welcome to the real-world".

As I first said, I support the teachers in the fact that someone is coming along and changing the deal they signed up to - breaching contract if you will. Anyone other than the government would be in court for that.

So no, no teacher should lose existing benefits, no matter how generous they seem from the outside.

As for people about to enter the profession, well they would just have to take whatever the new terms are.

[dyzio]

Where's the OP?

Originally Posted by SoulKiss

Its not "Teacher Hate".

Its just a "welcome to the real-world".

It may turn to hate though if the big union I am in start to kick off if/when negotitations fail

Originally Posted by SoulKiss

No teacher should lose existing benefits, no matter how generous they seem from the outside.

Thanks for the support, the benefits aren't as generous as the media make out unless you are a head or in the SLT in some way. My pension in todays money will be 11k a year, hardly gold plated is it. My current heads will be 65k or so, interesting stuff eh. The media have completely overblown that part of it, also for my 11k a year they want £300 a month from me in todays money. That's the same as the ticky on a new GSXR 1000

Originally Posted by SoulKiss

As for people about to enter the profession, well they would just have to take whatever the new terms are.

Agreed, then they knew what they were getting into when they signed up. Fair enough.

[MisterTommyH]

I have every sympathy for the teachers, and am sure if I was them I'd be wanting to protect my pension (which they have every right to do). I also have a lot of friends who are teachers and so appreciate how hard their job is (I wouldn't want to do it).

However some teachers, especially those who tend to be most vocal about things like this, see to think it is the only job in the world that is hard. They do not appreciate that private industry was on a pay freeze for 3 years before theirs was announced; Or that much of private industry does not have an employer contributed pension, and if they do, they do not get the level of contributions that teachers get.

I saw a face book post earlier saying "what will they cut next? maternity leave?" - I wonder if that teacher realised what private sector workers get for maternity/paternity leave.

Another comment was "do the government expect me to be planning and taking PE lessons at 68?" - Hate to tell you but a lot of people do manual jobs to that age because they have no option.

And yes teachers do get a lot of holiday, and yes they do work in the term time to balance it out, but there is no way that my employer would ever let me have 6 weeks off in a row. Even 3 weeks if I fancied going to Australia.

All in all, I recon that when you take into account the pro's and con's of teaching vs private industry it's mostly a level playing field, just different pro's and cons (except it's very hard to sack a teacher for being rubbish, but very easy to sack most other people).

This isn't a rant at all teachers (most of the ones that I know are perfectly nice people, and accept that other people work just as hard), but the most vocal - the ones on the News etc, seem to think theirs is THE hardest job in the world and forget that it is actually the contributions of everyone else who works hard and pays tax that is helping their pensions. I think that is what p1sses people off.

Having said that, if you were trying to take something away from me I'd fight to keep it. Don't see the point of only 2 of the unions striking though. Waste of time.

Rant over.

[Messie]

Go away for the afternoon to look after my Grandaughter because her schools' closed and look what happens.

It wasn't just teachers who went on strike today. And I see many more unions joining strike action in the coming months.

To whoever said their mates who are young teachers that were earning those salaries - sorry they were lying to you. I earn similar to what they were telling you in a Senior position and after 22 years experience and going through two threshold levels.

To all of you who think teaching is an easy life (or actually anyone seriously considering it as a career) I throw open the offer, or challenge if you will, to shadow me for a day, a week or two weeks. This is a genuine offer -someone else who contacted me outside of the biking world is actually doing this next week). Come on. Come and see what an ordinary medium sized 11-18 comprehensive school is really like

Edit - I'm not saying it's worse than any other job. I recognise the pleasure to be had in it as well. I just would like to show those people who do think it's a doss job to come and see what we do.

[MisterTommyH]

Just actually reading the thread, watching the news, speaking to people I know that this strike will have little effect.

Why?

Because strikes only work when they have public support. The general public seem to be overwhelmingly against this. The only people who I have seen speak in favour of the strike are teachers or other people striking.

Btw. I agree with messie about he wages. They are lying. Most teachers are in the 20k's. Maybe over 30 with a couple of TLR points. Over 40 as a head of year etc (possibly).