Schools 'break law' on teaching assistants

[featured_spectre]

Support staff could always go on strike....lol

[torledo]

Not been in been in one of our local schools then!

 

Presumably there's a reason why we're not all teachers then if the salary is so good

 

i think you'd have to look at the overall wage bill as a proportion of the education budget. In that regard, i'm not sure how much you could increase starting pay by, or how many additional teachers you could employ to ease the workload, before you had to look at making big 'savings' elsewhere.

 

Increasing starting pay by 2k might make it less risible, but that all adds up. And has to be funded somehow.

[GrumbleDook]

First and foremost I will say you are all wrong ... and also quite right.

 

It depends on the school. Each school is slightly different and if there is a good ethos in the school about learning, about respect and achieving stuff then it feeds on itself. That comes from good management of the school, good teachers and good support staff.

 

The single most important thing in a school which improves how well a child does in all aspects (behaviour, attendance, grades, integration into society) is a good teacher. This has been shown time and time again. Good teachers (who will be UPS2 and 3) are paid well. A school needs a healthy balance of this high calibre of staff and more affordable staff (frequently NQTs or in the first 3 years of teaching). Schools will get poor staff who they cannot move on, but who have been at the school a while and so have crept up the may scales. This means that corners have to be cut. If you can encourage a TA to do more they might get the bug ... and become a HLTA. They can then be pushed further and do a foundation degree (if they don't have one) and move into teaching as a full job. This plan could take 2-5 years in a school ... to identify someone good and move them up.

 

Schools don't have the benefit of waiting sometimes and have to take risks to get good staff in. Read the other articles out this weekend about recycling poor quality teachers in schools. Every school gets hit with someone they think will be good but turns out to be a millstone around the school's neck.

 

As for the time and effort teachers put in to be worth their salary? Most I know go above and beyond what they are expected to do ... whether it comes to marking, planning, extra-curricular activities, becoming examiners (they don't do it for the money, they do it to get an inside understanding of the courses and how to teach to get the best marks for their kids), community involvement ... like I said early, it will differ from school to school, so if you are unlucky enough not to know teachers who view their choice to teach as a vocation (and are dedicated to it) then I really do think it is a loss.

 

As for TAs not being qualified and not being good enough ... who is to say that IT Support in schools is any good? After all, there are lots doing it who are unqualified, seem to waste a lot of money and don't even bother listening to teachers.

[deanc]

the main complaint here seems to be that the uinions have fought for better pay and working conditoons for teachers and have got it.

 

is that not the point of a trade union?

[Firefly_Transport]

Yes it is - if the effect is that an entire sub-group of staff then become the subject of oppertunistic accountancy then that is hardly the fault of the teaching unions. It won' help the situation at all if a them & us enviroment aises.

 

However that should not mean they ignore the matter. A better and more uniform union for support staff would help both the support staff & employers.

 

And heck of a lot less politics of course

[Simcfc73]

Been a while since a teachers vs support staff thread came along.

 

Be better to continue this in August when we have more time to discuss it.

 

I will throw this one in

 

BBC News - Incompetent teachers 'being recycled' by head teachers

 

A job for life and £30k per year after 5 years and 13 weeks off a year...... but sometimes they have to work till 7 on an evening doing extra work.. de dums.

 

The statement about a pitiful salary is quite vulgar.. are we as a country suppose to pay more taxes to pay a new employee £30k + a year straight from university.

 

We are facing big cuts and huge deficit but this union again comes out with stuff to rile up the miners again... sorry I mean the teachers.

[featured_spectre]

I can tell you now that there are 3 incompetent teachers in my school. out of a teaching staff of 20, thats pretty atrocious. In another school I support, there are 7, out of 50. The fact that there have been complaints and they have been met with "we are stuck with the teacher and can only remove them if a disciplinary issue arises" is bull, if someone is incompetent, get rid of them, its that simple, and it DOES happen in other industries.

[Guest Guest]

the main complaint here seems to be that the uinions have fought for better pay and working conditoons for teachers and have got it.

 

is that not the point of a trade union?

 

No, not since the 70s anyway. They are supposed to get fair pay and working conditions. The unions of the british motor industry got better pay and working conditions, look where it got them.

[dwhyte85]

I can tell you now that there are 3 incompetent teachers in my school. out of a teaching staff of 20, thats pretty atrocious. In another school I support, there are 7, out of 50. The fact that there have been complaints and they have been met with "we are stuck with the teacher and can only remove them if a disciplinary issue arises" is bull, if someone is incompetent, get rid of them, its that simple, and it DOES happen in other industries.

 

I thought that was the point of performance management / appraisals with targets - our school has an absolutely huge turnover in staff, teachers are removed if they don't do what they're supposed... albeit at the end of terms, it happens. Our headteacher is brutal but an absolutely fantastic leader.

[localzuk]

No, not since the 70s anyway. They are supposed to get fair pay and working conditions. The unions of the british motor industry got better pay and working conditions, look where it got them.

 

Precisely. Fair working conditions is one thing, improving them to the state where they're unsustainable only does one thing - damage the industry. Its better to have a job, and be paid than to fight for high pay, and have no job as they have to sack loads of people to fund it.

 

I thought that was the point of performance management / appraisals with targets - our school has an absolutely huge turnover in staff, teachers are removed if they don't do what they're supposed... albeit at the end of terms, it happens. Our headteacher is brutal but an absolutely fantastic leader.

 

The problem is as the article that simcfc73 posted says - the poor staff may well get the push out the door, but they just move to another school and carry on their reign of incompetence there. Either that or they become supply teachers...

[featured_spectre]

performance management in our place consists of bad teachers doing bad teachers, and the head is the one who set it like that.

[deanc]

I can tell you now that there are 3 incompetent teachers in my school. out of a teaching staff of 20, thats pretty atrocious. In another school I support, there are 7, out of 50.

 

in that case the heads at your schools are failing to do thier jobs properly, there are ways to get teachers out of schools. there are competency procedures and we are all expected to meet the teaching standards. it is really annoying from my point of view that I am towards the lowest paid end of the scale but seem to spend significantly more of my time working than other members of staff. it becomes apparent in the results though. luckily most of the "old school" are due for retirement soon!

[PiqueABoo]

Our headteacher is brutal but an absolutely fantastic leader.

luckily most of the "old school" are due for retirement soon!

 

I'm not omnipotent and my view is largely of Primary, but I've been seeing experienced and often excellent intellectually-sharp/character Heads retiring. We're annually told this generation retiring is causing a shortage, which might explain why some of those replacements definitely seem mediocre, plus these days perhaps they're selected more for bureacratic skills (negotiating the "educational psycho-babble") than their management and leadership skills?

 

PS: Just Googling around I found much of the same stuff debated 18 months ago @ the TES and like bow-ties, this comment is cool and definitely worth borrowing:

 

During officer training we were told - in no uncertain terms - that there are no bad soldiers, only bad officers. My observations of SMTs confirm this. There seems to be a wafer-thin veil between assertive leadership and bullying, passion and paranoia, vision and narcissism. Sadly, many incompetents are promoted upwards or outwards making a mockery of references. Good teachers respond to a complex (and contradictory) situation with alacritry, creativity and good humour in an education system creaking under its own rampant bureaucracy. There are a small number of bad teachers who are clever enough not only to beat this monolithic structure but use it to their advantage. I would love to believe in a meritocracy where excellence has its own rewards and honesty is a virtue but the high percntage of effective teachers are too frequently distracted by administrative irrelevances, parental histrionics or less-intelligent but egomaniacal, self-publicising colleagues...

Edited July 4, 2010 by PiqueABoo

[MkII]

Good teachers (who will be UPS2 and 3) are paid well. A school needs a healthy balance of this high calibre of staff and more affordable staff (frequently NQTs or in the first 3 years of teaching). Schools will get poor staff who they cannot move on, but who have been at the school a while and so have crept up the may scales. This means that corners have to be cut. If you can encourage a TA to do more they might get the bug ... and become a HLTA. They can then be pushed further and do a foundation degree (if they don't have one) and move into teaching as a full job. This plan could take 2-5 years in a school ... to identify someone good and move them up.

In this economic climate, and in my area, schools can't afford expensive teachers... there are very few left. And in ten years I've seen none of the TA's who've taken on teaching roles encouraged or rewarded in any way. In my reality what you speak of is myth & folklore.

[jamesb]

I can tell you now that there are 3 incompetent teachers in my school. out of a teaching staff of 20, thats pretty atrocious. In another school I support, there are 7, out of 50. The fact that there have been complaints and they have been met with "we are stuck with the teacher and can only remove them if a disciplinary issue arises" is bull, if someone is incompetent, get rid of them, its that simple, and it DOES happen in other industries.

 

My family was close to the head teacher of my old school, who was appointed in my second year though. When she began the school was failing, suffering from bullying issues, poor results, and generally a bad ethos.

 

The head teacher's method to deal with this was to simply fire the bad teachers that were in the school. Her comment was that if a teacher was bad, a disciplinary issue could be found. These were then replaced with enthusiastic NQTs and a few more experienced, more practiced teachers.

 

The other part of her method was to get rid of disruptive students - there were about a dozen epulsions in my first year there.

 

Over the course of a year everything in the school improved, and it went from failing to being one of the most respected schools in the area. She wasn't at all popular for the steps she took - particularly for the dismissal of some teachers who had been there a long time, but they were steps which needed to be taken so they were.

 

The problem seems to be largely the fear of reprisals for getting rid of the few 'bad' teachers. Unfortunately these bad teachers have a disproportionate effect on the school as a whole.

[witch]

Going back to the original subject....

I would be very unhappy if TAs routinely taught my children. Some of them are, of course, brilliant, but the fact remains that they are NOT qualified teachers and therefore should NOT be teaching. Teacher training, when done properly, readies a teacher for the challenges ahead.

I am actually of the belief that good teachers are born, not made, and teacher training gives them those little strategies and wrinkles that help them do their job. On the same note, I have never understood why people can not go into teaching later in life, without a degree. Careful selection, good support and rigorous training would produce good teachers.

[dwhyte85]

The problem is as the article that simcfc73 posted says - the poor staff may well get the push out the door, but they just move to another school and carry on their reign of incompetence there. Either that or they become supply teachers...

 

Surely, if they're removed from a school they should have feedback for the new jobs e.g, references stating why... I've heard you can't give a bad reference but you can certainly give an honest one?

[localzuk]

Surely, if they're removed from a school they should have feedback for the new jobs e.g, references stating why... I've heard you can't give a bad reference but you can certainly give an honest one?

 

How would you say to give an honest one? Say, a teacher lacks classroom control abilities, turns up late regularly, and never marks their books. How do you get that across to a new school without saying it? Leaving the information out about how good they are at those things is one way but it is very subtle and could very easily be overlooked by a new school - especially in the face of a well executed demo lesson or a good interview...

[jamesb]

Surely, if they're removed from a school they should have feedback for the new jobs e.g, references stating why... I've heard you can't give a bad reference but you can certainly give an honest one?

 

You can give a bad reference, so long as it is accurate and you can back up anything you say.

 

In fact, if you give a reference, you are legally required to give an accurate and honest one. You can refuse to give a reference though.

 

References and job offers : Directgov - Employment

[dwhyte85]

@jamesb - so an honest one ;-)

 

@Localzuk - I know for my interview here they wanted to know how many times I was late, our school has a sign in policy and sign out policy - surely that'd be evidence towards it. I understand what you're saying though with the iview when they take a class... we had an example of that, the chap was kicked out after a term. I guess the issue with the supply teachers is that like IT supply, you get what you're given...

 

To be fair we have current SLT who are absolutely shocking teachers but because of roles in other schools they were given that sort of trust (AND SALARY!) - I guess that's an example of re-use from another school and it is very frustrating, just because somebody was say... as asst headteacher doesn't necessarily mean they were good at it.

 

Although I don't like the conservative viewpoint on only first class degree teachers... they have the right idea, too many people go into teaching because it's 'easy', within time you get a good salary, pension and every year good holiday benefits.

 

We have TAs and technicians staff with MSc, PHDs & they're treated terribly... we have teachers with a desmond from bucks chiltern who are SLT, 7 years experience and have no classroom control... what can you do? It's not all about degree but it has to be more selective & it has to be something continually improved upon.

Edited July 5, 2010 by dwhyte85

[webman]

Schools who have a bad teacher are extremely likely to give a glowing reference to get rid of them. If they give an honest reference for a bad teacher - who will employ them?

[dwhyte85]

Who gives a .... who employs them, if they're not up to the job they shouldn't be in the job!

 

I've known teachers to be sacked with no job to go to, that's tough but that's life - I can't understand why they're so protected?

[skiller]

I just moved back to South Africa after three years in my native England.

My now 7 year old son was at Poole Old Town First School and he wishes he were back there. His class was 25 kids, one fully qualified techer and two TAs each one year short of "qualifying". (I'm not sure of the definition of "qualifying.") That's a one-to-eight ratio! The TAs were very dedicated and motivated. Between them the educators were able to cope with the range of the kids' abilities, giving special attention where and when required. Absolutely brilliant!

 

I don't know what's going to happen to the UK school system now. Budgets are being cut dramatically and organisations reorganised as I write...

 

Meanwhile here in beautiful, rural SA, the state school is - umm - rubbish. Among other things, it could be improved by adding TAs.

(Arch-agnostic that I am, have sent my son to a local, small Christian school. Many other expats hereabouts home-school their kids.)

[chrbb]

Going back to the original subject....

I would be very unhappy if TAs routinely taught my children. Some of them are, of course, brilliant, but the fact remains that they are NOT qualified teachers and therefore should NOT be teaching. Teacher training, when done properly, readies a teacher for the challenges ahead.

I am actually of the belief that good teachers are born, not made, and teacher training gives them those little strategies and wrinkles that help them do their job. On the same note, I have never understood why people can not go into teaching later in life, without a degree. Careful selection, good support and rigorous training would produce good teachers.

 

Completely agree! I must admit I find the 'teacher bashing' on here gets to a ridiculous level at times, the majority of us work in schools and these people are our collegues, we should actually be working together for the good of the the school/children/community.

[penfold]

To be honest, I wouldn't be happy with with someone teaching any child without the training or qualifications to do it. It wouldn't happen in any other job. However, with enough life experience you can have a non qualified teacher do a good job of teaching a class.

 

What I am more concerned with is the way that teaching is monitored. I remember when I was in school that every pupil knew if you ended up in a particular teachers class you were going to fail the exam. Now if as kids we knew this, why wasn't something done about it? I have since worked with some very good teachers who go over and above what is required but unfortunately it is often the bad ones who stick out more and people remember. I would still rather a TA teach if they were better than a poor "qualified teacher" and they did a better job, but how would this be assessed?

 

All this realls highlights is that management in schools needs to be looked at to ensure that teaching standards are met. This shouldn't go down the us and them route lots of threads seem to take. I think most of us would agree that people who aren't up to the job shouldn't be teaching.