Taoiseach wants teachers to work 40 hrs a week

anfield liv

Fair play to you Enda,that means I will have more time to spend with my family.The Sunday Indo Anti Teacher news rag has the story today. I am over the moon with this news.Turning in for work at 8.30 every morning and rarely finishing at 4.00 when the classes do as I have extra curricular activities ,eg.training a sports team,Croke Park hours and other meetings,my working week must stretch beyond 60 hours when correcting copies at home and preparing lessons is taken into consideration.(The rag with the story failed to publish my reply to the article in their forum which was word for word as I have noted here).
Fair play to our Taoiseach,if he could do another little job for me now I'd be over the moon,how about cutting the government taxes on fuel (70% of purchase price is tax) as its costing a fortune to actually get to work! Or better still why not give me 35,000 of a rise as he did for one of his cronies in the government,he intervened and added the 35,000 to and already inflated salary of 189,000 which was deemed too small a wage for the incoming civil servant.I suppose that would be asking too much and in these times of austerity I cannot be too greedy.In any case Thank You so much Taoiseach for reducing my working week down to 40 hours from its present 60 + ,my family will be sooooo pleased.

spurious

It means the same for me - less work.
I can stop bringing stuff home, or spending my weekends getting stuff for next week's classes.
Hurrah.

km79

spurious wrote: »

It means the same for me - less work.
I can stop bringing stuff home, or spending my weekends getting stuff for next week's classes.
Hurrah.

I
Same. And i assume all extra curricular will be encroporated into the 9 to 4? And meetings ?
I'd be all for it then

whiteandlight

If it incorporates all extra curricular, meetings, correction etc I'm all for it!

bdoo

Musicmental85 wrote: »

If it incorporates all extra curricular, meetings, correction etc I'm all for it!

9 to 5 cool!

Pa Dee

bdoo wrote: »

Musicmental85 wrote: »

If it incorporates all extra curricular, meetings, correction etc I'm all for it!

9 to 5 cool!

Hopefully you're not a maths teacher. You know lunch breaks and other breaks dont go towards the 40 hours....

km79

It probably should be pointed out that nowhere in the article does it mention 40 hours for teachers. It says in general a 10to20% increase in working hours. And a greater output from teachers. The only mention of 40 hours is for consultants and they are currently on 37 hours.

Wicklowleaid

Im the same lads don't know how I'm going to fill all this extra time off I'm going to have by only working a forty hour week, think i might fit in a part time job on weekends with all my free time. Sweet and they say there is no good news for teachers, cheers Kenny some man for one man.

MidlandsM

You are all talking bollox......40 hrs a week will be a major pain the rocks for ye, and ye know it.......the good days are over (but ye still have the massive holidays to avail of)

flatbackfour

MidlandsM wrote: »

You are all talking bollox......40 hrs a week will be a major pain the rocks for ye, and ye know it.......the good days are over (but ye still have the massive holidays to avail of)

You have not got a clue.

Since the reduction in special duties posts and AP posts more and more core middle management work is being done for free usually by younger teachers

I would urge teachers to stop acting like lackeys and only do 40 hours a work absolutely not a second more.

No more free training sessions no more free admin duties no talking to parents in own time I could go on

It really is time we got better PR because we are taking a hammering and the only way to redress the balance is to start playing hard ball.

flatbackfour

km79 wrote: »

It probably should be pointed out that nowhere in the article does it mention 40 hours for teachers. It says in general a 10to20% increase in working hours. And a greater output from teachers. The only mention of 40 hours is for consultants and they are currently on 37 hours.

2.2-4.4 more teaching hours plus prep time corrections etc brings it up to 6-8 hours

that means I am going to be working 50 hours a week.

MidlandsM

flatbackfour wrote: »

You have not got a clue.

how do you I don't...? It's you that does'nt have a clue!

Yours,


Clueless MM.:rolleyes::D

MidlandsM

flatbackfour wrote: »

that means I am going to be working 50 hours a week.

ohhhhhh, wow, big deal.......but what about your 3 months off in the summer and all the other time off/holidays?

km79

flatbackfour wrote: »

km79 wrote: »

It probably should be pointed out that nowhere in the article does it mention 40 hours for teachers. It says in general a 10to20% increase in working hours. And a greater output from teachers. The only mention of 40 hours is for consultants and they are currently on 37 hours.

2.2-4.4 more teaching hours plus prep time corrections etc brings it up to 6-8 hours

that means I am going to be working 50 hours a week.

I really doubt it will be more class time. It will probably in effect just recognize the work most teachers do extra. And get those that don't to start doing it.
That's my read on it anyway but I may be horribly wrong. I like to try and be optimistic though

Extinction

flatbackfour wrote: »

2.2-4.4 more teaching hours plus prep time corrections etc brings it up to 6-8 hours

that means I am going to be working 50 hours a week.

50 hours a week would probably equate to just enough holiday time worked to entitle you to the summer holidays and the rest of the holidays throughout the year.

ted1

Don't forget there's 52 weeks in the year with 21 days holidays. As stated above lunch hour and breaks aren't included in working hours. So average your working week hours over a 52 week period.

flatbackfour

MidlandsM wrote: »

ohhhhhh, wow, big deal.......but what about your 3 months off in the summer and all the other time off/holidays?

Oh the holidays................ its great three months off so sweet .........................................

TheDriver

being management, I can't wait for this. Though who will he get in to do all the timetabling, form filling etc??

seavill

km79 wrote: »

It probably should be pointed out that nowhere in the article does it mention 40 hours for teachers. It says in general a 10to20% increase in working hours. And a greater output from teachers. The only mention of 40 hours is for consultants and they are currently on 37 hours.

Apart from the huge title of the article "Taoiseach tells ministers to get teachers to work 40-hour week"

But as you said it actually doesn't mention this again in the article, "journalism"

Wicklowleaid

Lads while your busy moaning you could be a bit more proactive with your little existences, you would have the PDGE done and be on the 3 months off with the rest of us, come on and join the party and turn that frown upside down!

doc_17

km79 wrote: »

It probably should be pointed out that nowhere in the article does it mention 40 hours for teachers. It says in general a 10to20% increase in working hours. And a greater output from teachers. The only mention of 40 hours is for consultants and they are currently on 37 hours.

A big massive headline though!

km79

doc_17 wrote: »

km79 wrote: »

It probably should be pointed out that nowhere in the article does it mention 40 hours for teachers. It says in general a 10to20% increase in working hours. And a greater output from teachers. The only mention of 40 hours is for consultants and they are currently on 37 hours.

A big massive headline though!

I know that but I'm saying that no way will it be anything like that for teachers. Sensationalism at its best/worst. One thing I feel certain will go is the S&S scheme. I think it will become compulsory and will make up most of any extra hours ?

seavill

Surely they can only make it compulsory for new staff, how could they do this for existing staff with contracts etc.

km79

seavill wrote: »

Surely they can only make it compulsory for new staff, how could they do this for existing staff with contracts etc.

How would they go about changing existing contracts from 22 hours to the headline 40 hours ? At this point they will be rewriting all contracts ...

Miss Lockhart

A 40 hour week would be a reduction in my working hours and I would be perfectly happy with that. The problem is that the balance of the hours will no doubt be taken up with unnecessary nonsense and I will still have to do my worthwhile and necessary extra work in my own time.

bdoo

Pa Dee wrote: »

bdoo wrote: »

Musicmental85 wrote: »

If it incorporates all extra curricular, meetings, correction etc I'm all for it!

9 to 5 cool!

Hopefully you're not a maths teacher. You know lunch breaks and other breaks dont go towards the 40 hours....

No not maths. I'm in from 8 til half four or five most days and haven't eaten my lunch in the staffroom since September.

I'll do 9 til 6 if o have to at least I will be able to quote the organisation of working time act when I'm working as hard as a private sector employee and I can insist on my statutory breaks.

Of course living on the real world I realise that the only time I can help students is when they are in the School so I give a little.

If I am being asked to hang around in school until six I will eat my lunch at lunchtime and push paper in the evenings. It seems to be what people want

doc_17

If S&S goes then it'll probably be subsumed into CP hours. We have another meeting tomorrow evening. Guest speaker. No doubt it will be a mother shocking waste of time

gaeilgebeo

It would be great if my working week was reduced to 40 hours.
I would welcome the extra time to spend with my friends and family.
Doing school work every night and for a large chunk of weekends is over-rated!

kippy

I'm not sure what any of this is going to do.
There are only so many hours children of certain ages can sit in a classroom or other environment.
Increasing the (official) working week doesn't actually save any money either......

Trotter

kippy wrote: »

Increasing the (official) working week doesn't actually save any money either......

Yes but it gets people who see no good in teachers off the back of 'anything for a quiet life' politicians. If they think they'll get brownie points from the electorate, I wouldn't be surprised by any ridiculous decisions. Primary school children don't vote.

kippy

Trotter wrote: »

Yes but it gets people who see no good in teachers off the back of 'anything for a quiet life' politicians. If they think they'll get brownie points from the electorate, I wouldn't be surprised by any ridiculous decisions. Primary school children don't vote.

I dont think it will though.
You'll just end up with lots and lots of pissed off teachers, the majority of whom, I suspect, would prefer another cut in salary over an increase in the amount of hours they had to spend in the work environment with no reduction to the cost of education.

implausible

Such fcking nonsense! This headline just panders to the uninformed reader who thinks that teachers just teach a few classes, drink tea and have the whole summer off. It also plays to the fable that we have one of the shortest working weeks in the EU, while other countries include prep-time, department meetings and availability when calculating a teacher's weekly hours. It's like comparing apples and oranges!

sitstill

kippy wrote: »

I'm not sure what any of this is going to do.
There are only so many hours children of certain ages can sit in a classroom or other environment.
Increasing the (official) working week doesn't actually save any money either......

Will this mean teachers on part time hours will get more hours? :-)

Inspector Coptoor

You'd think Enda would know better as a former teacher himself.

For shame Kenny.

I spent 4 hours today preparing for the week ahead, lesson plans, experiment prep, making tests, putting power points & notes together.

If you take even more of the autonomy & good will away from teachers. We'll end up like the pen pushers in the civil service & the water cooler jockeys in the private sector, holding sheets of paper pretending to be productive from 8-5 mon- fri a s it'll be the kids that suffer.

byhookorbycrook

Inspector Coptoor wrote: »

You'd think Enda would know better as a former teacher himself.

For shame Kenny.

He might find himself back as a teacher if he's not careful.....

Mardy Bum

Inspector Coptoor wrote: »

You'd think Enda would know better as a former teacher himself.

For shame Kenny.

I spent 4 hours today preparing for the week ahead, lesson plans, experiment prep, making tests, putting power points & notes together.

If you take even more of the autonomy & good will away from teachers. We'll end up like the pen pushers in the civil service & the water cooler jockeys in the private sector, holding sheets of paper pretending to be productive from 8-5 mon- fri a s it'll be the kids that suffer.

More like a politician in waiting. They are all cut from the same cloth. Kenny will pander to the uninformed public all day long for a few more votes.

Chris68

sitstill wrote: »

Will this mean teachers on part time hours will get more hours? :-)

No, just half the pay or there abouts. Instead of getting paid say 11/22 of a wage they will get 11/40 of a wage. A 45% cut in wages. Thats where this proposal "saves" money. :mad:

bdoo

Chris68 wrote: »

No, just half the pay or there abouts. Instead of getting paid say 11/22 of a wage they will get 11/40 of a wage. A 45% cut in wages. Thats where this proposal "saves" money. :mad:

I would imagine that they would do 20/40 for the same money.

Holocene

Inspector Coptoor wrote: »

I spent 4 hours today preparing for the week ahead, lesson plans, experiment prep, making tests, putting power points & notes together.

If you take even more of the autonomy & good will away from teachers. We'll end up like the pen pushers in the civil service & the water cooler jockeys in the private sector, holding sheets of paper pretending to be productive from 8-5 mon- fri a s it'll be the kids that suffer.

Fair play to you, though if you could make your point without belittling the efforts of 50 per cent of the workforce maybe people would be more receptive to what you have to say. Non-teachers take an interest in this forum too!

as_mo_bhosca

Who is going to pay for the extra heating and lighting we will use to keep school buildings open longer hours?

Triangle

I don't get it. If all teachers are working 60+ hours a week, then how does this announcement really affect them? It's just pandering to the masses.

As far as I can see, (and it's by no means scientific) but the primary schools I pass in the morning have no staff cars outside them and again in the evening when i go home there is still no cars outside them. Again not conclusive, but it is mysterious.

E.T.

Triangle wrote: »

As far as I can see, (and it's by no means scientific) but the primary schools I pass in the morning have no staff cars outside them and again in the evening when i go home there is still no cars outside them. Again not conclusive, but it is mysterious.

Not mysterious at all. And most definitely not scientific. Most teachers I know (myself included) prefer to take paperwork home and do it there in comfort.

When I stay late it's to clean the classroom, meet parents, sort out art etc for the next day, attend weekly staff meetings or other parts of my job that can't be taken home.

I pass 2 separate parents most mornings going the opposite direction to me, and regularly meet them coming back from work in the evening. I wouldn't dream of taking this as any kind of "mysterious" evidence that they don't work hard.

Miss Lockhart

Triangle wrote: »

I don't get it. If all teachers are working 60+ hours a week, then how does this announcement really affect them? It's just pandering to the masses.

As far as I can see, (and it's by no means scientific) but the primary schools I pass in the morning have no staff cars outside them and again in the evening when i go home there is still no cars outside them. Again not conclusive, but it is mysterious.

You, like many commentators on the topic, are being deliberately obtuse.

Is there a reason a teacher can't do correction, planning, resource making etc at home? Do you think the Department will be happy to pay the extra light and heating costs for doing these hours in the school building?

Apart from the fact that the school is cold, there is poor internet speeds and no colour printers, I don't feel safe walking home from my school in the dark because of the area it is located. I don't see how my working from home takes away from the work I do.

namoosh

Tried to post a reply on the indo as well, strangely enough it wasnt shown either. 40 hours would be great it would reduce my working week considerably.

E.T.

Miss Lockhart wrote: »

I don't see how my working from home takes away from the work I do.

Ah Miss Lockhart, I think you've hit on a major point here. Many people are all for longer working days for teachers as long as it's contact time and the children are in school. They couldn't give a toss what other work has to be done by teachers, this just doesn't enter a lot of their heads.

km79

E.T. wrote: »

Triangle wrote: »

As far as I can see, (and it's by no means scientific) but the primary schools I pass in the morning have no staff cars outside them and again in the evening when i go home there is still no cars outside them. Again not conclusive, but it is mysterious.

Not mysterious at all. And most definitely not scientific. Most teachers I know (myself included) prefer to take paperwork home and do it there in comfort.

When I stay late it's to clean the classroom, meet parents, sort out art etc for the next day, attend weekly staff meetings or other parts of my job that can't be taken home.

I pass 2 separate parents most mornings going the opposite direction to me, and regularly meet them coming back from work in the evening. I wouldn't dream of taking this as any kind of "mysterious" evidence that they don't work hard.

That's the crazy thing about this alleged proposal . Many many teachers fill their "free time" during school hours doing voluntary activities outside the classroom such as training teams, choir, quiz, young scientist and so on. Corrections and prep work for these teachers is done at home in the evenings.
IF these proposals become a reality teachers will do the prep work and corrections in school time and forget about all the voluntary activities. In effect the majority of teachers will find a lightening of their workload but schools will become very different places. All goodwill will be gone and they will become just another place of work.
One last point on this. Apparently when Thatcher introduced similar measures in Engalnd in the 80s the English national soccer team began to decline in the early 90s when those kids became adults.
Why ? Because teachers stopped taking school teams .....
Parents who are calling for these measures really need to consider the impact . If it turns into a 9 to 5 job that's just what it will become. 9 to 5 . Clock in clock out .....

RealJohn

km79 wrote: »

That's the crazy thing about this alleged proposal . Many many teachers fill their "free time" during school hours doing voluntary activities outside the classroom such as training teams, choir, quiz, young scientist and so on. Corrections and prep work for these teachers is done at home in the evenings.
IF these proposals become a reality teachers will do the prep work and corrections in school time and forget about all the voluntary activities. In effect the majority of teachers will find a lightening of their workload but schools will become very different places. All goodwill will be gone and they will become just another place of work.
One last point on this. Apparently when Thatcher introduced similar measures in Engalnd in the 80s the English national soccer team began to decline in the early 90s when those kids became adults.
Why ? Because teachers stopped taking school teams .....
Parents who are calling for these measures really need to consider the impact . If it turns into a 9 to 5 job that's just what it will become. 9 to 5 . Clock in clock out .....

That's rubbish in all fairness. england were never that good. They won the World Cup once and never came close before or since.

The thing about that is it's good for teachers to take teams do I don't think there'd be that much of a reduction in that sort of activity. I imagine the same applies to choir or any other activity that gives the teacher time with the students outside of class time because it helps to improve the relationship the teacher has with the students which helps improve behaviour which improves learning outcomes so ultimately, it's better to do that sort of thing than not do it, even if it eats into the teacher's personal time.

Probably some people will refuse on principle but people who understand the benefits will step into the gap. I'm worried that FG and Labour know this and are counting on it.

bdoo

RealJohn wrote: »

km79 wrote: »

That's the crazy thing about this alleged proposal . Many many teachers fill their "free time" during school hours doing voluntary activities outside the classroom such as training teams, choir, quiz, young scientist and so on. Corrections and prep work for these teachers is done at home in the evenings.
IF these proposals become a reality teachers will do the prep work and corrections in school time and forget about all the voluntary activities. In effect the majority of teachers will find a lightening of their workload but schools will become very different places. All goodwill will be gone and they will become just another place of work.
One last point on this. Apparently when Thatcher introduced similar measures in Engalnd in the 80s the English national soccer team began to decline in the early 90s when those kids became adults.
Why ? Because teachers stopped taking school teams .....
Parents who are calling for these measures really need to consider the impact . If it turns into a 9 to 5 job that's just what it will become. 9 to 5 . Clock in clock out .....

That's rubbish in all fairness. england were never that good. They won the World Cup once and never came close before or since.

The thing about that is it's good for teachers to take teams do I don't think there'd be that much of a reduction in that sort of activity. I imagine the same applies to choir or any other activity that gives the teacher time with the students outside of class time because it helps to improve the relationship the teacher has with the students which helps improve behaviour which improves learning outcomes so ultimately, it's better to do that sort of thing than not do it, even if it eats into the teacher's personal time.

Probably some people will refuse on principle but people who understand the benefits will step into the gap. I'm worried that FG and Labour know this and are counting on it.

I think that they may too realjohn, but it's hard to see how it will work if teachers must work til 6 when do they train teams etc?

The benefits to extra curricular are massive but they could be threatened unintentionally by mandating a certain length of working week.

Of course nobody has broached the subject of June yet! That would keep the public happy etc and teachers correcting their own exams in June will save millions on the JC.

rainbowtrout

RealJohn wrote: »

That's rubbish in all fairness. england were never that good. They won the World Cup once and never came close before or since.

The thing about that is it's good for teachers to take teams do I don't think there'd be that much of a reduction in that sort of activity. I imagine the same applies to choir or any other activity that gives the teacher time with the students outside of class time because it helps to improve the relationship the teacher has with the students which helps improve behaviour which improves learning outcomes so ultimately, it's better to do that sort of thing than not do it, even if it eats into the teacher's personal time.

Probably some people will refuse on principle but people who understand the benefits will step into the gap. I'm worried that FG and Labour know this and are counting on it.

Benefits or not, if teachers were to be asked to be physically in the building doing paperwork or whatever until 5pm each day and do a 9-5 day as it were, I think there will be a reduction in the number that are willing to stay on and take extra curricular after this.

Teachers have lives too that involve families, children, other commitments outside of school, some commute long distance to work and in the middle of all that if the work day is extended something has to give. And in those circumstances it tends to be voluntary stuff.

byhookorbycrook

I don't see how someone could be forced to do "extra curricular",these activities, as as the name suggests, outside of school hours.

Since Croke Park doesn't recognise any of this stuff at primary level, many teachers now only play matches during school hours.

The other issue is how you can force someone who doesn't know a basketball from a bowling ball to take on a team!!

Inspector Coptoor

You try being a young teacher on half hours or a teacher new to a school on a one year contract looking to get back the following school year & you'll see quite quickly that no one "forces" you.

You'll also see that if you don't contribute to school life in this way that you probably won't get your contract renewed.

The lack of job security for teachers who started after 2004 is scary.

Whats also scary is how little money they are paying graduates from this year onwards.

All the Bull$h1t you've been fed in the media about secure, gold-plated pensions doesmt apply to this cohort of teachers.
I'm in my 6th year teaching, 29 years old & have no job security & am stuck paying rent cause I can't get a mortgage.

Hardly a handy number