A message to wannabe teachers - Stay away from teaching.

marienbad

Peter Flynt wrote: »

Given a choice I would gladly take all my pension contributions and have them returned to me (and out of the pension scheme) as I don't trust the bastards.

In industry most jobs have appraisals, bonuses with salary increases each year.

These increases may vary from small to very large. . but they are still increases.

I wouldn't pay a plumber with more experience?

Why not?

You could end up paying more in the long run.

Yes in industry you do have appraisals each year, bonuses are completely optional and linked to both your and the companies performance.

And once you reach the top of the pay scale for any given job you only get cost of living increases , not incremental increases just for staying in the job. So they are not increasing you pay year on year just keeping you in line with inflation.

If you want more either change jobs or get promoted . There is only so much one pays for a pound of butter . When it was made or how well it was stored or whatever does not change its essential properties - it is still a pound of butter.

If it were otherwise a store man at that top of his scale but still getting incremental increases could be on more that his new store manager at the bottom of his scale - simply wouldn't happen .

And no I wouldn't pay a plumber with more experience more with the caveat I already included - which is after a certain amount of time you have all the experience you need for that particular role and anything else is not new, just repetition.

Maryanne40

Well I salute you if you put 4 kids through college with less money than that AND on higher taxes; you're a better woman than I am.

Equal pay for equal work you say....hard to argue with that. But you see, I don't think the quality of the work IS equal without life experience, in an endeavour like teaching. As I said, one can't teach to a formula: it is something that is always in a state of flux and constantly evolving. Why do our younger teachers regularly seek the advice of the older heads, if experience is irrelevant? Do your 4 children know as much as you do? Make decisions as informed as your's?

I think we'll have to agree to disagree on that one.

I'm off to bed...play nicely folks

seavill

PanBrian wrote: »

Do teachers really stay up this late?:rolleyes:

Those of us that have taken some on a trip after school and are still not home yet are still up. Work at 9 in the morning.

No credit or pay for that.

But us horrible teachers wouldn't deserve anything obviously

marienbad

Maryanne40 wrote: »

Well I salute you if you put 4 kids through college with less money than that AND on higher taxes; you're a better woman than I am.

Equal pay for equal work you say....hard to argue with that. But you see, I don't think the quality of the work IS equal without life experience, in an endeavour like teaching. As I said, one can't teach to a formula: it is something that is always in a state of flux and constantly evolving. Why do our younger teachers regularly seek the advice of the older heads, if experience is irrelevant? Do your 4 children know as much as you do? Make decisions as informed as your's?

I think we'll have to agree to disagree on that one.

I'm off to bed...play nicely folks

I am not saying life experience is irrelevant or that practical teaching experience is irrelevant .Indeed it is essential .

But an apprenticeship can be only so long- no more than 5 years and then one should move rapidly through the grade to the top of the scale and it should never be possible to be paid twice as much as an equally qualified colleague for the same work.

Peter Flynt

marienbad wrote: »

I am not saying life experience is irrelevant or that practical teaching experience is irrelevant .Indeed it is essential .

But an apprenticeship can be only so long- no more than 5 years and then one should move rapidly through the grade to the top of the scale and it should never be possible to be paid twice as much as an equally qualified colleague for the same work.

I'm paid more than one of my colleagues an we both teach the same subject.

I give all her all of my teaching resources (built up over many years) and provide (hopefully useful) advice to help her students.

So presumably I should be paid less. Right?

marienbad

Pwpane wrote: »

You have not backed up this statement (or your ladyfriend's salary statement) with any link at all, independent or not. Are you reading your own posts?

No one else provided the evidence for you either. Are you yourself reading the thread?

What evidence do you have for this statement? If you have none, please have the grace to acknowledge it as an ill-informed opinion.

Maryanne's post - no 152

marienbad

Peter Flynt wrote: »

I'm paid more than one of my colleagues an we both teach the same subject.

I give all her all of my teaching resources (built up over many years) and provide (hopefully useful) advice to help her students.

So presumably I should be paid less. Right?

Not at all- but after a limited number of years if that colleague is doing the same job as you they should be paid the same as you.

Peter Flynt

marienbad wrote: »

Not at all- but after a limited number of years if that colleague is doing the same job as you they should be paid the same as you.

That can only happen if my salary is stalled and hers is increased.

Here is the pre-2010 pay scale

Note there are only two rises in eleven years at the upper levels whilst at the lower levels the teacher is rewarded for their gaining experience

marienbad

Peter Flynt wrote: »

That can only happen if my salary is stalled and hers is increased.

Here is the pre-2010 pay scale

Note there are only two rises in ten years at the upper levels whilst at the lower levels the teacher is rewarded for their gaining experience

Yes yours should be stalled and hers increased , as your predecessors should have been stalled and yours increased .

How long did it take you to reach the top of the scale ?

Peter Flynt

marienbad wrote: »

Yes yours should be stalled and hers increased , as your predecessors should have been stalled and yours increased .

How long did it take you to reach the top of the scale ?

. . . and what you're asking for occurs.

Two pay rises in 11 years for those more experienced.

I'm not at the top of the scale.

marienbad

Peter Flynt wrote: »

. . . and what you're asking for occurs.

Two pay rises in 11 years for those more experienced.

I'm not at the top of the scale.

Same question applies - how long for you or anybody to the top of the scale ?

Peter Flynt

marienbad wrote: »

Same question applies - how long for you or anybody to the top of the scale ?

Who knows?

Used to be rise one point per year.

Now with Haddington Road it's one rise per 15 months to one rise per 18 months.

At this stage I'm out. . . . you should educate yourself about the profession before making claims which have no bearing on reality.

marienbad

Peter Flynt wrote: »

Who knows?

Used to be rise one point per year.

Now with Haddington Road it's one rise per 15 months to one rise per 18 months.

At this stage I'm out. . . . you should educate yourself about the profession before making claims which have no bearing on reality.

Don't be so hasty - you are just confirming for me what I already believed .

No profession can prosper long term when the top and bottom of the scale varies so greatly and for so long for exactly the same work. It is inherently unstable and it is a wonder it took this long and the troika for that reality to sink in.

In the meantime we will have a two tier system until the retirements and disillusionment takes its toll .

evolving_doors

marienbad wrote: »

Don't be so hasty - you are just confirming for me what I already believed .

No profession can prosper long term when the top and bottom of the scale varies so greatly and for so long for exactly the same work. It is inherently unstable and it is a wonder it took this long and the troika for that reality to sink in.

In the meantime we will have a two tier system until the retirements and disillusionment takes its toll .

I'm used to having the carcass of my payslip picked over as a teacher...and then compared to all and sundries in the private sector (for which I pay their wages too btw).

Maybe in the interest of balance and fairness here other posters would like to divulge their own occupation?

ledgebag1

Armelodie wrote: »

(for which I pay their wages too btw).

Maybe in the interest of balance and fairness here other posters would like to divulge their own occupation?

What do you mean by that statement?

I work in administration for a not for
Profit organisation, if you want to see a picked apart pay slip we can meet and maybe you can pay me?

Mod correction; see post 260 for correction!

Inspector Coptoor

Yawn

Like rehab?
They're a great organization....

ledgebag1

No, it is a charity i would be on a better salary if it is rehab, are you a teacher?

Also if you check my posts I haven't criticised any teacher or their salary, and the last time I checked organisation was spelled with an S.

itsaposter

I assume we're still talking about why students might be advised to stay away from teaching?

If so one of the biggest problems facing dedicated secondary teachers is that they're expected to do so much in a week. And since many people are blind to work that needs to be done outside of actual classroom teaching it's not alone thankless but gets them abuse.

20 years ago schools could get away with this, few parents were familiar with educational systems abroad. Back then no one cared if 5 years of second language teaching left a student with the conversational capability of a toddler as long as it generated an A or B in hons for the leaving.

Now parents are expecting their children to be taught as well here as everywhere else, so the pressure to do more will increase and there literally isn't time in the week to do everything.

If we really want to fix this - to improve the daily life for teachers and to improve how our pupils are taught, we've got to actually consider solutions.

So if we all agree there too many teaching hours in the week. How do you fix that and not alone have it not cost a fortune but save money due to a new more relaxed timetable, it's simple cut the weekly teaching/classroom hours and lengthen the school year, move us from a developing world style of school year to a modern style.

We don't need a school year set because it's been that way for maybe 100+ years, we don't need to throw our hands in the air because there's a state exam to schedule. Not every problem needs money thrown at it.

evolving_doors

ledgebag1 wrote: »

No, it is a charity i would be on a better salary if it is rehab, are you a teacher?

Also if you check my posts I haven't criticised any teacher or their salary, and the last time I checked organisation was spelled with an S.

Apologies Ledgebag1 (and Peter), I quoted Marienbad ( not ledgebag1 who thinks I was referring to them). for the record, Ledgebag1 hasnt criticised any ones wages...

ledgebag1

No harm at all and thanks, this thread could be very positive so let's move on with that, thanks again

gaeilgebeo

MOD WARNING :

This thread is about a teacher's perspective on whether or not to enter the profession.
It has descended into a debate about a teacher's salary and the justification of such.
Any further off-topic posts will be removed and posters infracted.
Back on topic please.

acequion

I'm just returning to the land of the living after an entire week of the worst flu I have ever had. Megabucks for guessing what caused it!!!

This is a fantastic thread with some truly enlightening posts. Unfortunately there is also loads of rubbish from various teacher bashers who haven't the remotest clue of what they're talking about.

Would I recommend teaching as a profession? I have no hesitation in saying that I would not and I say it with regret, because up to this decade I was proud to be a teacher and like so many others I am sickened to the core with the relentless attacks on the profession,accompanied by highly unreasonable demands on teachers.

I'm in a luckier position than many as I'll be retired in ten years at most,and hopefully will get out sooner. Like other posters,I very much enjoy teaching and though my school is large and highly pressurised,there is great collegiality and respect among the staff and maybe it's because I'm a senior teacher,nobody interferes in how I do my work. Some poster was trying to claim that experience doesn't matter. Well it does.Not just in teaching but in every walk of life and I certainly would pay more for the experienced plumber. That's a no brainer.

But,like everybody else, I'm worn out and burned out from constant work. And even at that,many corners have to be cut or I'd go insane. Those cut corners are usually with 1st,2nd and 4th years,but of course Quinn will soon be putting paid to that. Don't get me wrong.They're still well taught but at a much more relaxed pace.Musicmental85 mentioned in a post that prep and correction hours should be part of the contract and I wholeheartedly agree. On the one hand, there are all sorts of national campaigns for stress reduction,work life balance,family time,yet it is frightening that no logical person in authority appears to realise that teachers just CANNOT humanely do all that is expected of them without very serious personal or health consequences.I reckon it won't be long until we see someone taking a case against the employer on health grounds.

One last thing though. God forbid that they would shorten the school year! It's the only thing we have left and with the health risks of the job it is very necessary. Don't buy the spin that we have way longer holidays than other countries.If I were feeling a bit better right now,I'd dig out the link to school holidays [I think it's one of the OECD tables] but there are several countries with 10-12 week summer holidays and one or two with 13-14 weeks.Ok, there are also some with 8-9 weeks.England happens to be one of, if not, the worst.

At the moment you'd want the skin of a rhino or else the vocation of a saint to go into teaching.

Ambersky

There are also opportunities for teachers working outside of the mainstream school setting.
I took early retirement this year at 57 and have been teaching since I was first qualified and in my position post of responsibility were not available so I was on an ordinary salary and just reached the top of the salary scale a year before retirement. Like many teachers I worked for 11 years part time so I wont be retiring on a huge pension but it will be enough to get me by especially if I take up some part time work somewhere else.
I have no regrets as I had a great time in teaching and actually a couple of my past pupils working in another agency invited me in to have a chat with them and I now have a couple of hours work on their recommendation. I worked in a couple of VEC outreach centers and my students were people who needed independence training, so to have been sought out by them and to have recommendations from them, based on their past experiences of me as a teacher and what they learned with me, is actually very moving. I was passionate about my work and regularly had to work with others to create a better understanding of the people I worked with and for the provision of better facilities for my students in society in general.

I was lucky because the ability to get onto a students wavelength, to make them feel confident and good about themselves, to find a way to explain a thing again and again if needed but in different ways, the fact of being excited by your subject, the ability to present your subjects possibilities in a convincing way and finally the ability to ... Be Creative .. were things that were valued at one time in my career.
I think that standardisation now eliminates a lot of that creativity and diversity of approach. The constant paperwork displays a lack of trust, a kind of proving that you are actually working and planning in the way set out for you. So if I were beginning teaching now I dont think teaching would have suited me.

As I said I have worked in outreach centers and while in this situation things can be exciting, challenging and very rewarding I have always watched the way other workers regularly disappeared. I dont want to name where I worked but I have observed that working on the ground people are expendable and despite any reasons, inspections or arguments it will ultimately be the Organisation that will continue.
These centers often have a variety of sources funding their staff, paid by the Dept of Health, charitable donations, the Dept of Education and the VEC. All of my VEC colleagues were part time or after a bit of a struggle have been put on CIDs. People are moved or let go, based yes on need, but also because of politics and people can easily and correctly feel like pawns in someone elses game. An internal survey within the organisation I worked for recently found several complaints of bullying as well as rampant nepotism but Im so jaded I dont have much hope that this report will really change anything.

Teachers working in centers like this can have very rewarding careers but you can get very isolated from the rest of the teaching profession and you are also, I think, more vulnerable. I think the best thing is to take the good bits, learn loads, do what you can and be prepared to get out when and if it starts to do you damage.

marienbad

acequion wrote: »

I'm just returning to the land of the living after an entire week of the worst flu I have ever had. Megabucks for guessing what caused it!!!

This is a fantastic thread with some truly enlightening posts. Unfortunately there is also loads of rubbish from various teacher bashers who haven't the remotest clue of what they're talking about.

Would I recommend teaching as a profession? I have no hesitation in saying that I would not and I say it with regret, because up to this decade I was proud to be a teacher and like so many others I am sickened to the core with the relentless attacks on the profession,accompanied by highly unreasonable demands on teachers.

I'm in a luckier position than many as I'll be retired in ten years at most,and hopefully will get out sooner. Like other posters,I very much enjoy teaching and though my school is large and highly pressurised,there is great collegiality and respect among the staff and maybe it's because I'm a senior teacher,nobody interferes in how I do my work. Some poster was trying to claim that experience doesn't matter. Well it does.Not just in teaching but in every walk of life and I certainly would pay more for the experienced plumber. That's a no brainer.

But,like everybody else, I'm worn out and burned out from constant work. And even at that,many corners have to be cut or I'd go insane. Those cut corners are usually with 1st,2nd and 4th years,but of course Quinn will soon be putting paid to that. Don't get me wrong.They're still well taught but at a much more relaxed pace.Musicmental85 mentioned in a post that prep and correction hours should be part of the contract and I wholeheartedly agree. On the one hand, there are all sorts of national campaigns for stress reduction,work life balance,family time,yet it is frightening that no logical person in authority appears to realise that teachers just CANNOT humanely do all that is expected of them without very serious personal or health consequences.I reckon it won't be long until we see someone taking a case against the employer on health grounds.

One last thing though. God forbid that they would shorten the school year! It's the only thing we have left and with the health risks of the job it is very necessary. Don't buy the spin that we have way longer holidays than other countries.If I were feeling a bit better right now,I'd dig out the link to school holidays [I think it's one of the OECD tables] but there are several countries with 10-12 week summer holidays and one or two with 13-14 weeks.Ok, there are also some with 8-9 weeks.England happens to be one of, if not, the worst.

At the moment you'd want the skin of a rhino or else the vocation of a saint to go into teaching.

Sad to see a post like this where anyone who dares to depart from the agreed hymn sheet is deemed a teacher basher .

The less said about the deliberate distortion of other posts the better as the alternative is a staggering lack of comprehension and that would be unbelievable lack in one in the teaching profession so long.

The scary thing about such posts is that pupils are rarely if every mentioned.

spurious

marienbad wrote: »

The scary thing about such posts is that pupils are rarely if every mentioned.

Oh please give it a rest. The thread is about teachers.

marienbad

spurious wrote: »

Oh please give it a rest. The thread is about teachers.

Oh please grow up. Can you realistically discuss one without the other ?

I know lets chat about gardiners and never mention plants or chauffers and never mention cars.

whiteandlight

marienbad wrote: »

Sad to see a post like this where anyone who dares to depart from the agreed hymn sheet is deemed a teacher basher .

The less said about the deliberate distortion of other posts the better as the alternative is a staggering lack of comprehension and that would be unbelievable lack in one in the teaching profession so long.

The scary thing about such posts is that pupils are rarely if every mentioned.

This will be my last reply to you because if you cannot see how many of the issues spoken about here affect pupils it's not worth continuing a discussion with you.

Pay and conditions demoralise teachers-who wants pupils under those conditions? Have you ever worked under a manager that was demoralised? It's very difficult.

There have been many posts regarding the problems with the new JC and the issues with it. Again this will have a huge impact on pupils, students will not be assessed by anyone but there teacher except for one terminal exam at 18? That's mental. They will have no experience with the rote learning required for leaving cert because the JC has been reformed without any consideration of it.

Cut budgets in schools have resulted in guidance counsellors/sna's/basic investment all being cut. These are all impacting on students to a greater or lesser extent depending on the goodwill of teachers.

I honestly believe that if all teachers stopped doing the multitude of voluntary work they do from extracurricular to pastoral care then perhaps the nation might finally wake up to the impact this is having and see past the view 'teachers have it great, they're just moaners'

Ambersky

Oh yes I forgot to mention that. The anti teacher sentiment where you cant talk about your own situation, how your working conditions are impacting on your life without it somehow implying that you are inconsiderate of the impact it also has on the students makes it really difficult when you are having real problems.
Its not only teachers in Ireland who suffer from anti teacher sentiment or populist notions of how easy teachers have it. This seems to be experienced in a lot of places
This is an American version of the kinds of comment teachers hear all the time, its a different situation with teachers working under different conditons yet the questions and comments are the same. If you want to take up the profession you might want to get use to them wherever you go.
http://www.upworthy.com/12-things-you-should-never-ever-say-to-teachers?c=reccon1

marienbad

Ambersky wrote: »

Oh yes I forgot to mention that. The anti teacher sentiment where you cant talk about your own situation, how your working conditions are impacting on your life without it somehow implying that you are inconsiderate of the impact it also has on the students makes it really difficult when you are having real problems.
Its not only teachers in Ireland who suffer from anti teacher sentiment or populist notions of how easy teachers have it. This seems to be experienced in a lot of places
This is an American version of the kinds of comment teachers hear all the time, its a different situation with teachers working under different conditons yet the questions and comments are the same. If you want to take up the profession you might want to get use to them wherever you go.
http://www.upworthy.com/12-things-you-should-never-ever-say-to-teachers?c=reccon1

Of course you can and should talk about your own situation , but that is virtually all you talk about .

The biggest cause of anti-teacher sentiment is the unwillingness , not just now, but for decades ,to ever accept that it might be a good profession with great pay and conditions, compared to the economy of which it is part..

solerina

marienbad wrote: »

Of course you can and should talk about your own situation , but that is virtually all you talk about .

The biggest cause of anti-teacher sentiment is the unwillingness , not just now, but for decades ,to ever accept that it might be a good profession with great pay and conditions, compared to the economy of which it is part..

You have made your point, over and over, now can you please stop making it and leave us to discuss the real point this thread was started for !!
I for one am fed up of seeing your negative comments about something you really have no real understanding of !!