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| Credit: www.metalliform.co.uk |
It is a fact that teachers have been an essential part of
our education for centuries. However, recent research has suggested that teachers
are now being treated as commodities. As a society have we suddenly became
ignorant to the dedication teachers put in to work? And has this lack of
interest lead to a decrease in the standards of teaching?
Today, teachers are being paid buttons compared to other-
quite frankly- less important professions. Also, while many are under the
illusion that a teacher’s work ends with the school bell, like students, it
most assuredly does not, and can often lead to work consuming most of their
free time. This means many teachers put their personal relationship and their
health on the line in order to teach your son/daughter. This has led to a loss
of 50,000 teachers last year! And it
doesn’t stop there! This loss has left schools desperate for teachers and meant
they have had to employ underemployed/less qualified teachers in their
classrooms! Surely people can see that all these factors have a knock-on
effect! Bad pay, means more skilled teachers are forced to leave the
profession, meaning more less qualified teachers are getting jobs, meaning our
kids are not getting the quality of learning we expect, therefore it’s the
children who suffer when they try to get a job with 6 D’s, 4 U and a C at GCSE
and one A-Level! Now, instead of being seen as a job that requires skills and
qualifications, it is seen as a job that you go into when you can’t think of
anything better to do! Society sees little need for teachers to have deep
content knowledge or strong pedagogical expertise.
Not only this but because schools are strapped for teachers
they are employing under-qualified people to teach lessons. For example, in my
old school there were many examples of the two different ways this point can
branch into. Firstly, they were employing people who did not have the
qualifications to teach the particular subject, and then spent some of the
school budget to have them go on a “crash-course” for a month so they could
teach us. Secondly, we had science teachers and media teachers trying to teach
us PE and drama! Needless to say that I struggled in these subjects, and
required extra revision time from other teachers. The problem with the first
scenario is that the school is wasting money in order to find teachers for each
class, and the problem with the second one is that students are unable to learn
and forced to use up valuable time form other teachers, which can lead to them
falling behind with their work load if they accept and of course if they don’t then
the student falls behind. The uneducated child is then forced to try and seek
employment, while the stressed out teachers will probably end up leaving the
profession. As you can see no one benefits from this cycle!
Recently, George Osborne released the budget for 2016, stating
that there will be extra funding so that every school will be in the process of
becoming an academy by 2022. A quarter of secondary schools will be able to opt
into offering a longer school day from September 2017. And the government will
look at teaching maths to all pupils until they are 18 year olds. And while
these promises do look all fine and dandy, nothing has been done to the
standards of teaching or the environment which has caused teachers so much
aggravation for so long! Things need to be done! I am sick of seeing old bus
drivers attempting to teach maths, or seeing students just about able to spell
A* with no hope in hell of ever getting one!
While, I could never address all the burning issues that
aggravate me so much about this topic, it is important to note that there are
so many other aspects that make teaching one of the hardest jobs in today’s
society. Whether these issues are social, economic or political. The next time
you see a teacher I implore you to ask about their workload, to ask how much
spare time they have. Because I guarantee you that if you are someone who
thinks teaching is an easy job, you will be shocked by their response. Teachers
give up so much time for their students and their students’ families, to a
point were it is very unlikely that they will have a chance to have any free
time for themselves. They manage to balance so much and achieve so much, while
asking for so little in return, the only comparison I could ever make is to
some form of superhero. Putting other people’s needs-whether they are grateful
or not- in front of their own time and time again! It is so frustrating! Yet
they put up with it? They are the ones educating young people in order for them
to succeed in the future, and without them I would dread to think of the bleak
future that we would be faced with. It is time to stop treating teachers as
commodities, and value them for the pillars of society that they are…and maybe
stock up the staff room biscuit tin now and then!
Meet the author:
Faye Jones
Writer
I am 16 and currently studying English Literature, English Language and Government and Politics at Liverpool College. I am extremely opinionated and enjoy a good debate! And I encourage anyone to try and prove me wrong. So far I have only lived in Liverpool but have huge aspirations to move elsewhere and travel! While, I do enjoy discussing multiple topics I have a passion for education and politics!
Forget Wonder woman or Batman, teachers are the modern day super heroes
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Reviewed by Admin
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