Received from: Community
Congress recognises that staff retention and recruitment is a particular challenge for the education and school sector. Congress notes the latest workforce survey by the Department for Education showing that 40,000 teachers resigned from state schools last year – almost 9 per cent of the teaching workforce, and the highest number since it began publishing the data in 2011.
Congress also notes the results of the government’s own ‘Working Lives of Teachers and Leaders’ survey, showing that:
i. the most cited reason for considering leaving were high workload (92 per cent) and government initiatives or policy changes (76 per cent)
ii. more than half of all teachers thought their workload was unacceptable and they did not have sufficient control over it
iii. two-thirds of teachers report spending more than half of their working time on tasks other than teaching (rising to 77 per cent for secondary school teachers).
Congress recognises that reducing the overall workload pressures on teaching staff, allowing them more time to focus on teaching and less time on administrative and other tasks, is a crucial to redressing the retention issue presently faced.
Congress calls on the TUC to:
a. lobby government to publish the full results of their ‘Working Lives of Teachers and Leaders’ survey
b. work in partnership with teachers and unions to develop policy solutions for the specific problem of workload pressures, such as facilitating an increase to PPA (planning, preparation and assessment) time and greater levels of flexibility around PPA work.
Community
AMENDMENT
› Add new point under “Conference calls on the TUC to”:
“c. support industrial action and campaigning by affiliates to secure a national contractual limit on the working time of teachers and headteachers in schools and colleges.”
NASUWT