I really hate this country ....

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Originally posted by Don Atkinson:
Dom was whinging about having to work and pay taxes. He suggested life in a cave would be idyllic, no more work and no more taxes. I made it clear that I wouldn't feed such a person, in other words 'wake up Dom, you have to work to feed yourself'...yes, even in a cave.

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Ah, but, Don, I don't see feeding myself as "working"; we have to work to pay for food right now, but if it was caveman times, you're not forced to sit in a crappy overheated office with people you don't neccessarily like, being stressed out at muppets ringing/emailing with stupid problems; you feed yourself as and when. I'd much rather be a farmer than what I do now, but the pay's too pants; being a self sufficient farmer in Thailand though, I could handle.

__________________________
Don't wanna be cremated or buried in a grave
Just dump me in a plastic bag and leave me on the pavement
A tribute to your modern world, your great society
I'm just another victim of your highrise fantasy!

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It will record our culpability in facilitating what I suspect will become the bloodiest civil war in history.

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What's your basis for this belief? I assume you're talking about Iraq, where there seem to be a tiny rump of terrorists and a huge majority of people with diverse views but where they really would like to simply get on with it. I don't see how there can be a true civil war, let along 'the bloodiest in history'.

Paul

"Do the Dead Kennedys thing and "kill the poor" (and chavs) Just kidding"

Erm, you do realise that the Dead Kennedy's were indeed "just kidding". And that, much like your sig, it's meant to be ironic/satire?

Matthew

Well Paul

Obviously I'm not a prophet, but Iraq is simply not a country. It is an assemblage of three/four very different groups of people, none of which agrees with the others. In fact to generalise rather about history in many ways - it was Britain's creation. We have seen what Saddam Hussein did to the Kurds, and it will happen again. Saddam, it seems, discovered the only way by which Iraq could be held together (not that I'm defending it of course). Democracy, quite apart from not being the perfect system people appear to believe it, is in many fundamental ways completely contrary to the teachings of the Koran. Many - possibly most - Iraqis simply do not want democracy, and certainly not Bush and Blair's enforced version of it. As it stands despite the presence of vast numbers of well armed troops from the strongest fighting nations on earth, there is already resistance and in-fighting. When (possibly if, although Vietnam suggests there will be an end eventually) those troops are withdrawn, the populace of Iraq will not suddenly start to get on with one another.

I regret that I strongly feel I might be in a position this time next year to say "I told you so". But I bloody hope I'm wrong, really I do.

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
"Do the Dead Kennedys thing and "kill the poor" (and chavs) Just kidding"

Erm, you do realise that the Dead Kennedy's were indeed "just kidding". And that, much like your sig, it's meant to be ironic/satire?

Matthew

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Yep - of course; they're not after all a Nazi fascist punk band, unlike some of them

BTW - I know my sig's ironic, but in many respects this is what I'd want when I die - I'll probably end up as kebab meat or something Failing that, I might sell my body to medical research - I've heard they'll pay up front if you bequeath them your body, and since I have a rare syndrome, it's got to be worth something!

__________________________
Don't wanna be cremated or buried in a grave
Just dump me in a plastic bag and leave me on the pavement
A tribute to your modern world, your great society
I'm just another victim of your highrise fantasy!

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Stephen- I agree. I had 7 major school extensions to do last year (mainly sports halls), I have three school extensions on site currently and 2 university blocks to design this summer. There is a massive amount of cash going into schools.

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Ditto here

Though it`s a pity that (in my area at least) there is a chronic and desperate problem recruiting and retaining teaching staff.... so all that new equipment and new buildings (everlasting monuments to New Labour??!!)are sitting effectively idle

I think that the government could well take on board the response given about 10 years ago by Richard Branson as to what makes for a successful enterprise. The response was along the lines that the premises/facilities were largely inconsequential.....the critical point was to recruit the best quality, most highly motivated staff and treat and reward them very well indeed.

The above comments, sadly, simply reinforce my conviction that new Labour places more emphasis on PRESENTATION rather than CONTENT...ie if you can show the world shiny new buildings, then the fact that what goes on inside them is almost worthless doesn`t matter



laurie s

Laurie,

If you view the building of a new school or hospital as presentation rather than content then I'm not sure what anybody could do to convince you otherwise.

A better example of "presentation not content" would be, say, claiming "the NHS is safe in my hands" and then leaving our hospitals to gradually fall to bits.

Matthew

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Originally posted by Laurie Saunders:
Though it`s a pity that (in my area at least) there is a chronic and desperate problem recruiting and retaining teaching staff
laurie s

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I'm not sure this is much to do with money. I did think of training to be a teacher and I would have earned more than I was earning at the time. However, it's a really hard job, for which I'm not sure any salary would be enough for me to do it.

Teaching is a vocation. Only a certain type of person becomes (or we should want to become) a teacher. Several friends have left teaching. In each case, it was nothing to do with the money and all to do with the stress of teaching. And before anyone cries 'class size!' I'll remind them how hard and stressful teaching has always been. We regulary put teachers in hospital when I was at school - mainly for psychological problems....

That's not to say that teachers shouldn't be paid more. Or Nurses. Or GPs and politicians less.

Regards

Stephen

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
A better example of "presentation not content" would be, say, claiming "the NHS is safe in my hands" and then leaving our hospitals to gradually fall to bits.

Matthew

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or 'We shall have a free vote on Foxhunting', allowing several, then doing nothing, while still saying that it's a current policy.



Stephen

If a politician is in power and speaks its a lie, if he's in opposition its a future lie and if he's Libdem he can say what he likes cause he won't be found out.
A classic here is the building of "Fastway" guided bus system. £30m total disruption to the roads in town could have been done with "dud lane" painted on the road. To cap it all they are moving the A&E 8 miles up the road because of costs. BTW you would be lucky to get to the "new" hospital in 15 mins even with blues and 2s.
My wife is a primary school teacher, and yes it is a difficult job but so rewarding seeing the kids through their first stages of learning.The red tape bullshit is unbelievable though.

Howard

Howard

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posted Thu 10 June 04 11:30
Laurie,

If you view the building of a new school or hospital as presentation rather than content then I'm not sure what anybody could do to convince you otherwise.

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I`ve nothing agains presentation per se, I am fully in favour of it; only when it seems to be inversely related to content that I have a problem, because then it becomes a deception, by promising much and delivering little.

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Teaching is a vocation. Only a certain type of person becomes (or we should want to become) a teacher.

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Rather a romantic, quaint,view of the world IMO

This phrase is often used as an excuse for overwork and underpay(similar to nursing)IMO

Laurie S

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Originally posted by Laurie Saunders:

Rather a romantic, quaint,view of the world IMO

This phrase is often used as an excuse for overwork and underpay(similar to nursing)IMO

Laurie S

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I totally agree with the latter point.

However, while it is true thatI am an incurable romantic , I don't see that assuming that some people are drawn to teaching on grounds other than the slary or status is a romantic notion. The same is true in Nursing and other 'caring' sectors.

Regards

Stephen

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Originally posted by Laurie Saunders:
This phrase is often used as an excuse for overwork and underpay(similar to nursing)IMO

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My wife is a teacher and current salaries aren't actually all that bad. She's top of the unpromoted teacher grade and her salary is in excess of £30K. Yes she's very busy but that's as much because she gets involved in lots of activities because she enjoys them, as it is to do with course preperation and marking etc.

So far this school year she's been paid to do a weeks mountain leadership, she's done one week in the Cairngorms doing outdoor stuff, 2 weeks away on a hillwalking project, she's had climbing instruction (and is off doing the same again tonight), had lots of sailing training (she runs the sailing club), been off hillwalking or sailing with the school on various day and weekend trips (a guided trip along the Aonach Eagach ridge being this weekends outing) and has attended various work related courses and conferences. Many of her colleagues will be off to various parts of the world with clubs/teams etc over the summer (climbing in South America, the pipe band visiting Japan, the rugby team touring the continent). Sounds like a pretty decent job doesn't it, as long as you're not totally in it for the money. Yes she gets paid a lot less than I do, but it seems to be she enjoys her job much more as well. The long holidays would be also be nice.

Well, I can only speak from my own experience of the non-school sector.

We have a Chief Executive, Financial Director, performance targets, endless meetings discussing the latest madcap theories to emerge from the Government quangos. If we don`t follow the Right Way then we are sent on "mentorship" (ie indoctrination) courses.



Our performance is continuously being measured using absurd parameters as yardsticks...all that happens is that efforts are then (wastefully) expended in trying to satisfy these meaningless targets so that the goverment can broadcast to the nation that things really are improving

It the MANAGEMENT(aka the Government) that are trying to rid the system of the "romantic", vocational viewpoint, and ram the "business", "efficiency" ethic down everyone`s throat....to the point of absurdity.

I could go on , though it would probably become boring

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Sounds like a pretty decent job doesn't it, as long as you're not totally in it for the money.

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With all due respect, that comment might carry more credibilty were it to come from an "insider". It is easy to understand how an "outsider" might form that view, and I groan silently each time I hear it expressed

I have spent many years in industry (engineering contracting) and I can tell you easily that education is no soft option. The teaching side of things is the easy, enjoyable bit.

Regarding the long holidays, my contract allows 41 days per annum, which in the context of a typically 70 hour week (37 "contacted"....the rest "goodwill") does not seem excessive, also given the intensive nature of those hours (try asking an actor to perform on stage for 6 plus hours every day)

If the job is as attrctive as you are suggesting,then why is there a crisis in recruitment and retention of staff?


Laurie S

[This message was edited by Laurie Saunders on Thu 10 June 2004 at 14:23.]

Low pay for teachers is a bit of a fallacy. A pal of mine aged 35 is a secondary school Head of Music. He gets heaps of time off, is never at work later than about 5pm and gets plenty of lessons free in the day. All this for £36 300 in Bristol!! Contrast that with most of my peer group in the apparently well paid IT field who seemingly earn around £35-£50 000 and that's in the South East where living costs are a lot more. I will wager that £36000 in Bristol is in the GP salary band, probably considerably more than most high street bank managers and the equal of most solicitors. I've stopped feeling sorry for teacher's pay after knowing my friend!

I should also point out that my pal is able to earn several hundreds of pounds more a month doing private tuition and concerts so his take home looks very nice indeed.

Jonathan

Laurie said "We have a Chief Executive, Financial Director, performance targets, endless meetings discussing the latest madcap theories to emerge"

It sounds exaclty like the private sector.

"apparently well paid IT field who seemingly earn around £35-£50 000 and that's in the South East"

IT Graduates in the SE can expect to be earning at least £35k within 3 - 5 years of graduating. £50k would be about average for a experienced IT professional with 5+ years. More senior IT roles earn you about £60 - £100k.

"I will wager that £36000 in Bristol is in the GP salary band"

My mate is a GP in North Wales and earns about £80k a year and I'm pretty sure he'd earn that in Bristol as well.

A good teacher is easily worth £40 to £50k IMHO.

Matthew

Jonathan - FWIW it's substantially more than a similar-age architect can expect hereabouts!

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Originally posted by Laurie Saunders:

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Sounds like a pretty decent job doesn't it, as long as you're not totally in it for the money.

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With all due respect, that comment might carry more credibilty were it to come from an "insider". It is easy to understand how an "outsider" might form that view, and I groan silently each time I hear it expressed

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I might be an outsider but my wife (who's job I was describing) isn't and she loves her job (and has said so to me several times). Want me to get her to repeat those comments on here? It'll be quite late this evening as she's off doing climbing training with the school tonight...

If we were both teachers then while our total income would be substantially lower than it currently is we'd still have a combined income of £60K+ which isn't bad at all. I'd even consider becoming a teacher if it weren't for the fact that most schools seem to be using those hideous Apple things in IT. In theory I could teach chemistry instead but given how rusty I am on that side of things I'd probably blow the school up.

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Originally posted by Laurie Saunders:
If the job is as attrctive as you are suggesting,then why is there a crisis in recruitment and retention of staff?

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The description I gave was off my wife's role as a teacher - not some abstract view from a distance?

Perhaps there is a crisis in recruitment and retention of staff because people aren't aware that the salaries really aren't that bad, and the working conditions not always as dire as the press and teaching unions seem to describe?

My wife has worked in schools where the job appeared more about classroom survival and the application of political correctness than anything to do with teaching though.

Jonathon the pay is not that bad. It looks a bit different when the primary teacher is at school (like my wife) from 0800-0815 to 16:30-17:00 no non contact time during the day(ie free lessons) to do marking etc. So there is another 1-2 hours a night. Start adding the hours up and dividing it don't look quite so good.Young graduates(4 year course) start at a pretty low scale but they are quite short, my misses caught me up pretty quick when I was working for BT and she always has done more hours than me(not difficult I admit).

Howard

Whats the potential for an Architect though?

Dom,

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No, I think Nature will find a way personally; HIV didn't work so it'll produce something like a far more robust version of the Plague within a few years. Watch and see - Nature always self regulates sooner or later.

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Are you suggesting that Nature -- which I would take to be the sum total of the earth's biota -- evolved HIV as a population-control measure?

Please explain.

Joe

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:

A good teacher is easily worth £40 to £50k IMHO.

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In comparison to IT staff that's probably true, however that might be more of a reflection on inflated salaries that the IT sector still commands.

I run a small IT consultancy and the average salary in my company is just under £50K (and that's in Scotland!) which seem mad in comparison to simililary qualified and experienced staff in other sectors. Looking at it from that point of view then decent teachers probably would be worth £40K-£50K but in real terms neither the IT staff or the teachers probably warrant that sort of cash.

One issue I've seen in teaching is that there is still a lot of dead wood around and due to the way the salary structure works a crap teacher and a good teacher will get the same salary increases. There is a teacher at my wife's school who's been there for near on 20 years and who everyone knows is crap. The teachers with their own kids attending the school make sure their kids don't get him but it's terrible that nothing seems to get done about it. Recent statistical analysis showed that pupils getting him in 1st or 2nd year were significantly less likely to continue with that subject when course choices were being made - but still nothing gets done about it.

Howard - pretty damn poor compared with IT:RIBA notes; another salary survey. Rather fits with the 'vocation' concept discussed earlier. It's certainly not just a job - to paraphrase Tom Lehrer, some of you may have had reason to meet an architect, and to wonder therefore how they got that way....

Matthew

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It sounds exaclty like the private sector.

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Yes it does, indeed it is supposed to, but similarity is only skin deep. The reality is more like a rather unpleasant caricature

When we are assessed using criteria that we have no control over....

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A good teacher is easily worth £40 to £50k IMHO.

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I totally agree....how many (few) actually get this sort of amount

Jonathan

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Low pay for teachers is a bit of a fallacy.

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Well, in fact the average tutor working "full-time" in my institution (in the upper quartile nationally) gets a gross of c 20k

A top tutor (not head of section) who has significant management responsibilities, and usually mor than 15 years experience earns c £27k/a

These are facts, gentlemen

Laurie S

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Originally posted by Rasher:
There is a massive amount of cash going into schools.

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Really? Maybe in areas where Labour govern - my daughter's school had to sack two teachers because there was not enough money in the pot to pay them. No extra funds were made available so they had exactly the same budget as last year. Pay has risen (not forgetting the additional Employers National Insurance Contributions). All non-essential services (including maintenance) has been scrapped.

Sorry but the money is obviously being applied on a selective basis AND it is for reasons like this that I despair. Tony F Liar and his cronies - the sooner they are gone the better.

Mike