Primary School Rep

28 September 2012

“There was a joint NUT/NASUWT meeting at lunch time today that I led and members voted unanimously to implement the actions wholesale.

Together with the NASUWT rep, I took the document to the head immediately and informed her of members’ intentions. The head had many questions that I won't go into now, but I did my best to answer them and referred her to the instructions document. However, one question she asked was if it would be ok to approach members on an individual basis to ask them if they would be prepared to break away from the instructions. I pointed out that members could feel intimidated and that it would be a matter for the union if this situation arose. I told her that in regards to this you will unfortunately hear from me again in the near future.

The staff though are buoyed and reinvigorated by the action and union support and are just looking forward to the 3rd for the official start of the action.

I hope our example empowers other schools in the area, so we can take action together!”

Primary School Rep

25 September 2012

“Once I had received the outline of proposed action, I made an appointment with my Head and went through all the items that the action affected. We agreed together what this would look like in practice, how this would impact upon the SLT and our members. From this, I then held a meeting with our members and outlined the action to them. We are all clear about the proposed action, what we will be doing or not, without any confrontation or disagreement with the SLT.“

Secondary School Rep

25 September 2012

“In our first week back at school, we held a joint NUT/NASUWT meeting to discuss action short of strike action. Our members raised concerns over appraisals, and tasked us to challenge the policy of setting up to five targets. Earlier this week, reps from NUT and NASUWT met the Headteacher, and together we were able to secure a reduction in the number of appraisal targets to three.

This is a major step forward in our school. Last year, when staff raised their concerns over performance management, they were not confident to challenge it. This time, not only were we able to win a significant concession, but the impetus had come from our members, rather than from us as reps. Of course, we still have many challenges ahead of us. But this victory will give our staff confidence that they can contest their working conditions.”

Primary School Rep

24 September 2012

“I’ve been the rep in my two-form entry primary school for a number of years. A new head teacher started this summer, and seems to be from the “new school”, and wants us to start in handing in planning – giving up our entire Sunday to write far too detailed plans.

So the action guidelines came just at the right time for us!

I told the head that we would have a union meeting to discuss the guidelines and she did at least say that she was pleased I had spoken to her. I told her that it might take more than one meeting before I could come back to her.

I’m in the Juniors and I got a friend in the Infants to help get people to the meeting.

We had to meet after school because of different lunch hours and we almost got everyone there, including a couple of NASUWT members (they don’t have a rep in the school). We met in a classroom and I got the action instructions up on the electronic whiteboard from the NUT website. I just ran through them quickly, and said we would go back to any that people thought were difficult or needed more discussion.

Members in my school were generally very supportive. There was a concern about refusing to invigilate the KS2 SATs – we have done that regularly. We agreed to come back to it, and to think about whether we could say that we wanted TAs to do the invigilation, but that teachers could be there to reassure the children. The planning instruction was really welcomed – we really don’t want to start handing planning in – though there was some discussion about teachers in year groups sharing planning, especially with NQTs, but we’ll do that without handing the plans to the head.

So far so good. We’re meeting again next Monday after school and I plan to go to see the head with my Infant teacher friend. We’ll say we’re there as representatives not as individuals and that members intend to follow the instructions from the national union.

I’ve never had to get the union to come in to the see the head but I know they would if I needed them. But we’re also talking about ringing friends in other schools to encourage them to take the action.”