Approximate reading time: 16 min

It is officially my summer holidays, and I couldn’t be happier:-)

Unfortunately, I can’t afford to go anywhere at the moment.

But the weather is beautiful, and I get to write, so I’m happy.

The last six months have been ummm… an interesting journey. I had hoped that, by now, I would have a full-time job lined up for after the summer, and then I could write about all my experiences with a neat little bow tied around the ending. But alas, no happy ending is in sight, just yet.

I am, however, pleased to report that I am infinitely emotionally stronger

(and wiser)

than I was 182 days ago.

(Surely that counts for something?:-)

So, armed with my newly printed master’s degree and a shit load of student debt, I was determined that this year would be the year I found my ‘forever’ school.

Of course, I do realise I have been complaining about schools for the last 15 years and that all of my ‘studying’ had originally been so I could catapult myself out of teaching….

But two things continually suck me back in.

1. The kids: I adore them.

2. OMG, the holidays. I have had school holidays my whole- ENTIRE- life.

The thought of having only 3 weeks off a year is beyond depressing.

(I seriously don’t think I could cope!)

So, I’ve concluded that I am not quite ready to give up on schools just yet.

Perhaps all I really needed to do was find the right school for me.

I was up for the challenge.

School #1 Perfect on Paper

In January, I went for a trial day at a school that was looking for an intervention support teacher to teach a small class of six/seven Year 3 children. The school was just over an hour away from my home, so I was a bit dubious at first – but I loved the idea of doing small group work again, so I decided to just give it a go and see.

The school was amazing.

The headteacher was lovely, personal, friendly and super welcoming. The staff were also incredibly friendly and helpful, and I was instantly made to feel at home. Although some of the children in my class were a little challenging to work with, I was definitely up for the job. It was also only 3 days a week, which was perfect for me. It would allow me to have a regular salary and the option to fill up the rest of the week with supply teaching if I needed to… or rest if I needed that.

I phoned the agent after the trial day, absolutely ecstatic about the school. This was definitely the type of school I had been looking for. I asked what pay they were offering for the role and she gleefully said.

“Leave it to me. I will sort that out”

So I waited patiently to hear what their offer would be – desperately hoping that it would be at least in the ballpark of what I was expecting for a long-term role.

I woke up the next morning very excited to see on the agency app that I had got the job, and it had been booked in for 6 months until the end of the school year. My happiness lasted about …..mmm…15 seconds when I noticed that the 6-month booking had been made at my normal day-to-day supply rate.

A brief synopsis of supply teaching pay: Day-to-day supply teachers are paid a daily rate, which is significantly lower than a normal classroom teacher would get. It’s roughly about £40 less than what a newly qualified teacher (NQT) would get on the national teachers’ pay scale.

(This is the rate that I have been on for the last 8 years.)

It is generally expected that long-term roles, which come with more responsibilities, such as planning and assessment, should be paid in accordance with the national teacher pay scale. Based on my 25 years of teaching experience and my current position on that pay scale, I should be earning roughly £103 more per day than the standard day-to-day supply rate.

I absolutely did not want to take on all the responsibilities of a full-time teaching role while only being paid the day-to-day supply teacher rate.

But I felt conflicted.

I loved everything about the school.

The thought of asking for more money- and losing the role – was petrifying.

But I sucked it up and emailed the agency. I didn’t even ask to be paid on my correct pay scale. All I asked was to be paid the rate that an NQT would be paid – someone fresh out of university with no experience.

(I felt that was the least I deserved)

I received a lovely, polite email response, carefully summarising all the reasons why what I was asking for wasn’t possible. The main argument was that this was an intervention role rather than a whole-class teaching role and, as such, I shouldn’t expect to be paid as a qualified teacher on the national pay scale.

I was livid, to say the least.

It was all bullshit.

I am a qualified teacher with 25 years’ experience. I have my Honours in Learning Support, my Master’s in Attachment Theory, and no matter what label you slap on the job – I am still being employed to teach pupils.

Anyone who has worked in learning support knows just how demanding these roles can be.

Hell, in England, learning support teachers receive Special Educational Needs (SEN) allowances, or “SEN points”, precisely because they hold specialised responsibilities that go beyond the standard requirements of a classroom teacher. These allowances are usually paid on top of a teacher’s normal salary.

Bugger SEN points, here I was being told that I wasn’t even being recognised as a teacher.

I was not a happy camper.

My second day at the school was infinitely more stressful.

Although I had been given planning to follow by the class teachers, much of it wasn’t appropriate for the level my pupils were actually working at. It quickly became apparent that I would need to completely replan the lessons to meet my students’ needs. And it wasn’t just planning for the days I was teaching. I was also expected to prepare work for the teacher who would be covering the remaining two days of the week.

Ordinarily, I wouldn’t have had an issue with that….

Lesson planning is part of being a full-time teacher, but I wasn’t being paid as a full-time teacher.

I was being paid as a day-to-day supply teacher,

and my paid working day ended at 4 p.m.

Any planning I did after that was effectively unpaid.

I spoke to the other learning support teacher who did the same job as me and asked her if she was paid as a qualified teacher.

She looked visibly horrified:

“Yes, of course, aren’t you? We are teachers just like everybody else”

My silent frustration grew.

I know myself.

I knew that if I accepted this role, that would essentially amount to me working overtime most evenings.

That would have meant, in essence, signing up for:

a) Longer working hours

b) More travel time

All at the exact same rate I had been working at the last 8 years.

That second day, my anxiety went through the roof. My chest ached – my stomach was in knots – every inch of my body was screaming:

“Speak up.

Say something.

Your needs matter!”

At 3.30 pm, I was struggling to try and finish all my plans for the next day, when one of the staff members came and called me for the staff meeting.

I felt frustrated and completely divided on what I should do.

Had I gone to the hour-long staff meeting, I would then have had to stay behind to finish all my planning, and I probably wouldn’t have left until well after 5 p.m.

I knew long-term teachers were generally expected to go to staff meetings, but lest we forget –

I wasn’t being paid as a long-term teacher.

I was being paid as a day-to-day supply teacher – who are generallly not expected to go to meetings.

I was stuck in a grey area.

Clearly there was still a lot to iron out in respect to the expectations of this role. So, I politely declined to go to the staff meeting and made a mental note that I would absolutely have to talk about all of this with the head teacher the next morning.

I left at 4.30 pm that day, and I felt ever so slightly proud of myself. Old me would have gone to the meeting despite feeling disgruntled and frustrated inside. I would have made the choice to do so based solely on what was least likely to upset anyone.

The next day, feeling nervous as hell, I approached the head teacher first thing.

I freaken hate having these types of conversations.

For years I didn’t even realise when I was being undervalued – let alone have the courage to speak up for myself. At times like this, I am always so conscious of my inner child parts- some of whom are still petrified of people getting angry or upset with me.

(Neurotic Angel being the most notable one)

My inner dialogue was playing on a loop

“You are a grown-up, qualified, professional.“

“You have the right to have this conversation.“

“You have a voice, dammit all!“

I came in soft – trying to explain that the agency had booked the role on my behalf without us having any discussion around pay, and that I needed to talk about it. I told her that I had been hoping the rate would reflect something beyond a day-to-day supply rate.

People, all I can say is that it was like a 120-degree about-turn from the lovely, friendly, welcoming head teacher I had met when I first arrived at the school.

The very first thing she said in response to my opening explanation was:

“Yesterday you refused to come to our staff meeting where we could have introduced you to all the staff. So if that is the kind of attitude you have, then you definitely are not going to fit in here.”

That’s a tad bit personal, don’t ya think?

In that moment, it felt like all those hours I had spent watching YouTube videos on language analysis, critical thinking and how to debate effectively

Had FINALLY paid off.

It was like these tiny little pings were bouncing around in my head.

Of course, rational me could completely appreciate her point; perhaps I should have attended the staff meeting and then discussed my concerns about expectations afterwards.

But did my perceived “bad judgement” irrefutably deem me not worthy of fitting into the whole, entire school?

Um…I think NOT!.

It’s hard to explain how ridiculously calm I felt in that moment. It was as if some kind of Zen Jedi Master had temporarily possessed every cell in my body.

I pointed out that I have been teaching for 25 years and I am not even being paid as a newly qualified teacher. I explained how I have student loans to pay off after recently finishing my master’s, and how my hope this year was to get a long-term role to help pay my debts off.

I stressed that I wasn’t asking to be paid to scale….I was simply asking to be paid as a newly qualified teacher.

Her tone made it clear that she wasn’t pleased as she said:

“I know a lot of headteachers and what you are being paid is the going rate. You are never going to be paid on the teaching scale while using a supply teaching agency.”

I told her that I had met numerous long-term supply teachers who were (absolutely) being paid the (basic) rate of a newly qualified teacher.

She responded by explaining that she normally takes new staff on a two-month trial period before reviewing their performance and deciding whether to offer them a permanent position. I believe her exact words were something along the lines of

“You need to prove yourself first before expecting a higher rate of pay”

and she suggested that I was essentially putting the cart before the horse.

I wasn’t some entry-level intern asking for a pay increase. I was a teacher with years of experience asking to be paid the same basic rate a newly qualified teacher would be paid. While I understood her reasoning for wanting a two-month trial period to see whether I was a good fit for the school, I certainly did not feel that I needed to prove that I was worthy of being paid as a teacher.

My

25 years of experience

had already established that.

Most importantly, the agency had accepted the booking without first discussing any of these terms with me. I was not trying to renegotiate an arrangement after agreeing to it; I was responding to terms that had already been accepted on my behalf.

I am pleased to report I stayed calm.

I didn’t get emotional.

I didn’t try to explain, justify or defend myself.

I simply reiterated that all I was wanting was to be paid as a fully qualified teacher.

She was clearly exasperated by my obstinance and suddenly threw out:

So do you want to stay on in the role, or not?

Me: “Thank you for the offer, but no”

She looked a little shocked.

Inside, I felt a little shocked.

Somehow I managed to stay calm and poised and effectively stood up for myself without being reactive or drowned out by my emotions.

She then said:

“Well, if that’s the case, you can go home now; we won’t need you today.“

Me: “Um ok, but you do realise that the school will still need to pay me for today as the booking has already been confirmed.”

Realising that I was right, she reluctantly agreed that I would stay and teach for the day.

And that was that.

As soon as our conversation ended, I sent an email to the agency explaining why I wouldn’t be accepting the post and making it very clear that from this day forward I would not be accepting

ANY

longer-term roles that were not willing to pay me as a qualified teacher.

(At the minimum)

Looking back, it felt as though something shifted in me that day and my most important people-pleasing lesson finally crystallised.

It feels like this has been a slow, painstaking lesson that I have been working through for years, mostly in relation to my friendships.

It started to dawn on me how I had spent so many years keeping the peace and sucking down my own emotions and needs simply because I was so worried about losing a friend…and then even that never worked.

Inevitably, at some point in time, a rupture would occur in the friendship.

And I would be left feeling blindsided.

Either by the verbal attack on me as a person or by the ease with which the friend would simply cut me out of their life completely.

The feelings are always the same.

But we have been friends for years?

I don’t understand.

Is our friendship not even worth fighting for?

How could I have been friends with someone for so long and not realised who they were?

At some point, about 2 years ago, I finally got it.

The answer to my question was surprisingly simple.

Because I never really showed who I really was.

I spent too much of my time trying to be liked.

I spent too much time trying to avoid ruptures, and in doing so I denied myself the opportunity to discover how someone responds when a disagreement inevitably does arise.

It’s easy to be kind, reasonable and accommodating when everyone agrees.

The real test comes when opinions differ, boundaries are asserted, and genuine feelings are shared. I realised that how people respond to conflict tells me far more about the quality of a friendship than years of agreement ever could. That doesn’t mean heated arguments won’t happen, but it does mean that repair is possible afterwards. It took me far too long to finally realise that healthy friends don’t need to assassinate your character in order to win an argument, and they don’t throw you away at the first sign of trouble.

These last couple of years, I have changed a lot about how I approach making new friends.

I’m not afraid of speaking up.

I don’t shy away from disagreement or honestly sharing feelings of frustration and disappointment because I’d rather know early on whether a friendship is strong enough to survive honesty.

I have learned that rather than fearing conflict, I should use it as my barometer. If a friendship can’t survive a disagreement, a difficult conversation, or the expression of anger, then it wasn’t the conflict that destroyed the friendship; it simply revealed that we were never truly compatible in the first place.

It’s been liberating – to say the least.

Then that week at the “Perfect on Paper School” happened, and it reminded me that exactly the same principles apply in the workplace. As uncomfortable and awkward as that experience was, I’m grateful I got the chance to see how the headteacher handled a difficult conversation.

It told me everything I needed to know.

I am not saying she is a bad person, far from it. Her school is amazing; the kids are happy, and her staff turnover is exceptionally low, which are all very clear indications that she is doing a great job. But I also realised that none of those things automatically meant she was the right person for me to work with.

So the search continues.

To be continued….