HERE we go again. Two years ago, NEU teaching members in England were made a pay offer by the Conservative government to try to stop our pay strikes. It was an unfunded offer.
After taking several days of strike action, an overwhelming 98 per cent of members rejected the new deal – in large part because there was no money attached to pay for it.
Once again, in the run-up to annual conference, members can have their say on an unfunded pay offer recommended by the government, which will inevitably lead to cuts for schools already on the brink.
See pages 6-7 for more on this crucial issue – hear from members about why we need a YES vote to strike action in our preliminary e-ballot. NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede argues that an unfunded pay offer is worse than no offer at all (page 11).
And Tim Sanders, our cartoonist and an NEU member, makes a pertinent point about the familiar mood music we are already hearing about potential school strikes (page 35).
Members have shown they are more than willing to take strike action on a series of other issues – whether it’s health and safety concerns, staffing cuts or school closures (see pages 6-18). So it won’t come as any surprise if NEU members do vote YES to stand up for a fully funded pay rise.
Pay is one of the many issues being discussed by a new teaching commission chaired by Mary Bousted, which is looking into solutions to the national teacher shortage (pages 23-25).
Holocaust Memorial Day this year marked 80 years since the liberation of Auschwitz. The NEU held a moving event, with harrowing but also inspiring stories of resistance (see page 13).
On pages 26-29, you can read about NEU member Lorraine Alfaro, who was awarded a six-figure payout after she was driven out of her job following false allegations of bullying.
We also have two related opinion pieces on overhauling the curriculum: one showcases Our Migration Story’s resources (pages 30-33) and, for our Final word, Aminul Hoque argues for the need to seriously address the Eurocentric nature of our school curriculum (page 50).
All our other regulars are here of course. We hope you enjoy it – please do email me at educate@neu.org.uk
Max Watson Editor, Educate
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, led by Mordechai Anielewicz and the Jewish Combat Organisation, begins in resistance to the Nazi’s attempted liquidation of the entire enclave. The insurgents are defeated by 16 May. Around 13,000 Jews die, and up to 50,000 are deported to death camps, while Anielewicz (likely) took his own life with other leaders. These events were the most significant act of Jewish resistance to the Nazi Holocaust (see also page 13).
“An anxietyridden shell of my former self.” p26-29
22 Mary Bousted chairs commission Initiative to address the recruitment and retention crisis (below left).
26 “You never think this can happen to you, but it can.” NEU wins Lorraine Alfaro’s case after head teacher’s baseless accusation (above).
30 Our Migration Story Resources to re-work British histories (below).
PHOTO by Matt Wilkinson
PHOTO by Rehan Jamil
PHOTO by The Black Curriculum
‘This unfunded offer will devastate our schools’
The union is balloting teachers and leaders in England on whether they would be prepared to take strike action if the government doesn’t improve its proposed unfunded 2.8 per cent pay award for this year.
Voting starts on 1 March and ends on 11 April.
The NEU’s preliminary electronic ballot follows the government’s recommendation on pay –including that rises should be paid for by schools from existing budgets – to the School Teachers’ Review Body.
The government claims money for pay rises can be found if schools make “efficiencies”.
without cutting staff or resources or both. This is a fact that the government knows only too well. After years of cuts to funding there is nothing left in the coffers.”
Voting starts on 1 March and ends on 11 April
NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede said the suggestion was an “insult to the profession” after 14 years of austerity.
He added: “No teacher or leader will be able to identify efficiencies
Amid a cost-ofliving crisis, a real-terms cut in teacher pay since 2010, and the chronic underfunding of schools, members are contacting the union in their thousands to say the paltry, unfunded offer will be devastating for them and their schools.
Daniel said the 2.8 per cent proposed by the government would do nothing the address the worsening recruitment and retention crisis.
On Saturday 1 March you will receive an email and text message containing your unique voting link.
Check that we hold the correct email address and mobile phone number at myNEU Vote as soon as you receive the link and vote YES to holding a strike ballot to secure a fully funded, significantly higher pay award that takes steps to address the crisis in recruitment and retention.
If you have a problem with your voting
Sixth form pay dispute:
THE pay dispute involving teachers at non-academised sixth form colleges appeared close to being settled following eight days of strike action, as Educate went to press.
Members at non-academised colleges were voting on whether to end the dispute after securing written assurances from the government and Sixth Form Colleges Association (SFCA), the body that negotiates nationally college pay, that there will only be a single award for all college teachers from 2025/26 onwards.
These assurances end the threat of two-tier pay offers in future years. Following this development, the sixth form college strike committee, composed of elected reps, agreed to put the offer to members with a recommendation to accept.
The dispute with education secretary Bridget Phillipson arose because of a Department for Education error. It wrongly believed teachers in academised colleges were covered by the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) and
NEU members outside the Houses of Parliament
PHOTO by Rehan Jamil
NEU member Magda Murawska outside the Department for Education
YES to holding a strike ballot
link, can’t find it or have accidentally deleted it, please email ballotenquiries@neu.org.uk
Please vote in the preliminary ballot to ensure the union meets the goal of a 60 per cent turnout, and more than 90 per cent vote YES, so we can move to a formal ballot.
The NEU executive will then table an emergency motion at annual conference in April, confirming the timetable for a formal postal ballot in the summer term, which will run for at least ten weeks.
‘I’m
NEU’s preliminary online ballot 1 March-11 April Teachers in England are urged to REJECT the government’s recommendation of an unfunded 2.8 per cent pay rise in September 2025.
really needed, but is it worth it?’
Samantha Dubra (left) is a secondary teacher in London
“I’ve been a teacher for ten years and it feels like nine years too long,” Samantha told Educate. “I’ve worked in primary and secondary schools, and services and resources are being cut everywhere. In my last school, there were no exercise books; pupils were told to bring in their own things.
“Also, people who aren’t teachers don’t really understand the hours we have to put in. Twice I’ve been signed off with workrelated stress, from two schools. I remember as a newly qualified teacher taking marking with me on a family holiday to Cyprus, which I vowed never to do again. But in the last couple of years I’ve started to think, before a holiday, should I take my laptop with me?
“I’m really, really angry by the 2.8 per cent. It’s outrageous. Schools already don’t have anywhere near enough, even when pay rises are funded by the government.
“More money would mean teachers have the equipment, resources and time to do our jobs properly. We’d feel more valued and better supported. Those things would improve retention. There’s too much reliance on teachers’ goodwill.”
Aimee Smith (left) is a secondary teacher in London
In December, Aimee and a number of other teachers living in a south London apartment block were handed eviction notices and are now struggling to find affordable homes. They are among 150 residents handed section 21 notices by their landlord, which has said it wants to empty the building to refurbish it.
Aimee told Educate she and other teachers in the Vive Living building in Deptford were already struggling with the cost of living. “The government is touting a 2.8 per cent pay rise this year,” she said. “What am I going to do with that when my accommodation is going to be hundreds of pounds more a month?”
Rent for the two-bed flat Aimee shares with her partner has increased by £300 since they moved in during the Covid pandemic. It is now £1,900 a month. With rents in the area now between £300 and £500 more, Aimee says they may have to leave London.
“There’s a teacher retention crisis at my school, so I’m really needed. I love my job and the kids are amazing, but if we can’t afford to do anything or save money, is it worth it?”
members have their say on improved pay offer
funding was made available to award a 5.5 per cent pay rise for 2024/25 in line with school teachers.
Standalone colleges received no additional funding for pay rises and teachers were offered just two per cent.
In fact, pay at all 75 colleges – academised and nonacademised – in England is negotiated by the SFCA.
Angry members began their fight against the unequal deal and their action led to a proposal on 19 December. The SFCA increased the offer to 3.5 per cent, to cover September 2024 to March 2025, rising to 5.5 per cent from April.
Across the year, this means that for 2024/25, members in non-academised colleges will receive 4.2 per cent, while those in academised colleges 5.5 per cent.
Post-16 national executive member Duncan Blackie said: “Against the odds, we have boosted funding for an above-inflation pay award for our sector, guaranteed our
collective bargaining and safeguarded the future of the sixth form college sector in the long term.”
He praised the “tenacity” of college members, adding that their campaign had been “incredible to witness”.
The results of the consultation will be known just after Educate goes to press.
Clarification
In the January/February issue of Educate, we wrote that teachers at academised colleges had been awarded a 5.5 per cent pay offer, while those in non-academised colleges had been given two per cent.
In fact, while funding had been made available for a 5.5 per cent pay rise, no college teachers have yet received a pay rise. We should have been clear that the SFCA is the body that negotiates nationally with the government on pay for colleges.
PHOTO by Rehan Jamil
Blinkered Ofsted ignores educators’ criticisms
OFSTED’s proposed inspection framework was meant to introduce a more nuanced approach that was supportive and ‘felt different’.
But the detail shows a blinkered organisation incapable of responding to the workload and wellbeing challenges facing England’s schools and colleges.
That was NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede’s verdict on report cards, after Ofsted launched a 12-week consultation on them in early February. Sister unions the NAHT and ASCL have also expressed concerns.
Ofsted has proposed a five-point scale of grades: Causing concern, Attention needed, Secure, Strong or Exemplary, and a range of evaluation ‘areas’ . These areas are proposed to include curriculum, leadership and governance, attendance, personal development and wellbeing, and inclusion.
Daniel said: “Ofsted has ignored the findings of its Big Listen consultation. The
FSM for all – message your MP
MORE than 35 MPs have backed an amendment to the children’s wellbeing and schools bill, calling on the government to provide free school meals (FSM) for all pupils in state primary schools.
The bill was introduced in parliament on 17 December, and includes provision for free school breakfasts. But Simon Opher, MP for Stroud, a supporter of the NEU’s Free School Meals for All campaign, believes this does not go far enough.
Simon said: “A healthy school day doesn’t stop with breakfast. For too many families, a hot, healthy lunch at school is unaffordable. Labour leaders in London and Wales have made free healthy dinners available to all children in primary school, and the UK government could, and should, do the same for children across England.”
In England, household income must be less than £7,400 a year before benefits and after tax for a child to qualify for free school meals. This means hundreds of thousands of children living in poverty are going hungry every day. n Message your MP at tinyurl.com/fsm-bill n Visit freeschoolmealsforall.org.uk
chief inspector has ignored the voice of the profession. He has set out a course for Ofsted to remain as out of touch as before, just as crude in its assessments.”
The NEU believes it is not credible that inspectors could make reliable assessments in these areas during the length of an inspection;
that the system will be complex and onerous; and that it won’t generate better or more useful information for parents.
Ofsted launched a programme of change following heavy criticism of the high stakes attached to inspection. Julia Waters (pictured left), whose sister Ruth Perry committed suicide in January 2023 after her school was graded Inadequate, has become a leading campaigner on reforming Ofsted.
Julia told Educate: “It has not listened or learnt. In short, I am appalled there is no mention at all in Ofsted’s consultation launch of Ruth’s death.”
She added that Ofsted had also failed to mention the findings of the coroner’s report into Ruth’s death, which concluded Ofsted had contributed to it. Nor the parliamentary education committee report into Ofsted that recommended significant changes, or the independent learning review for Ofsted published by Dame Christine Gilbert in September 2024.
NEU members at Wanstead High School (pictured above) have settled a dispute over breaches of employment contracts, excessive workload, and verbal aggression by management. Teachers at the London school were working 100 hours over their directed time and teaching assistants were not paid for morning breaks. Members took seven strike days in January and announced a further nine in February, forcing management to agree to talks. They agreed to nearly three quarters of members’ demands. Brendan Weakliam, a drama teacher and NEU member at the school, told Educate prior to the resolution: “My ability to teach to the quality I would wish for my students is undermined by feeling regularly burnt out because my workload is untenable. Teachers and middle leaders have to constantly prove themselves and their departments through observations or filling out of endless forms. This cannot go on.”
Management agreed to 22 out of members’ 30 demands – which included specific, actionable changes to improve workload, directed time and school culture. Several staff members had also been refused pay progression since the dispute began.
PHOTO by Kois Miah
NEU’s preliminary online ballot 1 March-11 April Teachers in England are urged to vote YES to strike action to improve the government’s recommended unfunded 2.8 per cent pay rise.
Two-thirds of schools can’t offer arts options
NINETY per cent of GCSE students want to study a creative subject, but two-thirds of school leaders say they cannot offer a full suite of options, according to two NEU-commissioned surveys.
One in four school leaders surveyed by Teacher Tapp said they do not have enough funding for teachers and resources, or do not have the necessary facilities.
A second poll, of parents and students, was carried out by WeThink/Omnisis on behalf of the Arts and Minds campaign, which launched on 11 February at the Tate Modern, London.
Supported by the NEU and a coalition of 20 organisations, the campaign calls for all children and young people to have the right to study creative subjects and for arts funding in schools to be fully restored.
NEU president Sarah Kilpatrick said: “The lack of support for creative subjects has two main drivers: lack of funding and the reduced status of the arts.
“But the arts make us who we are. Not only do they contribute significantly to the UK economy, they open minds and communities. Creativity is central to the human experience and the growing disparity in access to art and creative education is devastating. It is more important than ever that we support and invest in the arts.”
A full report on the star-studded Arts and Minds launch will be in the next issue of Educate.
n Visit theartsandmindscampaign.org.uk
NEU members (pictured) employed by Coventry School Foundation (CSF) have taken nine days of strike action to defend their pensions. CSF provides independent education across Bablake primary and secondary schools, and King Henry VIII primary and secondary schools, plus associated infant and prep schools. Staff face a 12 per cent pay cut if they remain in the Teachers’ Pension Scheme and CSF has threatened to fire and rehire to force the change through. Joint secretary of Coventry NEU and executive member Chris Denson said CSF was unwilling to meet and “governors are nowhere to be seen”. Further strike action is planned.
‘Supply registers a whole-union issue’
THE NEU is campaigning to end the domination of commercial supply agencies by promoting more direct hiring by schools seeking supply staff.
Agencies siphon off education funds, making huge profits. Often, daily rates to even experienced teachers are significantly below what they would earn if employed directly.
Louise Lewis, NEU executive member, chairs the union’s supply members’ and home tutors’ organising forum.
She says the NEU campaign for direct hiring by employers through setting up supply registers needs to be a wholeunion issue.
“We need supply teacher activists encouraging districts and branches to start discussions with employers,” she said. “We also need reps to discuss supply matters with their school groups and raise the demand for direct employment.”
Are you a supply member interested in sharing your experience to help inform the NEU’s policies? There are vacancies on the Yorkshire and Humber, and Northern supply organising forums.
n To find out how to apply, contact your branch neu.org.uk/ district-branch-finder
NEU president Sarah Kilpatrick at the Labour party conference in September
Louise Lewis
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Making ‘efficiencies’ will devastate education
NEU general secretary
Daniel Kebede says you need to vote in our ballot to send a message to the government that our schools and our educators cannot go on like this.
AS you read this, the NEU’s preliminary online ballot over fair pay and funding will soon be landing in your email inbox or being texted to your phone.
After 14 years of school cuts under the Conservatives, we expected real change from the Labour government.
But just before Christmas, the government announced its recommendation to the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB), which proposes the rise teachers can expect in their pay packet from September.
Its recommendation was a 2.8 per cent increase but, crucially for our members, our schools and the children we teach, it has not allocated funds to pay for this.
A government spokesperson suggested schools make “efficiencies” to fund the rise.
To be honest, I was a little gobsmacked. Every single person working in education knows there are no savings to be made. Why doesn’t the government?
We know that our schools are already at breaking point – more schools are in deficit now than at any point since 2010.
Making ‘efficiencies’ will be a disaster
Following the recommendation, we asked the statisticians in our School Cuts campaign to do the maths and work out the scale of “efficiencies” required to balance the books.
The results are nothing short of a disaster. Seventy-six per cent of primaries and 94 per cent of secondaries will be forced to make cuts if no additional funding is made available.
We sent a survey to our members to work out if our numbers were correct. A staggering 2,746 of you responded in just two days to our In Conversation questionnaire –and the results make tough reading.
Almost all of you (91 per cent) believe that an unfunded pay rise of 2.8 per cent is unfair. You are worried about having to make cuts to school provision.
“An unfunded pay rise is worse than no pay rise at all because of the consequences and knock-on effects for pupils,” one member told us.
“Fewer new staff will be employed and there will be more redundancies,” said another.
Almost half (49 per cent) said the government’s proposal would make it less likely that they would remain in teaching.
Three quarters (77 per cent) of primary respondents said there is insufficient funding in their school to meet basic provision. Only five per cent of secondary teachers said their school had enough funding to comfortably meet pupils’ needs.
‘There’s nothing left to cut’ I found your personal stories heartbreaking.
One member said: “There’s nothing left to cut. I spend loads of my own money on things my class need. The school restructured last year and we lost 20-plus staff so there’s barely any support in classes or interventions for the children who really need them.”
Many of you told of working in cold and dilapidated schools, with buildings letting in the weather and no heating to save money.
When asked what extra funding would
mean, your responses reveal the degree to which education has been stripped to the bone.
“Basic investment – classrooms, paper, resources. At the moment, we are struggling to afford exercise books for pupils, let alone anything else.”
And: “Proper classrooms with adequate insulation, roofs that don’t leak and removal of asbestos.”
Make the right choice, do the right thing
We presented the results of our survey to the STRB (pictured above) at the beginning of February and wait to see if your views change the government’s mind.
Your responses show that schools just cannot go on like this.
Thousands of us voted for this government in the hope that things would get better. But forcing schools to make more cuts – when they are in such a desperate state already – will push many over the edge.
We have no choice but to launch this indicative ballot, to send a message to this government, to help it make the right choice and do the right thing.
Education is on its knees. Fund fair pay and save our schools. Before it is too late.
(From left) NEU executive member Chris Denson, SEND teacher Jenny Williams from Croydon, science teacher Emma Brady from Bedfordshire, primary teacher Merike Williams from Stockton on Tees and NEU president Sarah Kilpatrick gave evidence to the School Teachers’ Review Body on the need for fully funded fair pay and the impact the government’s recommended unfunded 2.8 per cent offer will have on schools
‘Overwhelmed’ Harris staff ballot to strike
MEMBERS at 18 secondary schools and sixth form colleges in London and the south-east in the Harris Federation multi-academy trust (MAT) have begun formally balloting for strike action.
It is the first action of its kind at the MAT, where staff are concerned about workload, an unfair and punitive pay progression and the treatment of teachers recruited from overseas.
For nine out of the last ten years, the federation has scored in the bottom ten per cent of all MATs with regards to teacher retention. More than a quarter of its teachers left last year.
Harris recruits many teachers from the Caribbean, particularly Jamaica, but members
No MATs for Liverpool Diocese
PLANS for ten new Catholic multiacademy trusts (MATs) have been dropped by the Archdiocese of Liverpool. The decision follows the removal of academisation grants by the Department for Education on 1 January. The scheme had provided financial support to schools voluntarily becoming academies.
All further moves towards academising Catholic schools within the Liverpool diocese area and its control have now stopped. Instead, the diocese is considering setting up federations of schools, which will remain state-maintained.
NEU senior regional officer Jim Dye said: “This precedent of abandoning academisation as the future of schools is very important.”
say the federation, which runs 55 schools, fails to provide sufficient support during their transition to the UK.
Despite being fully trained, they are made to wait as long as four or even five years before their school agrees to support their qualified teacher status, so they can be paid on the main and upper pay scale. During this time, they earn around £10,000 less per year than their UK-trained colleagues for the same work.
Members are calling for fully funded support and comprehensive paid inductions for overseas teachers.
Teachers can be denied pay progression if they do not meet their performance goals, which has led to extreme stress and extra workload. Some support staff members have reported going years without pay increases, and a lack
of transparency around pay bands. Members are calling for Harris to end performancerelated pay, and ensure pay transparency and annual pay progression for support staff.
“Educators are so overwhelmed with work,” members said in a statement. “We deeply care about the work we do, and the welfare of our colleagues is intrinsic to that.”
Harris chief executive Dan Moynihan is the highest paid education employee in England, receiving between £600,000 and £610,000 annually (total package).
More than 700 NEU members are eligible to vote in the ballot, which closes on 28 February. As the ballot opened, management agreed to talks with arbitration service Acas. At the time of going to press, negotiations and the ballot were ongoing.
Lewisham branch secretary James Kerr (far left), Newham branch secretary Louise Cuffaro (fourth from left), with Save Byron Court campaigners at an Educators against Privatisation event in January. Issues discussed included forced academisation, the impact of privatisation on terms and conditions, and the deregulation of supply agencies. Activists shared their experiences of taking action, including a co-ordinated strike across the University of Brighton Academy Trust; the campaign to save Byron Court from academisation in Brent; and the Prendergast strikes in Lewisham, also against academisation. Activists discussed how to co-ordinate and take their campaigning forward.
Harris NEU members gathered in October to meet each other and share perspectives at a federation-wide conference day
PHOTO by Rehan Jamil
Teacher ‘Righteous Among the Nations’
Aage Bertelsen was a Danish teacher and, alongside his wife Gerda, leader of the Lyngby group, which helped rescue 1,000 Jews from the Holocaust.
‘With denial on the rise, silence is not an option’
HOLOCAUST Memorial Day was commemorated on 27 January and this year marked the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in Poland.
The union hosted a moving event where members remembered the Holocaust and genocides in Bosnia and Rwanda. NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede began the night by setting out the ten stages that lead to genocide, citing how hate, exclusion and discrimination can take us down this perilous road.
The event was chaired by NEU president Sarah Kilpatrick, who introduced Sandra Kviat, the first female rabbi in Denmark and a leader at Crouch End Chavurah in London. Sandra described her family’s story as refugees in Sweden during World War II, and of the courageous co-operation between the Danish population, their government, neighbouring Sweden and the Jewish population.
99 per cent of Danish Jews saved Incredibly, 99 per cent of (nearly 8,000) Jews in Denmark escaped the death camps and survived the Shoah, explained Sandra, despite Nazi Germany invading their country. The Danish established church and other leaders told the population it was their duty not to comply with the persecution of Jews.
In 1943, on the night of Rosh HaShanah, the Jewish New Year, the Nazi secret police planned to round up the entire Jewish population and send them to their death. However, they had almost all escaped due to a tip-off. This was one of the largest acts of resistance to the Holocaust.
Learning the lessons from this incredible story, Sandra urged us to work together with inter-faith leaders across religious and cultural differences, and to teach young people that “despite what is going on around you, you can make different choices”.
‘Never again must mean for everyone’
This year also marked the 30th anniversary of the genocide against Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica. Working with Remembering Srebrenica UK, the union was grateful to host survivor Sara Hukic, who spoke of the horrors that ripped through Bosnia between 1992 and
1995 during her early childhood, and having to seek refuge in Denmark.
She reminded us we must stand together, share testimonies and fight for a better future, for those who can no longer speak for themselves. Sara left us with the powerful words: “If never again is to mean anything, then it must mean never again for everyone.”
A
million
murdered in Rwanda
The union also commemorated 31 years since the 1994 genocide against the Tutsis in Rwanda.
Members had the honour of hearing from Marie-Rose Rurangirwa from the Ishami Foundation, whose childhood was stolen by acts of dehumanisation and hate
Resources
n Resources on the diverse peoples persecuted during the Holocaust and their stories: neu.org.uk/mosaic
n Teaching resources about Rwanda: ishamifoundation.org/schoolresources
n Educating about the Srebrenica genocide: srebrenica.org.uk/learn
that led to the murder of over a million ethnic Tutsis. Marie-Rose recounted her humiliating experience of being singled out as Tutsi by her teacher at school, and how these experiences created a cycle of trauma. She works hard alongside other survivors to break this cycle. She amplified the voices of survivors: “I speak as a living witness, so that we can renounce hate in all its forms, ensuring silence is not an option, at a time when genocide denial is on the rise.”
Attendees enjoyed an array of Kosher Syrian and Polish delicacies and were able to visit the Witness art collection by Glasgowbased painter Robert McNeil, who is an ambassador for Remembering Srebrenica UK.
Ladi, an NEU member from Hammersmith and Fulham, expressed how emotional it was for her: “I am from Africa and Rwanda is my country’s neighbour, so Marie-Rose’s story really resonated with me. It also triggered my interest in the Holocaust and I’m going to use the resources at school.”
Another NEU member from Redbridge stated that the speeches challenged her: “It was wonderful. Sad, but also it switched my thinking from teaching an historical angle to a more humanitarian angle with personal stories matched to the age of pupils.”
(From left) Sarah Kilpatrick, Sandra Kviat, Sara Hukic and Marie-Rose Rurangirwa
PHOTO by Kois Miah
The government has recommended an unfunded 2.8 per cent pay rise for teachers and leaders in September 2025. It is just not good enough. It doesn’t correct teachers’ real terms loss in pay. And without guaranteed funding for the rise, the vast majority of schools will face impossible choices – cut staff, cut resources, or both.
In our preliminary online ballot from 1 March to 11 April to send a clear message to ministers: Do the right thing and fund a fair, significantly higher pay rise for teachers. Invest in our children.
Vote to REJECT the government’s unfunded 2.8 per cent pay recommendation.
Vote YES to indicate your willingness to take strike action to secure a fully funded, significantly higher pay award that takes steps to address the crisis in recruitment and retention if the government doesn’t listen.
Scan the QR code for more information.
FUNDFAIRPAY
NEU’s preliminary online ballot 1 March-11 April Teachers, update your details at my.neu.org.uk so the NEU can contact you during our ballot over the government’s recommended unfunded 2.8 per cent pay rise.
Cottingham staff ‘more resolute’ as strike goes on
NEU members at Cottingham High School have taken to the picket line over fears of compulsory redundancies due to the planned closure of the school’s sixth form.
Staff at the school in the East Riding of Yorkshire braved cold temperatures on the first day of action, 7 January. They took a further nine strike days that month, before increasing their action to four days a week in February, bringing the total to 16 days, as Educate went to press.
Members are also concerned about the introduction of a lesson framework and observation protocol, which they believe will be used as a way of putting staff on capability procedures.
“The new policy makes the school a panopticon [a prison where guards can monitor all inmates constantly], subjecting members to observation at any point,” said Steve Scott, joint district and branch secretary for East Riding NEU.
Cottingham High School and Sixth Form College forms part of The Consortium
Academy Trust, which has ten academies across East Yorkshire.
Steve said: “We’re asking for a commitment that the employer will halt the compulsory redundancies, and for negotiations on a policy that will cover the implementation
STAFF, parents and children
united on the picket line (right) at St Dominic’s Catholic School, east London in February to protest at Hackney council’s decision to close or merge four primaries in the borough. Around 120 staff are expected to lose their jobs.
PHOTO by Melinee Dufour
of this new framework, so that we can be assured members will be safe from capability and being bullied out of their jobs.
“We’ve notified for lots more days of strike action. Staff are getting angrier and are now more resolute.”
Support staff plan strategies to improve pay and conditions
ON a wet and windy Saturday 7 December, London’s first support staff strategy day took place at NEU headquarters.
Activists from across all settings, and in roles from librarian to technician, behaviour mentor to teaching assistant, met to discuss strategies to improve their pay and conditions.
Inspiring speakers shared their experiences of leading local campaigns, and working groups discussed how to move
forward on issues including pay, progression, workload and cover responsibilities.
Suggestions included:
n campaigning to reverse the trend of termtime only (TTO) contracts
n conducting a London-wide support staff survey on pay rates and job descriptions to ensure standardisation (including the removal of the clause “… and any other tasks the head teacher deems appropriate”)
n lobbying payroll providers to ensure
backdated pay rises are paid in instalments to avoid affecting universal credit payments.
We plan to make the strategy day a regular feature in the London calendar and will continue to build on the ideas from the day.
n Email phil.lindsey@neu.org.uk to be added to the London support staff activists WhatsApp group.
n Download the NEU model letter on backdated pay at neu.org.uk/backdated-pay-letter
By Phil Lindsey, assistant secretary, Newham NEU
THE NEU’s north west new professionals and young workers’ (NPYW) network held a social event (pictured left) in December where they shared experiences, discussed how to collectivise on workload and other campaign issues, and how to support the sixth form college strike action.
LIPA members strike over hazardous premises
STRIKE action continues at Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA) Sixth Form College, due to “serious health and safety failures” and excessive workload.
Members describe working in dilapidated premises with mouldy carpets, inadequate IT, a leaking roof, live electrical cables strewn over the floor and a lack of basic amenities, including drinking water.
Empowering disabled event
DISABLED members in Wales met for the first time on 18 January in Cardiff. The event was designed to support them to feel empowered, challenge discrimination, and use the NEU disability toolkit, including requesting reasonable adjustments (RA) and using the RA passport.
Colleen Johnson, NEU executive member, gave an excellent presentation on the social model of disability. This argues that people are disabled not by their impairment or difference, but by other people’s attitudes, as well as physical barriers. Removing these barriers can create greater equality and inclusion.
Members left the event recognising the power of self-identifying as a disabled member to the union.
By Ruth Osman, disabled members’ organising forum – Wales
Twenty-three staff took six days of action during November and December. The employer, which is part of LIPA multiacademy trust, has refused to negotiate. So a fresh wave of strike days began on 7 January, with members increasing their action to three days a week.
NEU regional officer Bora Oktas said the trust had refused to attend mediation talks with arbitration service Acas. “We have made
it clear we are open to negotiations and will not rule out suspending action if a resolution is within reach following negotiations,” he said. “The ball is in their court.”
NEU regional secretary Peter Middleman added: “Taking strike action is a last resort, but our members are fighting for the wellbeing and the health and safety of their students, who are being taught in premises that are not fit for purpose.”
NEU to focus on menopause at TUC conference
THE NEU’s delegation to this year’s TUC women’s conference (5-7 March) has submitted two motions on Black maternal health, and the “deplorable” lack of employers’ knowledge about the menopause.
The menopause motion argues that the stigma that still exists around women’s health negatively impacts them in the workplace.
Research cited in Menopause and Workplace, a report published by the Fawcett Society, found ten per cent of women aged over 50 left their job during menopause, 14 per cent reduced their hours and eight per cent had not applied for promotion.
Black and minority ethnic women receive disproportionately insufficient menopause care. The motion calls for an awareness-raising campaign and effective workplace policies that improve access to adjustments to working practices.
The second motion is on promoting Black maternal health outcomes. Figures show that maternal mortality rates are four times higher for Black women; two times higher for women of mixed ethnicity; and also twice as high for Asian women.
The motion calls on unions to support Black maternal mental health week (23-29 September) and to raise awareness of the need for employers to carry out appropriate and sensitive assessments during pregnancy and after their return to work.
n Visit neu.org. uk/menopause n Visit neu.org. uk/maternity
NEU members on the picket line at Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts Sixth Form College
NEU member John Pearce celebrated his 100th birthday on 31 January.
John joined the NUT in 1950 and continues to serve the union as an auditor. Before retiring, he was head teacher of Beacon Rise Primary School in Bristol. Throughout his 75 years in the union, he served at local, regional and national level – including as a division secretary and a national executive member.
He and fellow leading branch officer Peter Townsend negotiated some of the best conditions of service for teachers in the country and led successful campaigns to defend them in the 1980s. John fought fascism during World War II. Many happy returns, John.
PHOTO by Lee Thomas
www.leept.co.uk
News in brief
NI members reject pay offer
NEU members in Northern Ireland (NI) have rejected a pay offer and resumed industrial action as Educate went to press.
Rejecting the offer – which included a 5.5 per cent cost of living award for all teachers to be paid from September 2024 – meant that action short of strike action (working to rule) recommenced on 10 February.
NEU NI secretary Pauline Buchanan said: “Members deserve a fair and equitable pay award and the NEU stands ready to continue to negotiate with management side.”
n Visit neu.org.uk/northern-ireland
An ace year for NEU aromantic and asexual spectrum network
IT has been a fantastic 12 months for the NEU’s aromantic and asexual (aro/ace) spectrum network. We elected our first committee at the
2024 LGBT+ conference and have been working hard to raise awareness of aro/ace identities and support aro/ ace educators.
Over the last year, we participated in Asexual Awareness Week in October; organised social events; and shared myth busters and social media posts on how to be an ally.
In November, NEU aro/ace network chair Sara Hope was invited to participate in Ace Space London’s panel discussion on asexuality and aromanticism in the education system.
n Visit linktr.ee/NEUAroAce
By Abbie Sedgeman, NEU aro/ace network communications officer
NEU health and safety app
A NEW NEU app has been launched, which will enable members and reps to have health and safety information and advice at their fingertips. It contains briefings on 28 topics such as
accidents, injuries, stress and asbestos. n Search NEU in your app store.
Memorial call to action for Zane Gbangbola
ELEVEN years ago, seven-year-old Zane Gbangbola died at his home in Surrey during severe flooding.
There is strong evidence his death was caused by hydrogen cyanide gas, which seeped into the house from a nearby lake, a former landfill site, and was detected three times in the home by the fire brigade.
Join Zane’s parents on 28 April to send a powerful message to the prime minister about the need for an independent panel inquiry to investigate how Zane was killed. NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede will be introducing speakers, including mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham. n Register at tinyurl.com/justiceforZane n Visit truthaboutzane.com
Unanimous YES vote for strike action by ‘deflated, disillusioned’ staff
THREATENED continuation of strike action at Maricourt Catholic High School in Merseyside has forced management to return to the negotiating table in a dispute about workload.
NEU rep Conor Quinn described staff – who have been raising concerns for some time – as “deflated and disillusioned”.
New teachers at the school are overwhelmed with the production of resources, heads of departments are finding it difficult to cope, and teaching and learning responsibility (TLR) holders are considering giving up responsibilities and even their jobs.
Members took five days of strike action in December, after a ballot returned a 100 per cent Yes vote. Further dates of strike action were announced for January,
forcing management to return to the negotiating table.
Conor is hopeful the negotiations will lead to an agreement: “We hope that our work, priorities and professionalism are valued, and that our expertise is listened to. We are fighting for the return of some common sense when calculating 1,265 hours, giving us the time to carry out the many necessary duties we are expected to do.”
Kathryn Norouzi is a teacher in Nottingham. Her school is part of a multi-academy trust where she is the lead NEU rep.
Fighting for what’s right for educators
What do you love about your job?
So many things, but it’s the pupils that keep me in the profession: seeing them understand a concept for the first time, or knowing you have supported a student at a difficult moment or have been the listening adult they needed. I also love working with other professionals who care deeply about seeing young people achieve their potential.
What do you love about being in the union?
There was a time when my answer to this would have been: “What do you mean? The union just provides lawyers when you get into difficulty, doesn’t it?”
But more recently I have realised that the key to our union is its campaigning. I love that I’m part of a huge group of educators who come together to fight for what’s right for teachers, for the education system and, ultimately, for our students.
In 2012, I became a union rep because I was keen to support colleagues facing different issues within school. In 2023, I became the lead rep for my multi-academy trust (MAT). Like many, our MAT covers a number of branches and districts, so having one person co-ordinating actions and strategies is a lot more efficient. Mostly, I support the reps within my MAT to be excellent and active workplace reps and promote the wider work of the union, which I thoroughly enjoy.
Most lead reps attend their joint consultative and negotiating committee, although my employer doesn’t want me there – an issue we need to tackle urgently. I am the authentic voice of those I represent and yet the trust doesn’t want me at the negotiating table.
One win as a rep team was being able to say a collective ‘No’ to staff downloading a safeguarding app onto personal devices. If we had work phones it would have been different, as we don’t object to the app itself, but receiving messages and notifications outside work time isn’t good for wellbeing or workload.
All communication regarding safeguarding can be done successfully via work emails until we are provided with
work phones. It is also wrong to assume that everyone has a smartphone and is able to download a limitless number of apps.
At the moment, through this action, nobody is being pressured into downloading the app, regardless of whether they are in the NEU, however the trust has not withdrawn the policy formally. But our members have just refused to do it. There is safety in numbers, especially across a number of schools.
What’s important to you right now?
Thankfully, we have a new government. I am hopeful that policies will be more favourable towards education – although, let’s face it, they couldn’t have got much worse. First, the government must get rid of the anti-trade union laws that make it very difficult to take
strike action. It is a powerful tool that has been seriously blunted over the past few years. I also want the government to reconsider the role of Ofsted, which has undermined the profession for too long and needs to be abolished. We need a supportive and positive way to improve our schools, not a punitive one that drives educators out of the profession. Lastly, Labour made a good first step in pay restoration with the 5.5 per cent increase, but the unfunded 2.8 per cent it is recommending for 2025/26 isn’t good enough. It will negatively impact support staff and pupils. We must fight for fairer pay so all those in education get what they deserve.
What do you do on your day off?
My Christian faith is a big part of who I am, and it motivates the importance I place on equality and social justice, so I spend some of my time at church and with my church family. As a mum of two active boys, I am often poolside watching swimming lessons, or pitchside watching under-nines grassroots football, or sewing on Cubs badges ad infinitum. Left to my own devices, I like nothing more than a long walk in the Peak District followed by a pub lunch.
Tell us something we don’t know.
My surname, Norouzi, is Persian (my husband is from Iran) and it means ‘new (no) day (rouz)’. It is also the name of the Persian new year, which is 22 March. So remember to wish any Iranian friends, ‘Norouz Mobarak’.
CLASSROOM
I was teaching Dickens when one of my pupils asked if he was still alive. I realised most of them had no prior knowledge of this Victorian great. Fortunately, Dickens still featured on the £10 note and I had one on me. The boys eagerly crowded around to see what he looked like as I talked them through his life and work, including the scene from Pickwick Papers depicted in the background. One of the class, however, looked more puzzled than ever. “They put him on a banknote?” he asked incredulously. “For writing a book?” I realised I hadn’t quite got there on selling the importance of literature…
Priorities? We’ll give you priorities…
Words by Michael Rosen
Illustration by Dan Berry
“Listen everybody, you can have more pay; you can have more money if you do what we say.
“As you walk round school, look at the facilities! They have to be cut! Make efficiencies!
“You know those budgets? Time to analyse! Hack off dead wood and prioritise!”
“Whoever it is who’s done this calculation, knows nothing at all, about education.
“We’re not production lines. We help children grow. Some grow fast, while some grow slow.
“Please listen to us, we know what’s best. We create the future. It’s time to invest.”
Baroness Bousted
Mary Bousted tells Sally Gillen all about the new commission she is chairing that will address the chronic teacher shortage crisis.
WHAT will it take to make teaching an attractive profession again? If anyone is qualified to answer that question, and help tackle the national teacher shortage, it’s former NEU joint general secretary Mary Bousted.
Mary was a union leader for 20 years – until retirement from the NEU in 2023 – during a turbulent period in which political respect for the profession, and commitment to high-quality education, all but disappeared.
Workload soared, pay plummeted and chronic underfunding made every single problem in the sector, of which there are many, worse.
Today’s recruitment and retention crisis, growing every year, is an inevitable consequence of 14 years of neglect.
Mary spoke to Educate about the new Teaching Commission she is chairing, which was announced at the end of 2024. She was then made a baroness in the New Year’s honours list.
The commission was set up to investigate the teacher shortage and identify solutions. Mary says: “Teachers are working at a very high pace, they have very low professional agency, and there are inappropriate accountability measures. That creates a vortex of pressure on teachers, which drives them from the profession.”
Recommend to employers how to value teachers’ work
As chair of the commission, she has brought together 16 experts. They include a former NEU president, a current executive member, and practising teachers and leaders. Two have recently left teaching. They are gathering evidence from far and wide, including overseas.
The commission has three aims: n make recommendations to government about policy n recommend to employers how to value teachers’ work n produce a range of good-practice case studies from schools doing things well that can be adopted by others.
The NEU is a major sponsor of the commission, which is also supported by sister teaching unions ASCL, the NAHT and others. Its report will be launched in July, at the Festival of Education, in Berkshire – an event that attracts over 5,000 attendees.
Plan
to survey NEU members about life as a teacher today
At the time of Educate going to press, the commission had already held two evidence sessions and there were plans to survey NEU members on their experiences of life as a teacher today.
To restore teaching as an attractive career choice, and to keep those already in the profession, Mary says: “More than anything else we need to create the conditions where teachers’ working lives become more impactful, more rewarding and less stressful. Teachers’ workload and the demands of the job have doubled since 2002, and are double that of any other profession, according to research by UCL Institute of Education.”
The commission’s timing couldn’t be better. A change of government and a new education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, who has promised to “reset the relationship between the government and the teaching profession and build back trust,” sets the scene for meaningful change.
Recruit 6,500 teachers while retaining experienced staff
If Phillipson is to achieve the ambition for more “world-class teachers” and fulfil Labour’s election-winning manifesto pledge to recruit 6,500 extra teachers, she will need help.
“Teacher recruitment has fallen through the floor,” says Mary. “In 2024, only 259 more teachers were recruited than in 2023. So achieving that manifesto pledge will be very challenging. It doesn’t sound a lot, 6,500 more teachers, but when you’ve only managed to recruit 259 more, then it just shows the scale of the challenge.”
Retention is even more important, Mary believes, because when 40 per cent of teachers leave within ten years, the profession is weakened. “Young teachers don’t have the more experienced teachers to get guidance from, to learn from, be mentored by. The rates of teachers leaving within three years are going up dramatically,” she says.
The biggest group of leavers are women aged 30-39, corresponding with many of them starting families.
“Teaching is no longer seen as a family-friendly career. In fact, teachers say they look after everybody else’s children but can’t look after their own,” says Mary. continued on page 25
Building back trust
Photos by Rehan Jamil
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“Retention is a bigger problem than recruitment. If we retain more teachers, we need to recruit fewer.”
‘Wake up and smell the coffee’
One area the commission is focusing on is flexible working. “We can’t carry on saying we can’t do it,” insists Mary. “We have to wake up and smell the coffee.”
Recently, she met a physics teacher – “they’re like gold dust”– who had been working in a deprived, inner-city school and had asked to miss registration two days a week so she could drop her young daughters off at nursery and had offered to make up the time. Her request was refused, so she’s left teaching.
She was the only physics teacher in the school and her classes are now being taken by supply teachers, who aren’t physics graduates. “The school has lost its only physics teacher because it refused to think in any way creatively. How is that helping that school and those children?” asks Mary.
“I’m afraid you hear this just too often. I was talking to a flexible working champion, a chief executive of a multi-academy trust of special schools. Part of her job is to promote flexible working in other schools. She told me it’s almost impossible because she hears from them that they need consistency for classes, but of course consistency can be lots of things.
“It can be two teachers sharing the load. But if consistency just means the same person there all the time, well, when more and more graduate professions can offer flexible work, we must start thinking differently.”
The stock objection to flexible working, that it cannot be accommodated because of timetabling, is frustrating. “Many of these issues can be resolved with the touch of a button now, by a number of computer packages,” says Mary, though she concedes there may be challenges where there is, say, only one politics teacher.
But whatever the challenges, she says schools need to find a way to fit around teachers’ lives to keep them, and to provide a reasonable work-life balance.
“Why is it that 85 per cent of teachers say they are exhausted at the end of every single working day? Why is it that people who leave teaching say they have regained control of their working life, whereas only 22 per cent of teachers say they have sufficient control over their working lives?”
“We want to change the way teachers are employed and treated in schools.”
In her time as a union leader, the single biggest issue affecting recruitment and retention was workload, with falling pay a close second in recent years. Mary says government efforts to reduce teacher workload always failed for one clear reason: they never addressed what was driving the dysfunctional work – the accountability regime.
“It terrifies leaders, so they impose huge bureaucracies to provide the paper trail. Ofsted says it’s reforming but it needs to demonstrate it can inspect fairly and reliably. It is not an agency that has a good track record in looking at the profession.”
Ofsted’s lack of fairness includes the failure to inspect schools within their context and individual challenges, which means schools in deprived areas are likely to be penalised by a lower grading.
“Schools with the highest number of pupil-premium children have the most difficulty with recruitment and retention, and the highest number of lessons taught by unqualified
teachers. These are children who most need a stable workforce, and they are not getting it.”
Impact of child poverty on schools
The rise in child poverty, combined with government policies of austerity that shrank the central grant to councils by 40 per cent, leading to cuts in support services for poor families, has placed pressure on schools which they aren’t resourced to manage, says Mary.
“Schools have been left as the one place left standing to provide clothing, support with benefits, and food. Children are getting poorer, and we know poverty has a huge impact on the ability to learn and that 40 per cent of the attainment gap between middle class children and poor children is created before they start school.
“Yet schools are being told they aren’t reducing the attainment gap, at the same time as the government was making poor children poorer. If you’re working at a school in a deprived area, you aren’t just teaching, you are dealing with societal dysfunction, all the problems that poverty brings to families, all that it brings to children and young people, all of which they bring to school. Those schools are incredibly challenging to teach in.
“We need to understand how that affects teachers, who are people who want children and young people to succeed. Most people can think intellectually about child poverty but if you’re working in a school, you see its effects every day. It is terribly draining, upsetting and disheartening.”
She adds that the huge rise in special educational needs and the lack of resources to deal with that in schools are also a problem.
‘Engage NEU members in commission’
“The discussions we are having on the commission are so rich,” says Mary. “Our report is going to really speak to the condition of teachers in today’s schools and that’s why we want to engage the NEU membership in that conversation. We can’t just leave it to everyone else, we have to change the way teachers are employed and treated in schools.”
n Visit teaching commission.co.uk
n Support Not
Surveillance: How to Solve the Teacher Retention Crisis (right) by Dr Mary Bousted.
‘He
wanted
to crumble’
me
“Being a member of a union is the best way that colleagues can support each other.”
Lorraine Alfaro (right)
Photo by Matt Wilkinson
Lorraine Alfaro’s career was cut short by a baseless accusation orchestrated by her head teacher. She eventually won a six-figure sum with help from the NEU’s lawyers, but it took a terrible toll on her health. Emily Jenkins tells her story.
Turn to page 29
Maternity leave and pay
LORRAINE Alfaro was going about her busy day as a deputy head teacher when, on 24 May 2018, she was handed a letter that changed her life.
“It destroyed my career, wellbeing, health, self-confidence and reputation,” says Lorraine.
That letter was from the head teacher, signed by the chair of governors, informing Lorraine that senior, unnamed colleagues had made allegations of bullying and aggressive behaviour against her and an investigation was being held into her conduct.
“I was completely floored by its aggressively worded content,” she says.
Lorraine was working at St Benedict’s Catholic High School in Cumbria. Up until that point, her career had been unblemished. A full-time teacher since the age of 22, Lorraine, who was 58 when she received the letter, had been working at the school for 24 years. She says she had built a reputation as an effective, fair, responsible teacher and leader in her school and local community.
“I loved my job. I couldn’t think of one single incident that could have led to an investigation into my conduct.”
Staff terrified of aggressive head But she was not the first teacher at the school to receive a letter like this. The head had a reputation for aggressive management practices. “The staff were terrified of him,” she tells Educate. “But I had always spoken up.”
She had seen the head teacher use these tactics on other staff who had been put on capability procedures with the intent, she says, of forcing them to resign. Several had chosen to hand in their notice as a consequence.
Lorraine believed he wanted to scare her into resigning, and he calculated she would rather do that than face the serious disciplinary action outlined in the letter.
The letter also stated that Lorraine was being accused of publicly undermining the head teacher, and ‘undermining the inclusive ethos of the Catholic school’. “I’m a practising Catholic. The head knew that would hurt me.”
Lorraine believes the timing of the letter was calculated. She was acting as lead special educational needs co-ordinator, and it was handed to her moments before she was due to meet with a parent whose son had attempted suicide. The head was aware of this meeting.
The NEU reps at St Benedict’s had been suspended two weeks earlier which, Lorraine believes, was intended to prevent her from easily accessing union representation. “He wanted me to crumble,” she says.
“I was reduced to an anxietyridden shell of my former self.”
The two school reps subsequently went on to take out successful grievances against the school regarding their suspensions.
Despite the seriousness of the allegations, Lorraine had not been suspended. However, she says, she did not feel safe being in an environment where unknown colleagues had made allegations against her. So she called her NEU branch to discuss her options. She then submitted a formal grievance against the head and chair of governors, and informed colleagues why she wasn’t returning to work after the holidays.
96 per cent vote to strike
For many staff, the head’s targeting of Lorraine was the final straw. NEU members balloted for strike action in June 2018, citing bullying and aggressive management by the head and chair of governors.
A 96 per cent Yes vote for strike action led to the head taking sick leave and never returning, and the chair of governors following shortly after. Despite this, Lorraine still had to wait for her conduct to be investigated.
With no knowledge of who her accusers were – except they must still be at the school – she became increasingly unwell and didn’t feel safe returning to work.
After almost a year of waiting and fighting for information, Lorraine was exonerated by an
independent investigation. It concluded: “The allegations described in the letter are unfounded and not supported by the statements.”
All the blame was laid on the former head and chair of governors, with Lorraine’s accusers – three assistant head teachers who had been “loyal to the head” – merely being described as “naive”.
The school issued an apology and asked Lorraine to return to work. However, her accusers, whom she was expected to directly line-manage, refused to apologise. For a year, Lorraine fought to return to work, but with the school either unable or unwilling to hold her accusers accountable, in December 2020 she felt she had no choice but to resign to protect her deteriorating mental health.
“It affected not only me, but my family, friends and colleagues who watched me being reduced to an anxiety-ridden shell of my former self. I was afraid to leave the house. I couldn’t sleep and developed horrendous panic attacks and flashbacks, which I still suffer from. My self-confidence disappeared and, sadly, I have not been able to set foot in a school since.”
NEU legal team fight for compensation
It was at this point that the NEU’s legal team took up the case to prove the school’s actions had led to severe psychological damage and a loss of earnings.
James Gay, the NEU solicitor who led Lorraine’s case, told Educate: “It was clear there was a conspiracy by the head and chair of governors to have her removed. Lorraine had to cut her successful career short by ten years and suffered severe depression and shame within her local community as a result of the false allegations.”
Lorraine underwent years of psychiatric assessments and medical reviews to prove she had been made unwell. “I was made to feel like a fraud, I could easily have given up,” she says.
It has taken six years, but finally, in November, she won her case and was awarded a six-figure sum by the civil court as compensation for lost future earnings and pension loss. Lorraine says it’s a “relief” to have won but she would have much rather stayed in work. She hopes she can now begin to recover.
Lorraine says: “The NEU has been at my side for the six long and painful years it has taken to clear my name.
“Hopefully, reading about cases like mine will help show why being a member of a union is the best way that colleagues can support each other. You never think this trauma could happen to you, but it can.”
Remaking British histories
Professor Claire Alexander and Sundeep Lidher argue that the curriculum and assessment review is an opportunity for ‘our island story’ to be reconsidered, and for an overhaul of the way history is taught.
The Black Curriculum’s London Springboard workshop, where young people aged 11-16 learnt about Black British history through the lens of music and poetry
HISTORY matters. It tells us not just about what happened in the past, but about who we are now, how we got here and, perhaps most importantly, who we might become. It is a form of time travel, which connects past, present and future.
Rather than a collection of dry, dusty facts –dates of battles, a roll call of kings and queens, of great (and terrible) deeds – history is a magical mystery tour, with new stories to tell, secrets to reveal, truths to revisit and unravel.
History is what places us, as individuals, families, communities and nations, within the larger stories of war and invasion, religious transformation, migration and settlement, invention and exploitation, climate change. It connects us to local familiar spaces and to faraway places, which have shaped who we are and which we, in turn, have shaped.
It is the story of us.
Narrow and uncritically patriotic
Of course, that is not how history is taught in schools. Since the launch of the new national curriculum in England in 2014, the focus has been almost entirely on facts. For the past decade it has also been dominated by a reductive, narrowly nationalistic and uncritically patriotic view of British (or, rather, English) history.
This was branded by the then prime minister David Cameron as ‘our island story’ – referencing a children’s book of the same name, published in 1905, celebrating Britain at the height of its imperial power.
History, and history teaching, changes – over time, by place and too often at
the whims of whatever government is in power. Since its inception under Margaret Thatcher, the history national curriculum has been a shifting framework for collective remembering or forgetting. It reflects and shapes a sense of national identity that can be open and tolerant of diversity, or can be closed and exclusionary.
If British history tells us who ‘we’ are, the question arises, who or what is included in this national story? And who or what is excluded? Who are ‘we’?
An alternative history
Our Migration Story (ourmigrationstory. org.uk) attempts to offer an alternative vision of British history to the more insular ‘our island story’ narrative that dominates the curriculum. A partnership between academics and race equality think tank the Runnymede Trust, it began with a project tracing Muslim migration from the Indian state of Bengal after the partition of India in 1947, including to Britain.
This project placed the ‘little’ histories of individuals and families within the ‘big’ histories of empire and decolonisation, and of war, mass migration and climate change. This enables the exploration of how history shapes, and is shaped by, stories ‘from below’. As part of this project, we developed the Bangla Stories website (banglastories.org) and teaching resource aimed at young people aged 11 to 14.
This was followed by two projects exploring how inclusive histories could be taught in British classrooms. Making Histories (makinghistories.org.uk) used family and community oral history methods continued on page 32
Pupils using Our Migration Story resources
PHOTOS by A McIntosh
continued from page 31
to engage young people in Sheffield, Leicester and Cardiff as ‘history researchers’.
The second project, History Lessons (tinyurl.com/runnymede-history-lessons), examined place and heritage, focusing on teachers in London and Manchester and the challenges they faced in teaching an inclusive curriculum in increasingly diverse classrooms.
Broader range of voices and experiences
Two key lessons emerged from these projects. First, there was a strong desire among all young people for history teaching that reflected a broader range of voices and experiences.
Second, while there was a willingness to teach more representative histories, teachers felt ill-prepared and uncomfortable engaging with ‘difficult’ topics in diverse classrooms. Moreover, they felt constrained by their own lack of subject knowledge, and increasing demands on their time and energies in a fastchanging teaching climate.
Resources to teach a broad curriculum
During a roundtable event for the History Lessons project, one teacher challenged the team to create a resource that would make it easy for them to access material they needed to teach British histories of migration.
Our Migration Story (OMS) was our response to that challenge. In 2016, we worked with more than 80 academics, museums, archivists and local historians to
“Teachers felt constrained by their lack of subject knowledge, and increasing demands on their time and energies.”
compile an independent, free-to-access site, to give educators the materials they needed to teach a broader curriculum.
The website tells an alternative story of Britain through 2,000 years of migration, divided into different historical periods and with resources and downloadable lesson plans. Since its launch, it has had more than 1.3 million users from across the globe.
Such statistics suggest there is real appetite for a fuller, richer, evidence-based account of Britain’s past. This has undoubtedly grown in recent years through the demands to decolonise the curriculum, particularly in the wake of Black Lives Matter.
Race, empire and immigration
OMS is just one small part of a wider movement to develop a more inclusive curriculum, from the supplementary school movements of the 1960s and 1970s, through to The Black Curriculum (theblackcurriculum.com) and more recent campaigns led by the Runnymede Trust to teach about race, empire and migration.
OMS has four main arguments:
n Our island story is inescapably a story of migration to and from its shores.
n British history is not simply national but global, entangled with complex – and uncomfortable – histories of empire and colonialism.
n The histories of Black people are part of our national story within Britain itself –for over 2,000 years, ‘Black Histories are British histories’.
n In placing very different histories of migration alongside each other, we can begin to talk about both what divides us and what we share. And we can do this as equals, in a modern, multicultural Britain.
The curriculum and assessment review presents an opportunity for the government to reconsider the ‘our island story’ narrative –to embrace a more inclusive story of Britain that reflects our diverse past and present, one that offers a vision of an equal, shared future. In the wake of the racist riots over the
Children learning about Black British history at The Black Curriculum’s London Springboard workshop
PHOTOS by The Black Curriculum
summer, a more open, honest conversation has never been more urgent.
Time and resources for teacher training Teachers are crucial to this conversation. Our recent research, Making History Teachers (2023) shows that, especially in the wake of Black Lives Matter, teachers and teacher educators are committed to making change in their classrooms and curricula.
Professor Claire Alexander is head of the school of social sciences at the University of Manchester.
However, the move away from subjectspecific training, the fragmenting of the education sector and the ongoing pressures on teachers mean that enacting these changes is often impossible.
We suggest two main changes. First, that histories of migration, empire and colonialism are placed at the centre of narratives of British national identity. Second, that we equip teachers to address these often-difficult
NEU resources for educators
n Framework for developing a wholeschool anti-racist approach, neu.org.uk/ anti-racism-charter
n Recognising international equality events in January and February. neu.org.uk/ our-histories
Sundeep Lidher is a lecturer in Black and Asian British history at King’s College London.
topics through subject-specific training, and by giving them the time and resources for continuing professional development. History matters.
n Turn to page 50 for more on The Black Curriculum.
n The NEU uses Black in a political context to encompass all members who self-identify as Black, Asian and any other minority ethnic groups who do not identify themselves as white.
Find out more
n The often untold stories of the generations of migrants who came to and shaped the British Isles. ourmigrationstory.org.uk
n Family histories and migration stories documented by young people. makinghistories.org.uk
n Teaching resources on the Holocaust and Nazi persecution, produced by the NEU and the Holocaust Educational Trust. het.org.uk/ks4/mosaic
n Report from the NEU and the all-party political group on race and equality in education. neu.org.uk/ adultification
n Teaching resources to help pupils reflect on the importance of Windrush and how migration has shaped Britain. neu.org.uk/windrush-education
n Black teachers’ rights to pay and promotion, to help tackle discrimination in the workplace neu.org. uk/blackteachers-pay
n Stories of people who left behind home and family, who crossed borders, travelled overseas and made new lives. banglastories.org
n Re-imagining the future of education through Black British history. theblackcurriculum.com
Fact file
Tune in to the NEU’s podcast to hear about the issues that members are talking about, including:
> How do I get involved in the NEU?
> Why is the early years sector in crisis?
> What happens at NEU conference?
> What have Labour’s first 50 days meant for education?
Search The NEU Podcast on your podcast platform and make sure to give us a follow.
Join the conversation at @TheNEUPodcast or by emailing podcast@neu.org.uk
Shaping the education debate
Cartoon by Tim Sanders
Two words being overlooked:
children’s wellbeing
Warwick Mansell is a freelance education journalist and founder/writer of educationuncovered.
co.uk
WAS the Department for Education’s policymaking – especially high-profile changes to the structural control of thousands of schools – an unbridled success between 2010 and 2024?
Well, unsurprisingly, if you listen to the Conservatives, the answer is yes. And Labour’s recently introduced children’s wellbeing and schools bill is wrong to mess with this success, it is claimed.
This argument seems to have gained traction not just with Conservative politicians defending their record, but with the media. The BBC’s Today programme has joined the likes of The Times and The Telegraph in giving it serious airtime.
Key to the argument, as deployed by Tory education frontbenchers Neil O’Brien and Laura Trott, have been metrics pointing to England’s progress up international testing
league tables over the past 15 years. O’Brien, for example, quotes the country moving from 21st in 2009 to seventh in 2022 in the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) maths tests for 15-year-olds. And rising from 15th to fifth for year 5 science in the rival Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) study between 2011 and 2023.
This is taken as evidence that one of a host of education initiatives introduced during the period – the academies policy – lies behind these gains. And that Labour plans, in the children’s wellbeing and schools bill, to require academies to follow the national curriculum and teachers’ national pay and conditions, would undermine them.
Yet England’s record in international tests can be looked at more sceptically. Average performance, for example, in secondary science actually fell over the period 2009 to 2022 in PISA, and 2007 to 2023 in TIMSS.
Even if England’s international results were seen as a success, the fact that many schools academised during the period would not be the most obvious explanation, with changes in the national curriculum and its associated pedagogy more likely factors.
But the most glaring point to make is that the Conservatives and those who buy their claims have been ignoring other indicators which feature in these international studies. The latest TIMSS study found England had the third-highest proportion of teenagers reporting that they had “little sense” of “belonging” at school, out of 43 countries, in 2023. In 2015, it ranked 13th out of 39 on this measure.
Similarly, PISA showed the reported “life satisfaction” scores of UK 15-yearolds plunging compared to other countries from 2015, leaving it second-lowest on this measure across the OECD in 2022.
With policies in English schools including accountability measures and “noexcuses” behaviour drives arguably placing high pressure on young people to succeed and comply, these wellbeing indicators should be taken into account. It is sadly ironic and revealing that such metrics have received no airtime in this debate, since they relate to children’s wellbeing, the first two words of Labour’s new bill.
Whether the bill will halt the above worrying statistical trends remains to be seen. But the new government has been right at least to shine more of a spotlight on wellbeing.
Ask the union
Cover work for jury service
I’M a teacher and I’ve been called up for jury service. Am I obliged to provide cover work while I am absent?
The union believes it is reasonable for teaching staff to plan and prepare some cover work in advance when absence from work is foreseeable and potentially long term. However, it would not be reasonable to have to provide cover work during jury service as this would contribute to an unrealistic and unhealthy workload. The amount of cover work set should be sensible,
Supporting colleagues experiencing domestic
abuse
I THINK a female colleague is experiencing domestic abuse. How can I help?
Around one in five adults experience domestic abuse during their lifetime. So it is likely that in any workplace there are people affected by domestic abuse –either as a survivor or perpetrator.
Let your colleague know that you are concerned. Consider asking sensitive, non-threatening questions, one-to-one in a private setting. Someone experiencing domestic abuse may not want to disclose this.
Where a colleague has disclosed that they are being abused, take this seriously and seek advice if necessary. Do not advise beyond your expertise – it is better to provide information about specialist domestic violence organisations. Give them the National Domestic Abuse Helpline – 0808 2000 247 – and alert them to support available under your workplace domestic abuse policy if you have one.
The NEU’s model domestic abuse policy at neu.org.uk/domestic-abusemodel-policy sets out key steps to take.
You can also encourage your colleague to disclose their situation to their line manager or head teacher, but please respect and accept their feelings on the way forward as they may not be ready to do this yet.
Counselling is available from the Education Support Partnership at educationsupport.org.uk for your colleague, or indeed for you, as responding to a colleague being harmed can be distressing.
with consideration given to the length of absence.
Your employer should ideally have a cover policy, which should establish an appropriate strategy for dealing with planned and unplanned absences of teachers, including the setting of cover work. If your employer doesn’t have one, refer to the NEU’s model policy at neu.org.uk/cover-model-policy
For medium- and long-term absences, the union’s policy is that employers should deploy either a cover teacher, a fixed-term contract teacher or a supply teacher. Speak to your workplace rep if you have one, as they
may be aware of similar instances regarding cover work and will be able to provide further support and guidance if necessary.
Contact us…
n Please email your questions to educate@neu.org.uk
n If your question is urgent, please call the AdviceLine on 0345 811 811
Free CPD webinars for all NEU members
NEU members have exclusive access to our continuing professional development (CPD) webinars. Here are some of the courses coming up.
Transactional analysis in education – an introduction
Learn about the core principles in transactional analysis and the benefits for its use in education.
5 March 3.45-5pm
Behaviour - routines for learning Discover effective classroom behaviour
management through productive learning routines and reflective practice opportunities.
6 March 3.45-5pm
Leadership masterclassapplications and interviews
How to present your skills and prepare for career changes as an existing or aspiring leader.
18 March 4-5pm
Engaging children to read and write for pleasure in early years and key stage 1
This webinar will discuss research and consider informal book talk, choice-led reading and writing and multimodal, playful approaches.
26 March 3.45-5pm
Leadership masterclass –coaching others
Explore the concept of coaching others in your role as a leader.
29 April 11am-12pm
n Webinars are available for 14 days.
n Visit neu.org.uk/national-cpd
A class act
Creative conversations about future careers
An art lead in Peckham is making waves. Emily Jenkins finds out what makes Joseph Murray (pictured right) a class act.
JOSEPH Murray has already transformed the art department at Harris Boys’ Academy, East Dulwich, despite joining just two years ago.
“When I came to the department, I quickly set about redesigning the curriculum and changing the way students approach art as a subject,” says Joseph.
Art and its role in wider society
As head of art at the south London secondary, he introduced more contemporary art forms, such as creating ’zines on social issues like climate change and human rights. The aim is not only to engage students in art but also for them to see it as part of society and the wider job market.
So he ties projects in with potential future careers, such as designing book covers, which he uses as a catalyst to discuss the role of a professional illustrator.
Outside of lessons, Joseph encourages students to lead on projects. A group is currently painting an old shed and turning it into a public gallery space. Their first exhibition will be of postcard-sized artwork. Anyone at the school – including staff and former students – can submit their work, and the school counsellor and caretaker have already put theirs forward.
Students will run the art space themselves and pick which artwork wins a prize.
A major part of Joseph’s ethos is that students need to see real artists at work. To that end, he’s turned his office – which he never used – into studio spaces for working artists, who also bring their workspaces into the classroom itself.
“We’ve got a graduate from nearby Camberwell College of Arts, Molly, who comes here three to four times a week to
make her own work,” says Joseph. Molly is a ceramicist, and the students are free to watch her work or ask questions.
“The kids are around a real artist who is preparing for exhibitions. They can have these completely natural conversations about art,” he says. The studio spaces are provided for free. The importance, Joseph stresses, is students see art as a legitimate career opportunity.
Artists who pupils can identify with Initiatives such as these have improved student engagement, says Joseph. And they have been particularly impactful for students from socially disadvantaged families – about 41 per cent of the school’s pupils – most of whom are Black and minority ethnic students.
He has found that, often, due to financial circumstances or their cultural community, a career in art may never have been suggested. “A lot of the time it feels like the most vulnerable kids are given the strictest and most limited diet of what is believed to be a successful education,” he says.
Ninety per cent of working artists are white, compared to 85 per cent of the general workforce, according to a 2024 report by the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre. Its research looked at art, creative and heritage sector workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
For Joseph, it is vital his students meet and study artists who have similar backgrounds to them. Which is why he often invites artists who are Black, or of an ethnic minority, to come into school.
“It’s so important they engage with artists from their own backgrounds so they are able to see people having successful careers in the creative industries,” he says.
Shift in culture is really important
Joseph is incredibly proud of how he has turned the department around, increasing student and staff engagement. “Teachers from other parts of the school will visit. They’ll do their marking here and we’ll listen to music.”
GCSE attainment has increased too, but Joseph is particularly excited about the change in attitude towards art as a subject: “It’s the shift in culture that’s the really important thing,” he says.
Do you know a class act? Email educate@neu.org.uk
Ben, a former pupil
PHOTO by CleverBox
PHOTO by Olivia Weetch
Women and girls resisting Taliban rule
By Celia Dignan, NEU international secretary
THE Taliban resumed power in Afghanistan in 2021 and quickly banned girls and women from learning beyond primary education.
It is the only country in the world that restricts girls’ education by law. Women teachers are also prohibited from teaching in boys’ secondary schools, which has impacted boys’ ability to access secondary education.
The Taliban has instituted more than 100 laws restricting women’s rights. These include banning women from places such as parks, hair and nail salons, from taking part in sporting activities, and even singing and dancing. Women cannot travel far from home without being accompanied by a male relative, and recent restrictions on women training as healthcare professionals will effectively deny female access to medical and midwifery care.
In 2023, the Taliban extended the ban on women’s employment to include jobs with the UN and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs), creating additional challenges in delivering humanitarian assistance and vital services, including in education.
Gender persecution
Restrictions on the rights of women and girls, along with the use of arbitrary arrest and detention, enforced disappearance, torture, threats to family members and other ill-treatment, have been condemned by international human rights groups.
The UN Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation in Afghanistan and the UN Working Group on Discrimination Against Women and Girls have stated that the treatment of women and girls “may amount to gender persecution – a crime against humanity – and be characterised as gender apartheid”.
Nobel Peace Prize winner and girls’ education campaigner Malala Yousafzai has said: “Simply put, the Taliban in Afghanistan do not see women as human beings.”
Unsurprisingly, UN agencies have reported an increase in child and forced marriage, as well as gender-based violence and femicide. Many women and girls suffer from depression, in some cases leading to suicide. UN agencies say 97 per cent now live in poverty.
But the failure of the international community to help Afghan refugees has made the humanitarian challenges greater still. Pakistan, Iran and Türkiye have continued to deport Afghan refugees; while countries such as the UK have failed to establish safe routes for those seeking asylum.
Despite the risks, Afghan educators continue to advocate for girls’ and women’s rights. Education International, the global federation of education unions to which the NEU is affiliated, has collected more than 2,000 personal testimonies from teachers through the Afghan Teachers’ Rights Observatory initiative.
Shakila (not her real name), who has two daughters, has over 15 years’ teaching experience in Afghanistan’s Balkh province. Despite the challenges, she remains committed to advocating for academic freedom.
Hakimi (not her real name), a teacher in Kabul, laments the closure of girls’ schools and disrespect towards educators, and advocates for safety in education and regular pay.
Educate spoke to Shahrzad Koofi Ahmadi, the director of Justice for Equality in Afghanistan Organisation (JEAO), an Afghan women-led organisation that provides education and training support.
The daughter of a women’s rights activist and single parent, Shahrzad left Afghanistan in 2021 and came to the UK. She says the climate is becoming ever more difficult: “We were running nursing and midwifery courses
for 100 women but the recent verbal edict from the Taliban banning women from working in healthcare meant we lost our funding from the World Bank and the courses have had to close down. I can’t even continue to lead the NGO within Afghanistan; I have had to name a male representative to carry on our work.”
Shahrzad says she sees resistance everywhere in Afghanistan, from women wearing brightly coloured clothes instead of the black dress prescribed by the Taliban, to ignoring restrictions on where they go. “Afghanistan feels like an open-air prison for women but they are not giving up.”
How can NEU members help?
NEU members can continue to support women and girls by getting involved with organisations in the UK that are supporting Afghan refugees, she says, as well as empowering young people in Afghanistan. JEAO links students in the UK with students in Afghanistan, and the Afghanistan Development Academy has a volunteering platform that connects Afghan students worldwide, empowering them through education and skill development.
In addition, we must continue to pressure the UK government to support Afghans, including by establishing safe routes for those making the perilous journey to the UK.
n Download Let Afghan Girls Learn, a free resource including lesson plans, at tinyurl.com/maiden-factor
School girls in Kabul, Afghanistan, in October 2023
PHOTO by Rashid Noor/Shutterstock
Reviews
The School-Ready Governor
THIS helpful guide covers governance, inclusivity, documentation, human resources, safeguarding, curriculum planning, assessment and more.
One interesting area highlighted is ‘bike shedding’ –when a disproportionate amount of time in a meeting is spent discussing a small issue, such as the state of bike sheds, to the detriment of more important matters.
Changemakers
THIS book is about how to mobilise and equip supporters to become future organisers and activists.
Holgate and Page explore the practicalities of organising through their personal experiences of activism, the ideas of leading theorists and well-known examples of successful – and unsuccessful – movements. Each chapter concludes with a summary to start the process of organising or to reflect on current campaigning.
Changemakers are encouraged to think about transformational organising, such that others are empowered to act collectively to bring about their own change. All reps and officers should read Changemakers.
Graham Ward-Tipping
Changemakers: Radical Strategies for Social Movement
The author has a lot of insight, having worked as a head teacher. Recommended for any school governor or leader.
Cavan Wood
The School-Ready Governor: A Guide for Trustees, Governors and School Leaders by Rebecca Leek. Bloomsbury. £20.
The Riddle of the Viking Treasure
THIS book cleverly blends a thrilling whodunnit with fascinating forensic science.
It has the charm of a Famous Five adventure, infused with humour and offering an engaging, well-written story that will captivate readers. Although the occasional narrative detail may feel a bit imprecise, the intriguing science and Viking facts more than compensate and add real depth.
The inclusion of 17 pages of helpful weblinks is a bonus for those wanting to explore further. A highly enjoyable read that will spark curiosity and imagination.
Mike Follows
The Riddle of the Viking Treasure by Dr Mandy Hartley. Insight and Perspective. £16.99.
Send us your 100-word review to educate@neu.org.uk with a link to the book, and your membership number, and your review could be published.
Organising by Jane Holgate and John Page. Bristol University Press. £14.99
The VESPA
Handbook
BASED on a wealth of research, this innovative handbook has 40 activities to empower teenagers to improve their motivation and productivity.
Using the VESPA (Vision, Effort, Systems, Practice and Attitude) model, the authors explore these five key themes in detail with useful resources for students. Analysing the behaviours of high-level learners, there are 20 statements portraying the successful learning qualities needed in each of the VESPA areas.
The activities provided can be used with whole classes, small groups or individuals. Examples of curriculum plans are provided to show how to implement the topics throughout the year. An excellent resource.
Cindy Shanks
The VESPA Handbook: 40 New Activities to Boost Student Commitment, Motivation and Productivity by Steve Oakes and Martin Griffin. Crown House Publishing. £19.99.
Explodapedia: Rewild
AN excellent introduction to rewilding, exploring its role in ecology and climate-change mitigation. Shortlisted for the Association for Science Education’s book of 2024, it highlights the work of exceptional women scientists. They include Suzanne Simard, who helped popularise the concept of the ‘wood-wide web’ – mycorrhizal fungal networks that connect trees and plants, enabling nutrient, water and chemical exchange
for mutual support and ecosystem resilience. It offers valuable insights into how we might live more harmoniously with the planet for the benefit of all life on Earth, including our own. Ideal for biology, geography, and environmental science teachers and students.
Mike Follows
Explodapedia: Rewild by Ben Martynoga. Illustrated by Moose Allain. David Fickling Books. £7.99.
Brilliant non-fiction is the real deal
Jon Biddle, English lead and NEU rep at Moorlands Primary in Norfolk, is passionate about fostering a love of reading for pleasure. Here he shares ideas and tips for schools to try.
NON-fiction, along with poetry, is the poor relation when it comes to children’s reading. It receives less publicity, there are not as many reviews or recommendations available, and authors tend to be less well-known.
It is also often overlooked when it comes to reading aloud in class. As non-fiction author Andy Seed has passionately argued for years, it also has a terrible name, being the only genre of writing defined by what it is not, rather than what it is. He argues they should be rebranded as factual books, a name that is short, descriptive and, most crucially, positive. I’m in full support.
Whatever we call it, the non-fiction published for children today is incredibly good. As a child, I remember ploughing through enormous encyclopaedias with endless pages of tiny writing, occasionally interspersed with a minuscule black-andwhite photo or an indecipherable map. Today’s books are visually appealing, hugely varied and engagingly written. They are often interactive, with flaps to lift, pages to unfold and buttons to press.
Deer class top five non-fiction books 2024
the amazing true stories from David Long’s Survivors (left) and Heroes (right). I usually give them a choice of three stories from these two fascinating books – and, inevitably, the more outrageous the title, the more votes it receives. The Man Who Drank His Own Wee and The Woman Who Froze to Death – Yet Lived are consistently popular.
size, so lots of space is definitely needed. Pens and paper are always available as pupils love having the opportunity to write down interesting facts they have learned about breakfast cereals, or put together a list of the top ten deadliest sharks, or whatever may have sparked their interest. They might decide to create posters or even write their own non-fiction books based on what they are reading.
As there are non-fiction books available on almost every subject, they really do get children reading. We have several books about the Titanic in our classroom that are rarely, if ever, left on the shelves. Books such as Cats React to Science Facts by Izzi Howell, the Lifesize series by Sophy Henn, and Andy Seed’s own Interview with a Panda (all pictured left) are incredibly popular. In fact, so is anything that presents information in a new way.
It is important to include non-fiction as part of the regular read-aloud session in class.
My pupils love hearing one of
When new non-fiction arrives in the classroom, we will often select a page together to read and discuss, which is usually enough to guarantee that somebody will want to borrow the book as soon as possible.
It is important to remember that non-fiction texts do have a limited shelflife, as books featuring maps and scientific information can become out of date. Library organisations recommend they are replaced every ten years or so.
I ensure we have a couple of dedicated non-fiction reading sessions each term and that they are always very relaxed and informal. Because non-fiction is often written to be dipped into rather than read from cover to cover, pupils will generally have access to three or four books on various subjects to browse through. They can sit where they like, which includes sprawling on the floor with friends. Several books also unfold to an enormous
Last year, for example, I had a pupil who wrote her own mini-book about big cats as she had been so inspired by Crazy About Cats by Owen Davey (right). I also ensure that time is prioritised for children to talk with each other about what they have learned and share their knowledge.
Ensuring pupils have access to high-quality non-fiction will nurture their curiosity and interest and help them find issues they are passionate about and want to learn about beyond the limits of the school curriculum. That can only be a good thing – the more they care about something, the more they will want to read about it, which will ultimately lead to them wanting to take positive action and make their planet a more compassionate, empathetic and sustainable place to live.
jonnybid.bsky.social
Read more ideas from Jon next issue
Misguided academy
AS a supply teacher, I have worked in many secondary schools. It is obvious to me how and why the failing institutions that I have worked with are not giving the school, students and staff the full support and care that is needed. Unfortunately, it comes from the top.
At the school where I am currently working, it is shocking to witness the rudeness from within. The chief executive is rude and uncommunicative when walking round the school – no smile, no acknowledgment, no greetings to staff or students. No introductions made at the beginning of the academic year.
The principal is as bad, with very little profile around school.
Being an academy, it is top heavy with senior leadership on big salaries. They skirt around duties unless the trust is in for monitoring sessions. I often find them in their offices with doors closed.
Staff retention is poor. The school is dirty. Class sizes are big at 30+ in small classrooms. There are unqualified teachers taking lessons. There have been no year team meetings this academic year. No touching base with form tutors or acknowledgment of working together. No pleasantries.
Resources are hard to get. You can order them, but the process of getting through to finance then ordering the items is time consuming and wasteful.
It is incomprehensible that this school is not being held accountable.
Name and location withheld
Reliable or a rip-off?
I AGREE that supply teachers are being ripped off by agencies. However, as a cover co-ordinator, I used to find it very time
consuming looking for staff from the local authority pool. When receiving many calls from staff who can’t come in, it is easier to use agencies as they know who is free to work, while the local authority does not.
Name and location withheld
The editor writes: The NEU is calling on the government to invest in the funding of a national supply register that recognises experience, gives access to a public service pension scheme, and prevents public funds being siphoned off for profit.
From U3 to below M1
I APPRECIATE your recent article on Welsh supply members’ protest against rip-off agencies (see Educate, January/February, page 16). I feel strongly that more needs to be done.
With 40-plus years’ experience as a permanent teacher, I have been doing supply for the last three years. I registered with an agency, which takes a huge cut from my wage and pays me approximately £30 below the minimum main pay scale band 1 (M1) rate – at my
Teacher’s pet Tigger
Tigger is the lovely dog of Monya Kaur, a teacher in south east London.
Monya says: “Tigger is helpful when setting up the classroom, and he certainly knows how to make me
smile after a long day.
“My class already knows about Tigger, he is very much part of our lessons: from maths to practising our French skills. Hopefully one day the children can finally meet him.”
If you have a treasured pet you’d like to show off, email a high-resolution photo with 50 words about what makes them so special to educate@neu.org.uk
NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede and executive member Louise Lewis at a union protest outside the London offices of the UK’s largest supply agency, Teaching Personnel, in March last year
PHOTO by Kois Miah
Please write The editor welcomes your letters but reserves the right to edit them. Write to Letters, Educate, NEU, Hamilton House, Mabledon Place, London WC1H 9BD or email
last job, I was paid the maximum upper pay scale band 3 (U3) rate. When I ask the agency to increase my rate, the reply is: “We will have to ask the school.”
Schools would not be able to function without supply teachers. We should be highly valued and I would ask the NEU to have a designated supply teachers’ rep who will fight our cause. This needs to be highlighted in the media and agencies need to be honest about how much they charge a school.
Lorraine Molins, West Sussex
The editor writes: The NEU believes problems with commercial agencies need to be addressed as whole-union issue.
Supply members like you, Lorraine, are strongly encouraged to get involved with your district or branch and stand to be a supply officer (similar to your proposed supply rep). If there is already someone in that role, why not offer to help them out?
Supply members can also nominate themselves for their regional or Wales supply organising forum. Contact your branch/district officer for details. n Visit neu.org.uk/districtbranch-finder
educate@neu.org.uk
Please note we cannot print letters sent in without a name and postal address (or NEU membership number), although we can withhold details from publication if you wish.
Star letter
Support staff coverage and misogyny in schools
THANK you for an excellent edition of Educate. I am always pleased when my copy drops through the letterbox. I eagerly flick through to find the articles relating to support staff. I wasn’t disappointed: a super report from the support staff conference, and reports of strike action being taken over support staff redundancies and conditions. I am sure this year there will be many more.
I was also interested to read the article about misogyny in the classroom (see Educate, January/February, pages 30-31).
At Ellistown Primary School in Leicestershire, we are ahead of the game. On our October teacher day, we had training from organisation Breaking the Cycle (breakingthecycle.org.uk). It was an excellent half-day course run by an experienced tutor who used to work in prisons with offenders.
Our head teacher arranged the training as a result of sexist and demeaning behaviour from some of our year 6 boys. I was able to share much of the course with my husband on my return home... not sure he was ready to listen.
Thanks again for a great issue. Jan Abbott, Leicestershire
A plaque for Bernard Butt?
I READ your moving feature, The man was a lion (see Educate, January/February, pages 22-25), about the heroism of teacher Bernard Butt. Having been on a similar school cruise in the early 1970s, I found the article profoundly moving. It struck me that a fitting tribute to Bernard’s heroism would be to seek to place a memorial tile in Postman’s Park, London EC1A, a beautiful and peaceful memorial park established to remember ‘ordinary people who died saving the lives of others and who otherwise might be forgotten’. Thanks again for a great issue. Nigel Wood, Norwich
Postman’s Park was proposed by British painter and sculptor George Frederic Watts and opened in 1900 PHOTO by Alex_Mastro/Shutterstock.com
The NEU It’s Not OK event in Manchester in November, where 200 members gathered for training on stamping out sexism in schools PHOTO by Jess Hurd
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Canals help fight climate change
A FREE resource designed to support discussion around the role that canals and rivers can play in helping to tackle climate change has been produced by the Canal and River Trust.
The Climate Change resource pack is aimed at key stage 3 students. It covers topics such as flood management, biodiversity and hydropower through a variety of practical activities, discussion topics and problem-solving.
The resource was developed in collaboration with educators and also provides insights into careers related to engineering, environmental science and sustainability.
n Visit tinyurl.com/canals-climate
10 days of science innovation
FREE activity packs are available to download to support learning during British Science Week, which runs from 7-16 March.
The packs, created with the support of UK Research and Innovation, include practical activities designed to get students thinking
about this year’s theme, Change and Adapt. Ideas include designing playground games to account for the needs of different players, and considering how to reduce waste in school lunch preparation.
The activities are suitable for children and young people from early years to age 14. n Visit britishscienceweek.org/activity-packs
Download music for your class
CALLING all music teachers. The schools printed music licence (SPML) is free to all state schools in England and Northern Ireland. It allows you to legally copy and arrange printed music and digital downloads purchased from legitimate sources.
The reporting element of the SPML is being made more teacher friendly.
Step-by-step guides and practical templates are available to download from Every Copy Counts, alongside a range of free teaching resources to support music creation in the classroom.
n Visit everycopycounts.co.uk
Navigating new cultures
EXPLORE themes, including family, friendship and tradition, within Shirley Marr’s book All Four Quarters of the Moon with a free downloadable teaching pack from Usborne.
Aimed at key stage 2 readers, the book tells the story of 11-year-old Peijing who moves from Singapore to Australia with her family and must navigate new relationships and cultures, while trying to maintain a connection to her own heritage.
The teaching resource uses spotlight extracts, discussion points and activities to support readers to discuss their thoughts about the book.
n Visit tinyurl.com/moon-quarters
Are your membership details up to date
Have you moved house since you joined the NEU? Or perhaps you’ve got a new job at the same workplace? Or moved to a completely new workplace? Have your hours changed? Or are you about to go on maternity leave?
It’s important that your union has the correct details for you. If your details are out of date, you could find that you’re:
missing out on important mailings paying too much for your membership fees
unable to access NEU representation or assistance, including legal advice excluded from ballots
Checking and updating your membership details is easy my.neu.org.uk
If you have difficulty accessing myNEU or you have a more complex query, email the membership team at membership@neu.org.uk
Please note: changes to subscriptions including fee holidays during maternity, shared parental and adoption leave can only be processed in the current subscription year (1 September 2024-31 August 2025). We are unable to backdate requests for previous subscription years.
Update your membership details –
IT’S vital that the NEU has up-to-date details for all its members. You may be eligible for reduced subscriptions – for example, if you work part-time, are about to take maternity leave or retire.
It’s important we have the correct address for you for balloting purposes so, if you have moved, make sure you tell us your new home or workplace address.
The easiest way to update your details is by logging on to myNEU. Go to my.neu.org.uk to manage
your membership, including updating your address, workplace and equality information. Alternatively: n call us on 0345 811 8111 (Monday to Friday, 9am-5pm) n email membership@neu.org.uk
THIS fascinating photo was taken by Karen Gregory, head of English, media, music and drama at a school in Shepton Mallet in Somerset.
Karen says: “I took this photo of the Wells Cathedral chained library, built in the 15th century.
“There are only a few chained libraries left in the world and I was lucky enough to take a small group of keen young readers to a tour here. The chains show the value of books to our society in the past.
“We were able to see some ancient books, including The Canterbury Tales, and the designs were so beautiful.”
Why not send a picture to us at educate@neu.org.uk It should be large and high resolution, accompanied by 50 words about its subject.
We send a £20 book token to each featured so don’t forget to include your address in the email too.
n or write to Membership & Subscriptions, NEU, Hamilton House, Mabledon Place, London WC1H 9BD.
Access myRewards today myNEU is also a portal to accessing hundreds of exclusive discounts available to members through myRewards. From savings on your weekly shop to holidays and special treats, you could save up to £1,000 a year.
Visit neu.org.uk/neu-rewards
Quick crossword
Across
1 Musical composition inspired by the night (8)
5 Type of insect (4)
9 ___ dish: shallow glass dish used in biology (5)
10 Ancient language (5)
11 ___ Brown: landscape gardener (10)
14 Musical piece in slow time (6)
15 John ___ : US novelist and short story writer (6)
17 Danish capital (10)
20 Scottish lakes (5)
21 ___ Lewis: an X Factor winner (5)
22 ___ Yorke: Radiohead lead singer (4)
23 Nocturnal freshwater crustacean (8)
Down
1 ___ Valley: region of California famous for its vineyards (4)
2 ___ Blanchett: Australian actress (4)
3 Christian doctrine that rejects the Trinity (12)
4 Paul ___ : US actor in The Verdict (6)
6 Inflammation of bone (8)
7 Popular variety of melon (8)
8 US singer known as the King of Rock and Roll (5,7)
12 A knight in Arthurian legend (8)
13 Spanish cold soup (8)
16 Richard ___ : German composer (6)
18 Cartoon bear (4)
19 Ernst ___ : Austrian physicist (4)
Sudoku
issue’s (Jan/Feb 2025) sudoku
Across
1 - Musical composition inspired by the night (8)
5 - Type of insect (4)
9 - ___ dish: shallow glass dish used in biology (5)
10 - Ancient language (5)
11 - ___ Brown: landscape gardener (10)
14 - Musical piece in slow time (6)
15 - John ___ : US novelist and short story writer (6) 17 - Danish capital (10)
1 - ___ Valley: region of California famous for its vineyards
Sudoku solutions will feature on this page next issue.
2 - ___ Blanchett: Australian actress (4)
3 - Christian doctrine that rejects the Trinity (12)
4 - Paul ___ : US actor in The Verdict (6)
6 - Inflammation of bone (8)
7 - Popular variety of melon (8)
8 - US singer known as the King of Rock and Roll (5,7)
12 - A knight in Arthurian legend (8)
13 - Spanish cold soup (8)
16 - Richard ___ : German composer (6)
18 - Cartoon bear (4)
19 - Ernst ___ : Austrian physicist (4)
Prize crossword
£50 Marks & Spencer voucher
Across 7 Mike with nice solo arrangement – punctuated by this? (9)
8 See 4 down
10 Head’s upset –I’ve got glue! (8)
11 Partially ignore boy turning up as fairy king (6)
12 Military alliance evident in the sanatorium (4)
13 Using narrow strips of material, attempt a woven picture (8)
15 Lesson I arrange for footballing girl (7)
17 Penny takes Roy round archaeological excavation –brilliant child! (7)
20 Hopeless Leo in bed –extremely lazy (4,4)
22 Pleased with good boy (4)
25 College member a sort of lone wolf? Not on (6)
26 Provides support for SAS units on manoeuvres (7)
27 Thick, so needs revision! (5)
28 A rug fades badly, so protect (9)
Down
1 University city is out in front, we hear (5)
2 Nice changes before The Graduate is screened here? (6)
3 Computer screens for special pupils? (8)
4 & 8 across Sets aren’t too bothered that this helped decipher ancient languages (7,5)
5 Emphasised the mixing of desserts (8)
6 Argue once unfortunately, but also motivate (9)
9 Starting some Open University projects as a first course? (4)
14 Did see boy confused – didn’t do as he was told (9)
16 To require a smaller amount is unnecessary (8)
The winner and solution of this prize crossword will feature on this page next
18 Perhaps I regret including head of school in record of pupils’ attendance (8)
19 She aims to produce Handel oratorio (7)
21 Depressed, being away from university? (4)
23 A graduate takes copper and sulphur to make simple calculator (6)
24 Silver extracted from crushed granite produces a gas like argon (5)
Send your completed crossword, with your contact details, to: March/April crossword, Educate, NEU, Hamilton House, Mabledon Place, London WC1H 9BD, or email a photographed copy to crossword@neu.org.uk. Closing date: 31 March.
This issue’s quick crossword solution (p48)
Inclusion in practice, not merely symbolic
Fact file
Dr Aminul Hoque is lecturer in education at Goldsmiths, University of London.
THE independent curriculum and assessment review – led by Professor Becky Francis – is long overdue.
There are many inherent complexities with the national curriculum, which was introduced in 2014: age-appropriate teaching and assessments, immense target-driven pressures on schools and pupils, and too many exams, to name a few.
Another urgent area that needs addressing is its Eurocentrism. A report by social enterprise group The Black Curriculum (theblackcurriculum.com) in 2021 found that Black British history is systematically omitted in favour of a dominant white, Eurocentric curriculum, which fails to reflect our multiethnic and broadly diverse society.
The lack of global or alternative histories within our curriculum disempowers many pupils, some of whom lack a sense of identity and belonging. The Black Curriculum group asks an important question: should Black history be taught all year around and be embedded within the curriculum? This is a key question for Prof Francis’ review panel to consider.
There is a whole page devoted to the centrality of inclusion in the national curriculum for both primary and secondary education, which states that teachers should take account of the diverse backgrounds of
pupils across the protected characteristics. This includes race, disability, religion, sexual orientation, pupils with special educational needs, and those whose first language is not English.
More than Vikings and Victorians However, there is a body of research that suggests the idea of inclusion, diversity and equity operates, for pupils, as rhetorical and symbolic as opposed to genuine and actual. This is especially so for those who are of Black and ethnic minority backgrounds.
For example, a brief reading of the curriculum in subjects such as art, English and history illustrates the vast space given to examples of themes and issues that can be taught and are British and European in context.
History includes the Viking invasions, the battle of 1066, Victorian England and so on. Then a few nominal references (towards the end) to the teaching of ancient Benin or Egypt, the Shang and Qing dynasties etc. For literature, the curriculum includes Shakespeare, Romantic poetry and contemporary English literature, plus some nods to the teaching of ‘world literature’.
So how should the current review address the Eurocentric nature of the curriculum? Often, some simple yet effective changes to the wording in the guidance for teachers can empower educators to teach a more diverse
and global curriculum that is reflective of their students.
Take, for example, the subject guidance for primary art. One key directive is to ‘know about great artists, craft makers and designers, and understand the historical and cultural development of their art forms’. Adding the words ‘from across the globe’ after ‘designers’ advances a more inclusive message. This would allow teachers to be flexible and creative, going beyond a focus on European artists such as Picasso and Da Vinci.
More broadly, how do we make inclusivity a central and tangible part of how we teach and learn? One way is to develop a ‘culturally responsive pedagogy’ in our approach to reforming the curriculum to make it more relevant to our students’ lives.
The term ‘culturally responsive pedagogy’ is a teaching philosophy, developed by Ladson-Billings (1995), that taps into various kinds of knowledge and lived experiences of pupils as a means of making classrooms and curricula more inclusive. It is premised on the idea that valuing culture is central to learning.
Educators should be taking the time to listen to, value and understand the lived experiences of their pupils. This is especially the case for many Black pupils who come from disadvantaged, low socio-economic backgrounds and whose identities and voices are often silenced, misrepresented or ignored.
Members of youth organising charity the Advocacy Academy, with Millie Mensah (third from left), author of Migration, published by The Black Curriculum. It has also published books called Legacies and Places
PHOTO by The Black Curriculum
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At a glance
Savour South Africa’s magnificent wildlife on this once-in-a-lifetime, full-board safari holiday, based in the locally-rated five-star Sebatana Lodge, with its own sweeping private game reserve.
| Departing 4 Aug 2025, 3 Aug 2026 & 16 Aug 2027
Tour Highlights & Inclusions
• Seven nights’ carefully chosen accommodation, including one at the five-star Sanctuary Mandela, and six at Camp Bethel, plus two on the aircraft
• 21 meals, including seven breakfasts, seven lunches and seven dinners.
• Three game drives in Kruger National Park
• Wildlife rehabilitation centre excursion
• Panorama Route scenic drive
• Included water, coffee, tea and juice, together with local beers and wines during your stay at Camp Bethel
• Return flights to Johannesburg
• Fully escorted by a friendly, knowledgeable tour manager and wildlife specialist
