newteachersblog

Solving recruitment problems for Teacher Training Providers.

Problem 1: Teacher training applications are down by 40% in the last twelve months. Source: Professor John Howson, Oxford Brookes University in the TES. Dec 2017

Problem 2: Ofsted “will deny ‘Outstanding’ rating to training providers that do not maximize their recruiting potential”. Source: TES, Feb 2018 Read this article: http://bit.ly/2IevkX9

Solution: A video on your website.

Video can increase traffic to your website by up to 55%;
Video is up to six times more effective in generating responses than print & direct marketing combined;
Video is the number one medium for reaching 18-34 year olds, 80% of whom say ‘it is the biggest influencer in their decision’to engage with or buy a product or service;
Video evokes ‘trust’, ‘curiosity’ & ‘confidence’ more than any other form of communication.

Sources: Cisco Systems, CloudsWave Digital Research & Diode Digital Research

How do we do it?

By understanding your SCITT and creating content and the images that match it;
By capturing video testimonials and case studies to convey trust in and endorsement of your SCITT;
By creating helpful, informative video content that people return to for future information;
By creating short visual content – maximum 4 minutes – that is featured on your landing page and easily shared on social media.

What’s involved?

Creating a script that is tailor-made to your needs, your values and your offer;
Working around you and your trainees in school;
Directing, producing and managing all processes of the project;
Filming, with sound and lighting equipment – but with the minimum of disruption;
Post-production of the video (editing, colour correction and sound)

– then within three weeks, we deliver the video to your website ready to upload.

What options are available?

Option One:

A 2 to 4-minute master video. Here’s an example we did at ELASCITT and another we did at NEP SCITT

Total Price: £2,750 – no extra costs (This option requires one day of filming)

Option Two:

A 2 to 4 minute master video, like this one we did at Billericay SCITT;

plus 6 short videos reflecting specific case studies important to the school for use in social media and website (something like this);

plus 60 high quality professional still images for use in social media, your website or other media.

Total Price: £4,250 – no extra costs (This option may require 1-2 days of filming)

Who are we?

Alan Newland worked as a teacher, teacher-trainer and headteacher in London for 23 years and then for over a decade with the DfE and the GTC. He now lectures at universities & SCITTs on teaching professionalism and runs the award-winning social media network newteacherstalk. His book ‘Working in Teaching’ (Crimson Publishing) was published in March 2014.

Edan Schiller is a professional filmmaker and film editor who has made videos and films across various industries including education, charities, music and fashion for over ten years. His clients include the London Borough of Newham, Fashion TV, MTV, M&C Saatchi, Calvin Klein and Marvel. You can view the quality of his work at cleanslate.london

What our client SCITTs have said about us:

We thoroughly enjoyed working with Alan and Edan. They are very professional and personable and had a good understanding of ITT and what we were trying to achieve through our videos. The planning and delivery were excellent, and we are extremely pleased with the final videos in terms of both quality and content and have no doubt that they will successfully support our marketing for future recruitment.

Sarah Beall, Business Manager, North East Partnership SCITT

Alan and Edan, the support and planning you gave us was excellent and the video itself has raised our profile – it has turned out to be such good value for money!

Kay Truscott-Howell, Executive Director, Billericay (SCITT) Educational Consortium

Here are three more interesting facts about video…

With a video on your website, you are 50x more likely to appear on the first page of Google;
62% of 18-34-year-olds watch a video before reading any text;
YouTube is the largest search engine after Google;

Sources: Cisco Systems, CloudsWave Digital Research & Diode Digital Research

Want to discuss a project?

Call Alan Newland on 020 8372 6382 or 07824 398144 or email alan.newland29a@gmail.com

“The only time we touched the kids was to restrain them!”

Yesterday I met a woman training to be a teacher who made a remarkable comment that I will remember for a long time.

I was talking to PGCE trainees at one of our leading universities about the legal, moral and ethical issues in teaching. I was trying to reassure them that the law gives teachers a lot of authority as well as responsibility.

The trouble was that these trainees had just had a session on ‘safeguarding’ and were clearly – even visibly – nervous and confused about the questions I was asking them.

One of the questions was: ‘Are teachers allowed to touch children?’ I could see their eyes widening, as though I’d said something sinister.

So I asked another, which freaked them out even more: ‘Do you know the difference between appropriate and inappropriate touching?’ Silence.

How have we got to the point where teachers don’t know how to answer such questions with confidence? (The answer by the way, to both questions, is a very definite and confident ‘YES!’)

But hundreds, if not thousands of schools in this country, have advised – nay, required their teachers (it has to be said on the back of advice from some teacher unions) – ‘to avoid physical contact with their pupils and students unless they have to restrain them in an emergency’.

In my view, schools that have adopted such policies are mad. While they say they are doing it to protect their staff from vexatious or malicious allegations – actually they are engineering neglect into the professional practice of their teachers.

It not only undermines teachers’ social and physical confidence around their pupils (wondering for example, whether it is appropriate to comfort a distressed child or congratulate and praise their achievement) but it also undermines their skills (wondering for example, whether they should manipulate their arms, hands and fingers on a musical instrument, a pencil or paintbrush or hold them in balance while demonstrating PE techniques).

In the middle of the discussion, the young woman I mentioned, named Lucy Carter made the most remarkable contribution and one which had never occurred to me before.

She said that she had worked at a school where such policies had been adopted but eventually they realised that the only times they were touching children were negative ones – restraining them when fighting, restraining them when trying to run out of class or removing disruptive children. They realised the children were never being touched in positive, affirming ways.

What an indictment this is of our profession – a so-called caring profession – that we have allowed this situation to gain hold, all in the name of ‘safeguarding’.

We need to remind ourselves – and be confident the law gives us this authority as well as the responsibility – that a duty to keep children safe from harm and abuse is quite distinct from the ‘duty of care’ we have to provide for their physical, emotional, social and psychological well-being.

If you’re working in a school with such restrictive practices, I’m not suggesting you undermine them – you’ll have to work within the school’s adopted policies.

But my advice is this. Once you get into a position of authority or influence, change those policies. If you can’t do that, then find another school – because you and the children will never flourish in such a place that has so utterly confused the core purpose of its professional practice.

Alan Newland worked as a teacher, teacher-trainer and headteacher in London for over 20 years and then for more than a decade with the DfE and the General Teaching Council for England. He now lectures on teaching professionalism and runs the award-winning social media network newteacherstalk. You can follow him on Twitter at @newteacherstalk and invite him for a talk. His book “Working in Teaching” (Crimson Publishing) was published in March 2014.

Watch one of Alan’s sessions on professional values and ethics in teaching…

Legal, moral, ethical – a lesson from The Archers.

If you’re an Archers fan on BBC Radio 4 (and I’m not, but I have to listen because my wife insists…) you’ll know that the lead storyline at the moment is the relationship between 18-year old ‘just left sixth-form and about to go to uni’ Lily Pargetter, and her 40-odd year old teacher, Russ.

Gasp! Shock! Horror! What? Are you sure this is an Archers’ storyline?

Oh, yes. I told you, I have to listen to it every night in silence. My wife bans me from uttering a word for the fifteen minutes it’s on the radio…

That is shocking!

I know. I’ve told her I should be allowed to eat at least…

No, I mean, it’s a shocking storyline.

Do you think so?

Yes! Appalling!

There was a time when this kind of thing was not particularly shocking – in the ‘good old days… when I was a lad… at school in the 60’s and 70’s’. While I wouldn’t say relationships between teachers and school-students were common in those days, they were certainly not unheard of.

Really?

Yes. There was a strong suspicion of one at my own school when I was a sixth-former in the early seventies, though nobody knew for certain. The parties involved – a female teacher and a sixth form ‘boy’ (though he was a pretty big ‘boy’) were very discreet and nobody thought it anyone else’s business to inquire.

I can’t believe that!

If you think I’m joking, I can point to the fact that the former (and first) head of Ofsted, the late Sir Chris Woodhead, once began a relationship with one of his sixth form students. It lasted over a decade and both he and the woman involved defended it long after it ended.

Shocking! That kind of thing is not still going on, is it?

Well, probably… though these days sexual relationships between teachers and students at the same school are deemed explicitly unprofessional and therefore unethical – ‘teachers must observe appropriate professional boundaries’ booms the 2012 Teachers’ Standards – that means they will result in summary dismissal. Such relationships are also now deemed ‘catastrophic breaches of trust’ and were even made illegal by the 2003 Sexual Offences Act if the student is under 18-years-old.

So what’s happening in The Archers? Do tell!

In every episode, we hear poor Elizabeth Pargetter agonising over whether she can report her daughter’s teacher… to someone… anyone! for the way her daughter has been manipulated by the mature charms of her child’s silky-voiced teacher. The scriptwriters have kept up the ambiguity well by keeping us guessing about what are the exact circumstances of the relationship. We’ve had no explicit sex scenes or anything…

I should hope not!

But it leaves the nation – or at least the millions who listen – including my wife, of course, asking the questions – every weekday for 15 minutes twice a day and again for an hour and a quarter every Sunday morning during the Omnibus Edition. Is it illegal? Why doesn’t Lily’s mother just go to the police?

Isn’t it? Why doesn’t she?

Well, that would be silly, it would ruin the drama…

Be serious and tell me!

Well… it would be illegal if there had been a sexual relationship between Russ and Lily – a teacher and a student at the same school if she hadn’t reached her eighteenth birthday when it first happened. But Lily has now left the school and is no longer the subject of her teacher’s ‘position of trust’.

Does that make a difference?

Well, yes, legally – in that the police would have to establish that a sexual relationship began while Lily was still a student at the school, and under eighteen. Without clear evidence – and The Archers scriptwriters have cleverly kept us in the dark about exactly when the sex started – we don’t know if a crime has been committed.

But isn’t it still considered unprofessional? Couldn’t Russ get the sack?

Yes, it is and yes, he could. He could even be barred from the teaching register by a disciplinary panel at the Teaching Regulation Agency in Coventry, just up the road from Ambridge…

So why don’t they get on and do it?

Hold your horses! A complaint has to be made first and then a referral, either by the employer – that’s the school or the sixth-form college. Or by the parent. Evidence would have to be established that an inappropriate relationship began while Lily was still a student at the school. She didn’t have to be in any one of Russ’s classes, just being at the same school will-do for being in ‘breach of trust’.

But the poor little innocent girl has been groomed!

Actually, the storyline is quite explicit about Lily’s own agency in the relationship – a clever little ploy by The Archers scriptwriters – as she is clearly a willing participant in a consensual relationship. In fact, she’s totally besotted with him…

Creep that he is!

And she has clearly been active in driving the relationship. She’s even invited him to move into a flat with her when she goes to Manchester University next week.

Does that matter? Hasn’t she been a victim of his grooming?

Again, it’s an interestingly ambiguous case, isn’t it? She is eighteen now – but does anyone know when her eighteenth birthday was? Though she was a subject of her teacher’s position of trust while at the school, she has left it now and is no longer.

But it’s disgusting!

You might find it disgusting – morally – that a teacher is having sex with an 18-year-old ex-student but it’s not illegal. Now that she’s left the school – ethically, it’s a grey area.

Really?

Yes, and if Lily and Russ had been at separate schools there wouldn’t even be a case to answer. A relationship – even a sexual relationship – between a teacher and a school student who are at separate schools is considered neither illegal (as long as the student is over 16 of course) nor even a professional breach of trust.

I’m sorry, but that’s disgraceful.

You may think so. Again, that’s your morality. It’s not a matter for the law with whom you have consensual sex once they’re over the legal age of consent and if the student is at another school, it’s not a breach of a teacher’s professional code of ethics either. It’s a private matter.

Not for Russ and Lily… they’re on the radio every night!

Watch one of Alan’s sessions on professional values and ethics in teaching…

You can disrespect the idea of burkas Mr Johnson, but don’t disrespect the people who wear them.

The former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson is in the news again.

This time, while commenting on Denmark’s introduction of a ban on full-face veils (such as niqabs and burkas and following similar bans in France, Belgium and Austria) he rejected the idea that the UK should impose one as well.

However, he said, it was “absolutely ridiculous” that wearers should “go around looking like letterboxes” and “bank robbers”.

Now, I spend much time – both on the pages of this blog and speaking at universities around this country – defending the right of people to make remarks that some might find offensive.

We live in a democracy and a free society where the right to speak one’s opinions and beliefs is a fundamental right.

No-one has the right to be protected from offence. Though I suggest you don’t offend others as a daily matter of routine, otherwise, you’ll find you have very few friends. Try to reserve offending others to occasions when you are declaring matters of principle.

Free speech necessarily has to be constrained in the interests of all. For example, it is not our right to shout “Fire!” in a crowded theatre. That’s not just an ‘offensive’ thing to shout, that puts people’s lives in danger.

Similarly, we have decided, through statute, to remove the right of people to abuse, threaten or incite violence or hatred against each other. That’s not just being ‘offensive’ – that’s behaviour that creates a real danger to others.

But there are two things that strike me about Boris Johnson’s ‘offensive’ comments.

The first is to describe a style of dress linked to a religious or cultural group – however archaic – as “absolutely ridiculous” and wearers look like “letterboxes” or “bank robbers” is moving closer, in my view, not just to ridiculing the idea but to ridiculing and abusing them as people.

While Johnson has a right to be ‘offensive’ in a free society, as a citizen let alone politician, he also has a duty to choose language that steers clear of ridicule and possible abuse.

Why? Because it is willfully disrespectful.

It is incumbent upon teachers – and this is my second point – that as part of the Teachers’ Standards they ‘must not undermine democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance for those with different faiths and beliefs’.

Teachers must respect their pupils even if, sometimes, not all those pupils reciprocate.

Politicians must respect their citizens – the voting public – even if sometimes, not all those citizens reciprocate.

Johnson may think that wearers of niqabs and burkhas do not respect the values of modern, western society. I share some of that unease.

Personally, I am uncomfortable with seeing women dressed in niqabs and burkas. On the occasions I interact with women wearing them, I feel that their act of concealing their face is a willful suspension of commonly shared values and norms around communicating on a personal level. To me, I find it disrespectful.

But because we live in a democracy with a rule of law, I respect and tolerate the individual liberty of people wearing things I don’t like, and even though I might disrespect the idea of wearing niqabs and burkas, the very last thing I would do, Mr Johnson, is disrespect people.

Teachers must not undermine British values, but are British values undermining teachers?

A qualified teacher who was accused, stood trial and acquitted of rape has recently lost his Supreme Court appeal to have reference to the case removed from his Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) check.

He claimed that reference to the case made in employers’ enhanced CRB checks ‘infringed his right to a private life’ and would ‘stigmatise’ him, resulting in loss of employment.

The Supreme Court said reference to the case was ‘reasonable and proportionate in the context of the job applications’ – presumably meaning in relation to his role working with children and young people.

This seems to me to go against some of the oldest of the so-called ‘British values’ and ones for which this country is internationally famous for having founded, namely: the presumption of innocence and the right to walk free from a court without a stain on one’s character having been found ‘not guilty’ by a jury of one’s peers.

Apparently, that’s not now the case if you’re a teacher.

Teachers, as part of their professional code of conduct and practice, the Teachers’ Standards, ‘must not undermine ‘fundamental British values of democracy, the rule of law, mutual respect, individual liberty and tolerance for those with different faiths and beliefs’. Indeed, schools must go further and actively promote fundamental British values to children through the National Curriculum.

Yet it appears that at least one of those so-called fundamental British values – the rule of law – does not fully apply to teachers who have been acquitted of a serious charge.

Teachers are already exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 – which means that however minor the caution or conviction they may have received, perhaps years ago, must always declare it to an employer. While most other jobs and professions can look forward to having cautions and convictions ‘spent’ after an appropriate period of time, teachers (and others like doctors, nurses, lawyers etc.) always have to declare them and have them recorded on their CRB.

Now it seems, depending on the seriousness of the case, teachers will also have accusations, charges and even acquittals recorded too.

Are these ‘fundamental British values’?

I think not. What do you think?

Never mind ‘British’ values, Gareth Southgate is re-defining ‘English’ values.

Softly-spoken, measured, gentlemanly, be-suited in shirt, tie and waistcoat – the current England manager is a role-model of a very different kind.

Or is he?

Actually, he reminds me of many teachers – well prepared, meticulous in planning; considered and considerate; fulsome and generous in their praise for others. Like all good team managers (and like good head teachers too) he is the first to acclaim and appreciate not only ‘these young players’ but ‘the staff’ after each game.

Watching the World Cup in Russia this summer has coincided with a series of talks I do every summer at universities and teacher training centres around the country on promoting so-called ‘British’ values – something I believe do exist but are quite difficult to define in concrete and exemplary terms.

The government has defined ‘fundamental British values’ as democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance for those of different faiths and beliefs– and though I’m not going to expand on those now, I do want to say how watching Gareth Southgate in the last few weeks has made me reflect on how this man has become a strong model of them.

Let’s take ‘democracy’first. Being a football manager (or a manager of any organisation) is not to hold a democratic position – but that’s not to say good managers cannot reflect democratic values. I think Gareth Southgate’s management of the England team shows exactly that. He has been widely lauded for the way he listens to the opinions of his staff and his players before making decisions.

He is also known to be a stickler for playing the game as it should be played – with due adherence not just to the rules, but to the spirit of the game – upholding the values of ‘the rule of law’ through sport – which is the metaphor that ‘sport’ is. Indeed, this is the reason ‘sport’ was invented in the first place – as ‘rule-governed play’.

He has also been praised for the sense of ‘freedom’ he has brought to the team, encouraging them to ‘write their own ‘individual’history’ and throw off the burden of 1966 and all that… Not only has he allowed this with his players, but he has demonstrated it in his own ‘individual’ management style, fearless in dispensing with the so-called ‘stars’ of the past, whoever they were.

He has included a greater ethnic diversity in the team, more than any previous manager, entirely on the basis of merit. In my view, that is the ultimate demonstration of ‘respect.’ That ‘respect’ has been reciprocated too – there has not been a whiff of dissension or gossiping from the players about Southgate. Compare that to previous squads.

Finally, last week when full-back Fabian Delph’s wife was about to give birth to their third child, he allowed the player to return home to be with her – a remarkable demonstration of ‘tolerance’ by Southgate in the midst of such an important tournament but also a fine demonstration of Delph’s own priorities and values.

Admittedly, I have stretched analogies a little for the purposes of the topicality of this article. But there is a serious point here. Gareth Southgate is showing himself as a role model to the nation by demonstrating very laudable and respectable values. Whether he intends it or not, he reminds me of a good teacher and he reminds me of the values I feel proud are associated with being ‘English’, let alone ‘British’.

Whether or not England win the World Cup, that is worth celebrating.

Is it unreasonable to be a ‘gun-adept’ teacher?

Donald Trump’s announcement that he intends to equip up to one million American ‘gun-adept’ teachers with firearms in the wake of the Florida school shooting brings in to sharp focus the contrast in values between a society like that of the United States and a society like that of the United Kingdom.

Not that I think most American teachers will welcome Trump’s proposal. I don’t. I think American teachers have, broadly, very similar professional values to teachers in the UK. In the broader societal picture too, our countries share many fundamental liberal, democratic values.

But teachers live and imbibe the values of the societies they inhabit and cannot escape their influence.

I saw one of President Trump’s ‘gun-adept’ teachers being interviewed on television the other day. She said she already took her firearm into school not only for the protection of students but for her own protection as well. She welcomed President Trump’s proposals.

Before we all start to throw up our hands in horror, let’s just consider what one of our fundamental roles as teachers is – to be in loco parentis (that’s Latin for in place of he parent in case you haven’t had a Classical education).

When I talk to student-teachers and trainee-teachers up and down the country, I sometimes have to explain that this is a legal responsibility teachers have – to be in place of the parent – not an option.

Teachers actions – particularly where the safety and security of their pupils and students is concerned – are judged by whether they have behaved in a way that was ‘reasonable in the circumstances’ and whether they behaved in a way that ‘a responsible parent would in the circumstances.’

A few weeks ago in one such session, a trainee-teacher asked me: “What should I do if a student came at me with a knife?”

So I said: “What would it be reasonable to do in such a situation?”

He said quite plainly: “I’ve no idea.”

So I pressed him.

“Come one, let’s just imagine it for a moment. Someone is coming at you with a knife. Your life is in danger. What would you do?”

Again, he said: “I don’t know.”

So I pressed him again: “Would you run?”

“Probably!” he said.

“Yes! That would be a reasonable thing to do wouldn’t it? Flight or fight. You’re frightened. You don’t know if you could take this person on, so you choose flight, and many people would do the same. That’s reasonable.”

“But what about the kids?” he asked.

“Good question,” I said. “Tell them to run too! That would be reasonable wouldn’t it?”

“But what if we can’t run? What if the person with the knife is blocking our escape route?

“Another good question!” I said. “So now tell me again what would be a reasonable thing to do in the circumstances?”

“I don’t know,” he said, genuinely perplexed.

“Well, let me tell you what I would do if someone was about to attack me with a knife,” I said.

I could tell everyone in the room was hanging on my every word.

“I would pick up a chair or a table or any long, hard object that came to hand and I’d hit that person as hard as I could, probably over the head, to try and disarm them. I’d do that both for my own protection and for the protection of the kids in my care. That would be a reasonable thing to do wouldn’t it?”

The student still wasn’t sure.

“Yes, it is.” I had to say it to convince him. “My actions are reasonable in the circumstances – to protect myself – which I have a legal right to do – and to protect the kids – which I have a legal responsibility to do. Not only would the police almost certainly think so, but so would a court of law find it a reasonable thing to do in the circumstances.”

I could see the student was still not entirely persuaded.

“But what is not reasonable – especially if by hitting him with a chair has knocked him unconscious – is that I then go over and continue hitting him over the head while he is lying on the ground. That is obviously an unreasonable use of force and no reasonable person would condone it.”

The fact that someone – probably a police officer and possibly a court of law – is going to ask you to account for yourself in such a situation – does not mean you have done anything wrong.

What is being tested by such professional accountability is whether you have behaved reasonably in the circumstances to protect yourself and to protect those you are legally charged with protecting.

Now going back to Donald Trump and the United States…

In the context of that society – where 30% of Americans own a gun; where there are more than 350 million guns in legal circulation and where “the right to bear arms” is enshrined in the American Constitution – then Trump is merely invoking what is reasonable in the circumstances for teachers to do in a society such as the United States.

But I know in which society I would rather be a teacher, and in which society I’d rather live.

Alan Newland worked as a teacher, teacher-trainer and headteacher in London for over 20 years and then for more than a decade with the DfE and the GTC. He now lectures on teaching professionalism and runs the award-winning social media network newteacherstalk. You can follow him on Twitter at @newteacherstalk and book him for a talk. His book “Working in Teaching” (Crimson Publishing) was published in March 2014.

Should teachers be able to touch children without their consent?

The answer to that is ‘Yes’.

In many circumstances, it will be your responsibility and your duty of care as a teacher to do exactly that.

But in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein allegations and the debate about what constitutes ‘consent’, I’ve noticed how many people – and I’m talking trainee teachers here – confuse and conflate ‘inappropriate touching’ with ‘touching’.

(If I need to explain the difference between ‘inappropriate touching’ and ‘touching’ to you, then, with respect, you are not suitable to be a teacher and you might as well stop reading this article now.)

Some people view consent as always needing to be explicit. I don’t. It depends on what is being asked of me.

We all give our implicit consent a hundred times a day. Every time we go to a shop and buy something, every time we drive on the road, every time we sit next to someone on a bus or a train, every time we greet, question or speak to other people – we are assuming consent to trade, travel or engage socially.

Often this involves spontaneous physical contact which is a natural human behaviour that helps build communication, trust and relationships.

Requiring ‘explicit consent’ for every interaction makes life intolerable, unworkable and indeed unsafe.

Recently, a trainee-teacher in Sheffield said in one of my sessions, that teachers should ‘always model explicit consent before touching children’. They should always say things like: “Is it ok for me to touch you?”

Yes, I agreed, that’s fine if you want to use a child as a ‘model’ to demonstrate, for example, a PE technique. You might say something like: “I want to show everyone what a forward-roll looks like. Can I use you as a model to demonstrate? I’m going to need to hold you in a couple of balanced positions. Would that be ok?”

Of course teachers should do that – it’s just common courtesy, isn’t it?

But requiring ‘explicit consent’ as a ‘general rule’ is neither adequate nor appropriate to fulfil your responsibilities of duty of care.

Here’s a few scenarios – very common in teaching – for you to consider what I mean:

Two kids are fighting in the playground. Do you ask them: “Is it ok for me to touch you in order to break up this fight?”
A child in your class is scratching their forearm with a pair of scissors. Do you ask for their consent to take the scissors away?
A child is having an epileptic fit and they are lying in a position that is dangerous. Do you wait for them to regain consciousness in order to ask their ‘explicit consent’ before moving them to safety?

If your answer is “Yes’ to any of those questions, then you are unsuitable to teach. Not because you’re not a ‘nice’ person (you might be perfectly ‘lovely’) but because you are not prepared to take the complex and weighty responsibilities required by your duty of care and by your professional status.

If you think you need to ask kids their permission to break up fights, you will not only be laughed out of the school by all the kids themselves but your colleagues will feel you are abdicating your professional responsibility. Parents (particularly of the child who comes off worst in the fight) will also feel that you have neglected your duty of care to protect their child from harm.

If you’re not prepared to take responsibility to properly exercise a duty of care to protect children from harm – by touching them without their consent – then don’t go into teaching.

Flirtatious and sexualised banter in school – it’s a minefield out there

There’s a lot in the news at the moment about sexual harassment – in Hollywood, in Parliament, at the BBC and in workplaces generally. Most of it relates to the sexual harassment of women by men, though much of the discussion acknowledges that of course, it can run both ways.

I think it does in schools too, especially in primary schools.

I have written about ‘flirtatious and sexualised banter’ in schools both in this blog and wider. In my view, whether ‘flirtatious and sexualised banter’ tips in to ‘sexual harassment’ is very much in the ‘eye of the beholder’ – that is, if the person on the receiving end of it thinks it’s harassment, it is.

At the heart of what makes ‘flirtatious and sexualised banter’ harmless to one person but menacing to another is the exercise of power. But where I think many commentators get it wrong is that power is not a fixed concept, but a shifting dynamic. It does not always reside with for example, authority, as such.

The idea that a hapless young woman who has recently taken up appointment as a junior researcher, let’s say in the office of a long-standing male MP, is somehow at the mercy of his authority and power is to miss the point. Yes of course, on the face of it – an MP is an employer with the power to hire and fire, in a nominally influential position with access to a network of colleagues and contacts. All of which the female might not and probably does not have.

But that ‘nominal power’ can be turned on its head, sometimes very easily and dramatically. For example, by being publicly embarrassed, challenged or accused giving power and agency to the person in the apparently vulnerable position.

I think many men in schools are in a vulnerable position – particularly young men in primary schools – where they are almost always in a minority and in many primary schools across the country, in a minority of one.

They will often be the focus of attention from female colleagues and female parents alike – complemented by banter, jokes and gossip.

To be fair, most of men teachers I have met over the years don’t think of this as being ‘vulnerable’. Most men I have spoken to think it’s rather desirable!

Many men who have experienced a lot of attention – which has included ‘flirtatious and even sexualised banter’ from colleagues and parents, have said they rather enjoyed the experience – thinking of it as ‘fun’ or ‘harmless banter’ as long as it remained ‘banter’ – though of course many people have met their long term partners at school.

Over my career, I can attest to that. But there were one or two occasions where it was less agreeable and my professionalism was seriously challenged.

One such instance was when I became a head teacher in east London in the mid-1990s. Within a few weeks of my appointment, a female parent started to take a significant interest in volunteering her time and energy to school activities. She became a school governor; volunteered to maintain the school plants, flowers, gardens; work in the school library; run school clubs and sports teams.

All good stuff one might think – and it was. But it also came with an increasing number of requests to talk to me privately and meet with me in my office, often with a suggestion that any unfinished business could be continued over a coffee or dinner sometime.

I soon became the butt of friendly but nevertheless embarrassing jokes from my sympathetic but relentlessly teasing colleagues in the staff room and with my office staff who would smile knowingly, often giving me a nod and a wink when this particular woman came into school to ask to see me about yet another contrived school matter – and often not taking ‘no’ for an answer either.

On the surface, I was the person with ‘power’ – a man with the authority of being a head teacher. But I was also a new head – finding my feet with new colleagues, parents and children and not wanting to alienate an influential parent who had considerable cache in the school community.

Her ‘flirtatious behaviour’ was obvious to anyone who observed it and though I never ‘responded’ to its intention – or my perception of its intention – my credibility and authority were very much at stake. I was vulnerable.

Flirtatious and sexualised banter in school – it’s a minefield out there – and in my view, especially for men in primary schools.

Alan Newland worked as a teacher, teacher-trainer and headteacher in London for over 20 years and then for a decade with the DfE and the GTC. He now lectures on teaching professionalism and runs the award-winning social media network newteacherstalk. You can follow him on Twitter at @newteacherstalk and book him for a talk. His book “Working in Teaching” (Crimson Publishing) was published in March 2014.

The values of our profession are fundamental to your survival

Change is threatening and those who survive it are those who can adapt.

I’ve been in teaching long enough to know that Darwin’s dictum is true. I’ve seen over the years that it wasn’t necessarily the best, most talented teachers who survived to make a successful career – I saw some brilliant inspirational teachers leave after only a couple of years.

The rapid pace of change simply defeated them.

Those who went on to thrive and succeed were those who could adapt to the new and often exacting demands of the environment – whether that was a change in government education policy, a change of head teacher, the unexpected outcome of an Ofsted inspection or the stresses and strains of teaching a new and challenging group of kids.

But for those teachers who did survive to make a difference, where and how did they get the faith and the belief to do it?

In my view, the teaching profession provides three fundamental sources that underpin the faith to manage change: our identity, our hope and our destination.

Our identity as a profession is to know who we are and why we are different from other jobs and professions. Get to know what it is that makes teachers different and special.

Our hope is that we have a moral purpose in what we do. We’re trying to make a difference and to do a moral good. Well, aren’t we?

And our destination is that place where the lives of those we teach are better and more fulfilled through education. That place is not reached by exam passes but as an end in itself. We’re trying to take others to a different, better place – even if we can only take them as far as glimpsing it.

Where we come from, where we’re going to and why. These are the fundamentals of a profession with a moral purpose – like teaching.

When we really know these things as a profession we will have more confidence to adapt to change and survive it.

How do I know that?

Because I’ve lived through ephemeral government policies, ambitious and bullying head teachers, arbitrary and superficial Ofsted inspections and transient classes of difficult kids.

But the fundamental values of a profession don’t change. They will sustain you through good times and bad.

For those of you thinking of leaving teaching this summer, I hope you’ll think again.