The Teacher Strikes

Welcome to my first review of this blog, and no, this is not the conventional type of review I will be posting in the coming months. However, this is an issue that has affected me today, which is why I will be reviewing just why and how many teachers up and down the country have gone on strike today.
   Thousands of schools across the nation shut today due to two large teaching unions (The NUT and the NASUWT) striking over pay and pensions. At least 2,500 schools were closed, with areas in the East of England, the Midlands, Yorkshire and the Humber being the worst affected.
    My school was not closed, and most teachers were there, though my class were in the hall for one section, due to the fact that a teacher cannot be covered for a lesson when they are striking. My dad's school was open, whilst my sister's and mum's were both shut due to strikes.
    Should teachers, employed for the vital role of educating the 'next generation', have the right to strike? I believe so.
    There is a common misconception that teachers work from 9-3 and have it very easy, with their work stopping as soon as they leave the classroom, with little or no care about the children they have to educate. Why should they have the right to want an improvement on an already generous pension and wage structure?

Today's Union strikes.

    The fact is, the role of a teacher is so much more, and I know that from experience. Of course there are bad, lazy teachers, who perhaps give the profession a bad name, but what profession doesn't employ some incompetent workers? The same can be said for the majority of jobs in society. Both my parents are teachers and I know that their job involves an incredible amount more than the misconception I stated earlier. The work in the classroom is simply the tip of the iceberg: the average teacher leaves the house at 7-7:30 in the morning and doesn't return until about 6 in the evening, often later. There is a great deal of marking, lesson-planning, welfare-calling, audit-completing and much more, none of which can be done in lesson time. There is also the added pressure of 30 sets of eyes looking up at you, waiting for you to slip up and prove you wrong, and the lack of ability to simply go to the toilet when you wish. The general pressures on you from senior management and the like is also great and hard to cope with.

Michael Gove, the controverisal Education Minister.

    Not only the is the issue about reductions to pensions and pay, but also about the way Michael Gove is revamping education. Nor is he the first to do this - many teachers take issue that plans are put in place for education which last only until that particular government is out of power, and sometimes not even that long. They worry that Gove is making damaging, wholesale changes to the profession which really could tarnish the education system.
    One argument is that parents get fined for taking their children out of school and denying them a day of education, yet teachers are allowed to do the opposite - it does sound a little hypocritical. But I believe that public sector workers, including teachers, should have the right to strike against pensions, pay, and Gove's ideological changes.