Letters..

Back our teachers

IN RESPONSE to a few comments in Record Readers yesterday, people seem to be under the impression that teachers are threatening to strike solely because they want more money.

Yes, teachers have seen their pay reduced, in real terms, by 24 per cent over the past decade but this dispute is also because they are grossly overworked.

A teacher relative of mine works at home until late in the evening every school day, and across most of the weekend, to prepare classes and deal with marking and paperwork.

In school, they have to deal with children in their class who, in previous generations, would have been in special units.

Today, they are included within regular classes and their behaviour is extremely disruptive and holds back the learning of the entire class, a problem that is compounded as the class progresses up through primary school.

Inclusion is a good idea in principle as long as teaching assistants are deployed to work alongside these pupils but nearly all have been withdrawn in recent years to save money.

My relative must also bring in pencils, pens and basic stationery supplies from home as the shrinking school budget for these things soon runs out.

Yet money has been ring-fenced by the Scottish Government to help “raise attainment” but this money has been – and continues to be – squandered on projects that do nothing to raise attainment.

Scotland’s teachers deserve every penny they are asking for, and a good bit more besides, and it’s high time Scotland got behind them. Anon