Teachers step up classroom threat over workloads
SCOTLAND’S biggest teaching union yesterday stepped up its threat of classroom chaos in a row over workload caused by new exams.
The Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) will launch a statutory industrial action ballot ‘in relation to the excessive assessment demands placed on teachers and pupils’. The move came as SNP exam reforms were condemned for creating an ‘unintended and unsustainable level of work for learners and teachers’ – by the Scottish Government’s own experts.
The as-yet-unpublished document by a Government group set up to review new qualifications stresses the ‘need to take action to address the very real pressures on teach-
‘Growing frustration’
ers’. The EIS is threatening ‘work to rule’ industrial action. Its general secretary Larry Flanagan said the ballot decision was ‘a reflection of the growing frustration within the secondary sector over the excessive workload that has been generated by Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) assessment and verification procedures’.
The burden on teachers came after National and 5 qualifications were brought in to replace old Standard Grade exams in 201 . Term-time tests known as unit assessments have created a surge in work for teachers.
A review of the assessment requirements in every subject under the new system of qualifications is now being carried out by the SQA.
A Scottish Government spokesman described the union’s decision to ballot over industrial action as ‘disappointing’ and said it had been working to address teachers’ concerns.
TEACHING unions are quick to mobilise to fight anything that looks like a change to their cosy status quo, so the latest strike threat by the Educational Institute of Scotland has to be judged with a cynical eye. Yet the Scottish Government’s own review of its school policies is warning of an ‘unintended and unsustainable level of work for learners and teachers’, the Curriculum for Excellence is anything but and there are already fresh concerns about the quality of another key exam this year.
Nicola Sturgeon urgently needs to replace hapless Education Secretary Angela Constance with a politician of sufficient calibre to establish what lies behind an escalating crisis in our classrooms. But does anyone in the SNP have the vision and courage to tackle the vested interests and deliver world-class schooling for Scotland’s children?