Five years ago my fellow PGCE students and I met with the then minister for schools, Lord Adonis. We were bubbling with energy and enthusiasm for the career we were about to enter. He questioned us with interest, keen to find out if the Labour government incentives were working to entice the best the UK has to offer into a career of teaching. As Oxbridge PGCE students we certainly felt we fitted that mould; already established as accountants, journalists and PhD qualified scientists, we had all chosen to enter this profession to help to build the future society, really make a difference to the lives of children today.
That was five years ago and sadly the reality of the profession has taken its effects. Even though we had gained our PhD on the former TDA's highest rated PGCE course, numbers actually working as state school teachers five years on are depressing. Some were quick to jump ship into the private sector – and with longer holidays, better pay and conditions, smaller class sizes and less behaviour issues, who can blame them? Even worse, some have fled to international schools. Our best graduate teachers are lining up to take up posts in China, Singapore, Malaysia and Dubai; competitive salaries, all expenses paid accommodation, flights home for Christmas and a juicy tax-free bonus can't be argued with now can it? Others have left teaching altogether. They swapped other people's children for their own, went back to university to study something else or are using the multiple skills they have gained in a short period teaching to rise through the ranks of an easier job.
A few like me are still holding on though. Since the change in government, the notion that I can actually make a difference is feeling more and more futile. Hidden cuts to schools are taking their toll.
Teaching jobs are not being filled on resignation, leading to rising class sizes and teachers on maximum timetables. Classes of 32 on a 90% timetable does not give me the opportunity to be the teacher I really want to be. To mark more than 200 books and homework tasks, and to give the work the time and feedback it deserves would take thousands of hours. The notion that I can deliver outstanding lessons hour after hour after hour with five hours of planning time a fortnight is ludicrous and even devoting every evening and weekend to the job only touches upon what I would actually have to do to be a really good teacher. On top of that there is the reports, the meetings, the phone calls home, the planning of school trips, the 'voluntary' revision sessions and the extra detentions. The result? A state of permanent near exhaustion.
The students are astute to adult weakness. They can smell a poor night's sleep a mile off so even if I have planned them the best lesson, chances that I can deliver it in a satisfactory way under these conditions are unlikely. Yet one day I still hope that I can make a difference.
I wonder how many of my elite university peers will still be doing this in another five years time? Or maybe those of us that have stayed will have escaped the throes of being a main scale teacher and risen to the lighter timetabled ranks of SLT and will have finally found job satisfaction?
This week's Secret Teacher teaches science in the south of England.