There’s a view that schools can’t afford to offer flexible working. Our new report explains why they can’t afford not to and offers practical solutions.
It’s the Timewise view that no profession is un-flex-able. Yes, it’s much more complex in shift-based environments, or those offering a 24 hour service. That’s why we created our Innovation Unit, through which we tackle these hard-to-fix sectors. But impossible? No.
Yet when it comes to teaching, there is a commonly held view that it is just too complicated, particularly because of timetabling. There’s also a concern around the potential cost; Laura McInerney’s much-read 2018 piece suggested that making more part-time teaching jobs available is unaffordable, because of the extra teachers it would require. And, as in many professions, there is inevitably some resistance from leaders and colleagues.
Certainly, there are constraints within teaching that make introducing part-time and flexible roles less straightforward. But my response to the comment that we can’t afford to offer more part-time and flexible teaching roles is this: we can’t afford not to. Our new report, published in association with Now Teach , explains why, and offers some first steps to help secondary schools create viable solutions.
Flexible working can help schools find and keep brilliant teachers
It’s no secret that the profession is struggling to find and keep its teachers. The government has admitted that it has missed its targets for teacher recruitment for six years running. And when people do join the profession, they often don’t stick around long; government figures have also indicated that a third of NQTs leave the profession within five years. Increases to teacher workloads certainly haven’t helped.
Of course, there are limits to what schools can offer current and potential teachers. They will never be able to match corporate salaries, for example. But one thing they can do is try and give their staff more control over their time and work-life balance.
According to a Teacher Tapp survey cited by McInerney, while 40% of teachers say they would prefer to work part-time, only 17% actually do. This means large numbers of teachers may be dissatisfied with their arrangements, or struggling to manage them – with an inevitable knock-on effect on their students. And Now Teach have told us that most of their graduates want a part-time job after training.
Exploring the options for flexible teaching roles
It’s for all these reasons that Now Teach commissioned us to research how to build flexibility into secondary schools. We spent six months investigating the current situation, identifying the cultural, attitudinal and structural barriers that stand in the way of more flexibility, and exploring the options for overcoming them.
Our report sets out what we have learned, and recommends a six-step process that secondary schools can take to bring about meaningful change. This includes: building a team to lead and drive change across the school; challenging perceptions about issues such as the impact of flexible working on students; upskilling staff on the options for flexible job design, and piloting any chosen approach.
The role of timetabling in designing flexible solutions
Our research also highlighted the role that creative timetabling could play in designing flexible solutions. For example, if you have staff who would like to take their own children to school, you could schedule form time later in the day and make sure they don’t teach lesson one. Similarly, by allocating all a full-time teacher’s free periods into a single day, you could make it possible for them to spend that day working from home.
Of course, timetabling can be tricky, even without incorporating this kind of creativity. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. The latest timetabling software makes it easier to build in options for some teachers to do early starts or late finishes and take days off; some schools, cited in our report, are doing it already. So the next step must be to make part-time and flexible teaching roles more widely available, as they are in other professions. And it’s encouraging that education secretary Damien Hinds agrees.
Investment is needed to deliver flexibility across the board
But – and it’s a big but – we need to tackle it at a profession level. Many schools are already struggling to balance their budgets, so this kind of work won’t happen without centralised funding. And while this may seem unaffordable in the current economic climate, we genuinely can’t afford not to take action.
Our report is a great first step, but there is so much more to be done before flexible working becomes properly embedded into teaching. If you feel inspired to get involved, share your thoughts on how to attract the funding we need, or just tell us about your own experiences with flexible working in schools, please get in touch.
Published July 2019
