In pursuit of Health, Wealth and Happiness

Birdie85

Oh I feel really cross on your behalf Tete! It's so annoying (and wrong) to have to lie about the reasons for 'your failures' because managers fear looking like they've got it wrong! What's so bad about admitting that there's a resource issue, surely it's better to say 'We haven't got enough staff right now' rather than 'We've got enough staff but they're not doing their job correctly'?! :mad:

Hope the meeting goes well and don't be afraid to stand up for yourself. Managers are there to take the crap from Head Honchos and at the end of the day they're responsible for everything that happens and if it doesn't happen on time it's because they failed to keep on top of projects and ensure adequate support was available. I like to remind myself that worries like this are above my pay grade!

Tete_en_l'Air

Thanks girls. Meeting done (she turned up an hour early!) and wasn't too bad. Manager was getting in a flap I think and that made me go on the defensive yesterday. I wasn't put on the spot or anything, and in the end I felt more patronised than anything - being told what I really must be doing - when I KNOW what I should be doing, there just aren't enough hours in the day. Esp. having to go to crappy meetings all the time.

Totally agree Birdie about about not being paid enough to be getting stressed about it. Manager is stressed about it all but a stressed manager puts pressure on their workforce

It was nice to be able to think, when talking about things that will be happening in 12 months' time, 'I won't be here then if everything goes to plan' rather than my usual 'Oh god I hope I'm not still here then, I need to get out!'

Birdie85

Ahh that must be a lovely feeling! Fingers crossed it'll be behind you sooner rather than later!

My least favourite thing about work is the useless meetings they seem to love! I once had to go to 3 meetings about the fact that I was going to be unable to finish an urgent piece of work one day. So rather than letting me get on with it in the hopes that I might be able to finish it after all, I had to waste 2 hours talking about how I was short on time! :eek: No-one got the irony of it!

Tete_en_l'Air

Birdie85 wrote: »

My least favourite thing about work is the useless meetings they seem to love! I once had to go to 3 meetings about the fact that I was going to be unable to finish an urgent piece of work one day. So rather than letting me get on with it in the hopes that I might be able to finish it after all, I had to waste 2 hours talking about how I was short on time! :eek: No-one got the irony of it!

EXACTLY!!!! Exactly exactly exactly!! That's what this has all been about, little things not getting done because I basically lost a week when we moved offices and have been catching up ever since, and now have had to spend about two working days in the last two weeks having meetings about why. And tomorrow am at a conference all bleeding day! Management never has any common sense!

wendz86

Sounds like a nightmare at work at the moment!

Glad the meeting went ok .does sound rediculous having a meeting about time management or whatever and time getting taken to do that. Try not to let it get to you, at least you are taking steps to do something different.

Tete_en_l'Air

Thanks Wendz, it's ridiculous isn't it? But yeah the thought of getting out is the only thing keeping me from some sort of genocide.

I am doing my application. Eeep. It's not actually as arduous as I was expecting, although I need to dig out my GCSE and A-level certificates to find out what the exam boards were for each subject ...

Personal statement is causing me some issues. I want to start it with, "I never wanted to teach..." then go on and explain what has led me to reconsider what had been a really definite mindset comparatively later in life. That's what feels natural to me - I can't hand on heart say, "I've always wanted to be a teacher ever since I taught my cousin to spell his name when I was five" or whatever - but I'm worried such a negative first sentence is application-suicide?? Argh!!

Kittikins

Hi Tete, apparently they hate the "I've always wanted to be a teacher cos I lurve kids" kind of personal statement, so I reckon a negative and how you've turned around sounds funky

My starter was "I'm applying for course X because....."

Guess what - I've got a job in a school! Not as TA, but PA. Hopefully it'll be for the spring and summer terms only when (fingers crossed rather than if!) I get onto the course, but who knows! It was a great interview day, apparently very much in the style of teachers' interviews, spending the whole morning meeting people and doing some work, then lunch, then sadly 2 people were called into the room and disappeared, and the remaining 4 of us had interviews. YAY

The pay is a third of what I was on in my last job but its term time only

My suggestion: write your statement, print it out double-spaced, and also email it to friends/teacher chums (feel free to email it to me if you like? I can't steal it from you as mine is in already, lol), and get their opinions. Take bits of them into account and rewrite as you want to.

Good luck!

Tete_en_l'Air

Ah that's brilliant news Kitty! Any experience in a school is bound to be good experience, and it'll give you a good insight into how things work behind the scenes so to speak. Not sure about the TV-esque "you've been voted off" interview though - yikes!

Hmm I take your point about how most people say the same thing ... but I don't want to be too controversial and 'out there' either. But then, I can't exactly bang on about how I've always wanted to do it because why would it have taken me eight years since graduation to get around to applying for it?! Augh.

Forgot to mention earlier that I was at a conference with work yesterday - I wasn't looking forward to it as I was fully expecting it to be a waste of my time but it turned out that the exhibitors' stalls were in the actual conference room so we got to neb in on the talks. One was on safeguarding and although it was quite harrowing to listen to in parts, it was really interesting. And there was a motivational speaker on at the end who got me all fired up haha!

Ebay items starting to end tonight, made £6.50 so far, woo.

Kittikins

I graduated 18 years ago so definitely didn't put in that I've always wanted to be a teacher, I think honesty of loving languages, enjoying spending time with children, wanting a varied and interesting career change etc are the things to put in (she says having no real idea as after all I haven't got an interview yet!!!)

Tete_en_l'Air

Yes I definitely think honesty is the best policy. Going to do a bit of stream-of-consciousness typing and look again tomorrow and see what came out!

You know the bit where you fill in your degree info and it asks about modules and weighting? I can't remember anything about the weightings (and only just about remember what modules I did!) - did you go into detail there?