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Wednesday, September 23, 2009

A day of vistas



A few fugitive moments before I am dragged away from the comfortable seclusion of the staff room in building 4 and have to face my sixth form.

Already it is almost midday and we are all looking forward to a well deserved four day holiday after slogging our guts out by teaching for eight days with the kids. If only this could set a precedent for the succeeding weeks I might be able to face the future with some degree of equanimity. As it is hard reality will hit first thing on Monday morning of next week!

The things that I have planned to do in this holiday (the more I go on using the word the more it makes the four day gap seem longer) now have expanded to fill much more than the time allotted to their completion. One of the days is a Bank Holiday and trying to get anything done on a day like that which involves other people being in work is obviously a non-starter. As two of the days comprise a weekend you will note that the amount of time I have to get real things done is remarkably limited.

At long last I am going to try and transfer all of the important elements in my banking life from The Worst Bank in the World (aka BBVA) to the saintly La Caixa. I am terrified that I will forget some standing order or something and all hell will break loose. Trying to get something reestablished which has been willfully disconnected is not easy in this country so I need to take things in a regulated and careful way. I only hope that my new bank actually knows what it is doing – though having said that it would indeed be difficult for them to do worse than BBVA. And I sincerely hope that I am not tempting fate by saying that!

Disturbingly, after lunch and just before classes were due to restart I was approached by one of the Heads of School and asked to go with her to a meeting. As is usual with me I immediately assumed guilt and rapidly reviewed my teaching over the last week or so to discover where the fault was.

When I got to the meeting room the Head of English was there so it seemed like some sort of disciplinary court.

I was somewhat reassured by the Head of English saying, “I’m here to translate!” and the Head of School saying, “Stephen we want to ask of you a favour.” I still assumed that this was a polite lead up to some sort of condemnation so I remained tense.

In some ways it turned out to be worse than a denunciation. It turned out that our “pampered darlings” (Othello?) go sailing on a Thursday afternoon and they needed someone to accompany them to the Olympic Port for their shenanigans. It turns out that I have periods free on Thursday afternoon and “as you are not a form teacher” (said sotto voce by the Head of English) I was the obvious candidate to go with the kids and the Head of PE.

This removes free periods from my timetable and there is no offer of more money to compensate. This is, however a complex system of time-off in lieu. As I start one teaching day at the totally unreasonable time of 8.15 I can take half an hour at the end of the day to pay myself back – if I have a free period. The extra time for taking the kids is only considered if I am late back to school for the 4.45 finish. I am not sure of the mathematics, but if I am able to have a free afternoon every other week I think that will be acceptable. If not, then I have been taken for a fool and I will find a way out of it. If I can.

Thursday (the day on which I will be taking the kids and working a longer day) is the only day in which I have a free period last thing. There was an offer of my being able to come into school in the morning late, but this is a false idea as all the time I would gain in coming in late would be lost by having to start off for school by leaving even more time to cope with the increase in traffic.

And my timetable was changed again.

Given the way that my timetable in Llanishen changed on an almost daily basis at the start of one term when there were multiple absences I suppose I should count my blessings. And I can always walk away!

That last sentence is truly one of the sweetest that a teacher can utter – as long as it is not self defeating!

In a foolish move Toni has revealed that Messi’s annual salary could employ (at my rate of pay) 410 teachers. There is something mind-bendingly obscene about a statistic like that and, even though I think that Messi is an outstandingly competent and professional player how can he possibly be worth the salary of over four hundred teachers? It is at times like this that I remember one of my favourite quotations from Picasso when asked about the then astronomical price for one of his paintings. “Is the painting worth the money?” a reporter asked. To which the Great Man replied, “You are asking the wrong question. It is not whether the painting is worth the money, but whether the money is worth the money!” In other words society puts a value on things and judges their worth by putting a monetary price tag on them. Who is to say if a missile is worth the same as a middle rating Modern Master? All of which I think shows that I am not being paid enough!

Or something

The holiday has begun.

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