I’m sad – but also greatly relieved – to say that I’m one of the many English teachers quitting the profession this summer (“Trying to find a maths or science teacher is like looking for a unicorn”, News). On leaving, I will have completed 12 years of teaching across secondary schools in London and North Yorkshire. In happier times, I would tell everyone how privileged I felt to spend my day in the company of young people and their amazing energy, especially as I could do so with a Shakespeare play in my hand. Yes, there were always a lot of stresses, but I was certain that I smiled and laughed each workday more than the huge majority of the population.
Well, for the last year those smiles have all but dried up. The stress has become too much. Burnout has ravaged me. There are many reasons: worsening student behaviour since Covid; the workload; Ofsted pressures; tedious obsessions with targets and data; growing class sizes; a lack of funding and resources; a lack of pay and appreciation.
What it all adds up to is that so many brilliant teachers are leaving, forced out with their mental health in tatters. For the children, this sadly means that they will not get the school experience and standard of education that they deserve. It’s a situation in which everybody loses, and the government needs to face up to it as a matter of urgency.
Phil Bond
York
I read your article about teacher shortages in English schools with some frustration. I am one of these unicorns: a newly qualified physics teacher seeking employment, but in Scotland the situation is different. I have applied to six vacancies this year, and have made it to interview for five, but been turned down for each. I’m always told that I have done well to make it to the interview stage, and that the schools are receiving 15-20 applications for each position – that can’t be far from the total number of physics teachers trained in Scotland last year, and fewer than the total number of physics teacher positions that have been advertised across the country. I suspect that some of the applicants to these positions are economic refugees from the English education system, seeking the better pay and conditions that Scottish teaching unions have secured north of the border.
I have a young family, and my partner has a well paid job at Edinburgh University, so I cannot apply for jobs outside of the commuting range of Edinburgh. There’s a week and a half before the end of the Scottish school year; I have one interview next week and another two applications submitted, but I’m starting to become resigned to the idea that I’ll spend the next year at least as a supply teacher. I do hope that the unions in England can persuade the government to improve conditions, both for the sake of the generation of schoolchildren who are going to miss out if they do not, and for my own financial stability.
Eddy Barratt
Edinburgh
West at fault for migrant toll
In response to your leader, it is indeed we, the west, who are responsible for these deaths (“The migrant drownings won’t stop until the west accepts responsibility”). We pick and choose who “deserves” assistance based on the aggressor in a conflict, or a country of origin. Afghans, Palestinians, Syrians, Egyptians, Pakistanis and more: many hundreds have died in the Mediterranean in recent weeks.
Will people start to ask questions about why Ukrainian refugees can move easily into and across Europe, and others cannot? Or is it simply too hard for us to admit that race and religion are the key motivators to allowing people to die horrific deaths at sea, fleeing violence, poverty and wars that we created?
We will wallow and say “things must change” and “how sad” for the next week, and then the headlines will change, until the next boat of 500-plus people die at sea, or the body of another young child washes up on a popular beach resort to remind us all of the governments that we voted for and what we continue to allow to happen.
Katharine Spencer
Cádiz, Spain
Define us by sex, not gender
Kathryn Bromwich believes that women can’t be defined by their female anatomy (“There is so much more for us to worry about than men masquerading as women to access single-sex spaces”, Comment). While we agree that there is much else that defines us as individuals, the reality of our sex does account for a great deal of our experience as well as our interests and needs, including sometimes for single-sex spaces for our safety, privacy and dignity. That is why sex – not gender – is a protected characteristic under the Equality Act and why we support the Sex Matters campaign to make this clear.
For Ms Bromwich to put such emphasis on the threat of sexual violence being the main unifying characteristic of women is chilling. What message does this send to the next generation of girls to have to believe that women are defined not by the reality of their sex, but by their permanent state of victimhood?
Dr Zoe Hollowood, chair, Liberal Voice for Women, Kington, Herefordshire
I would like to thank Kathryn Bromwich for her article. I’m the parent of a 10-year-old trans daughter. She is bright, beautiful, innocent and just wants to live as a girl in peace. We lie awake at night and worry about the statistics, we have lost friends and family over this. We agonise about it all, so she doesn’t have to, so she can just get on with living her childhood. This article sums up so much of our fears and beliefs about the issue. And that of the countless parents of trans kids we encounter. Thank you for your solidarity and support, your kindness and good sense.
Rosie Sharp
Bingley, Bradford
I was there at birth of NHS
Alan Johnson’s review of Isabel Hardman’s book about the NHS (Books, the New Review) starts with the question: “What must it have been like to be there at the birth of the NHS on 5 July 1948?” Here are one man’s memories.
Aged 20, I joined the civil service in the Ministry of Health on 1 July that year and was posted to the department dealing with compensation to GPs for the loss of the right to sell their practices. The minister was the controversial figure Nye Bevan, who had seen the complex legislation through parliament against opposition from the medical profession and Conservative MPs. The system struggled with the backlog of demand for its services and there were rumours that some senior staff doubted whether it could survive without change. Sensing that morale was low, Bevan called all his staff to a meeting in the Westminster Central Hall. He was famous for his fiery political oratory, but on this occasion, without rhetoric and with no notes, he spoke for about 45 minutes about the need for a health service, describing life in the Welsh mining valleys and the health problems among miners. He had himself gone down the mines at age 13.
It was 75 years ago, but I have a clear memory that by the end of the speech, the mood of the audience had changed and most were converted to Bevan’s cause. I have heard many political speeches, but none to compare with this.
Harold Miller
Colchester, Essex
