Tech City NUT strike picket, Islington, 8.12.15, photo by Judy Beishon (Click to enlarge: opens in new window)
NUT members at Tech City academy in Islington, north London, are taking two days of strike action on 8 and 9 December and have planned a further three day strike in the following week.
The college has been run by the Aspirations Academies Trust since 1st September, a Trust that runs 12 academies altogether.
The management has refused to address the concerns of the teaching staff, despite these being raised by the NUT in a number of meetings.
The teachers are requesting an agreed performance management policy which would include a limit of three lesson observations per year and to have reasonable notice of them.
They are also asking for an acceptable pay and performance policy to allow progression up the pay scale unless they have been notified in writing earlier in the year of any problems, and given support and the opportunity to address them.
More than a third of the teachers have been denied a pay increase that they had been led to expect. Aspirations claimed that their performance wasn’t good enough – but had given no previous indication of this.
The teachers have faced “limitless” observations with inadequate notice. They also want an end to the intrusion of being regularly contacted by managers during evenings and weekends; one teacher said she had been called at 11pm on a Sunday night.
The NUT produced a leaflet to give to the students to explain the reasons for the strike and to ask for their support.
