#WomenEd Blogs

by Caroline Stanbrook @caroline stanbrook This summer has been an exciting and nervous one for me.  In September I am taking a step up in my career into the role of Associate Vice Principal at Winton Community Academy.  It is a move that would not have been possible if my new Principal had not been open to flexible working.  My new s...

by Gemma Molyneux @GHOEnglish The anxiety of taking a career break to extend parental leave is exacerbated by the belief that a gap in work history will be a setback to future success.  In the same way, achieving temporary flexibility can also feel like stepping 'back' or 'down' from your career. There's a myth that you have to make a choice b...

by Kathryn Taylor MEd FCCT @super_KAT1 I appreciate the irony that I'm writing this on a Sunday evening, having spent my Saturday at the #WomenEd Global Unconference.  But you don't need to work silly hours just because I do, and nor should anyone feel obliged to.  I'm really concerned about the state of education, and you should be too. ...

By Lindsay Patience     @mumsyme Flexible Teacher Talent recently asked in a Twitter poll how part-time TLRs (Teaching and Learning Responsibility) worked. I was shocked to find again that a large proportion of teachers are not being paid properly for their management responsibilities. 54% said they were responsible for the whole rol...

By Lindsay Patience @Mumsyme As I approach the birth of my third child, it seems a good time to reflect on how things have changed with regard to flexible working in the education sector since I was expecting my first child in 2016. Before I was pregnant for the first time, I was working full time on the SLT in a large comprehensive school in ...

by Abby Bayford @Abby­_BayfordIn March 2022, my life changed in the most wonderful way. After years of infertility, I had a successful round of IVF and found out I was pregnant. I had yearned for this for many years and my mind became preoccupied with thoughts about the wonderful surprises ahead. The surprise I hadn't considered, however, was the f...

By Nicola Mooney @nicksnook   Network Leader @WomenEdSW This blog post is about something that is very important to me. I have 4 sons ranging from 3-16, I work full time, and am hoping to become a secondary headteacher in the future. I am writing this blog while son #3 (aged 6) is at a bowling birthday party, and #4 (aged 3) is playi...

By Caroline Doherty @_C_J_B

Dear Headteacher,

If I were to offer you a simple way to get you a more diverse, skilled, happy and engaged workforce with greater levels of wellbeing, you’d say it sounds far too good to be true!

However, when I chaired a webinar on Flexible Working in partnership with the Department for Education and Teaching Vacancies this is exactly what we heard from our expert panellists happens when schools offer opportunities to work flexibly. You can watch the full recording here

by Katy Marsh-Davies @KatyAcademic

I received the following email response from a colleague in professional services today: ‘Sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner, I only work part-time’. I’ve had this response from colleagues before, but this time it rankled. I already knew she worked part-time because I received her automatic email reply. I also knew because a senior colleague had told me, in hushed tones, that members of her team mainly work part-time, ‘so you might not always get the support you need in a timely manner’.

by Lorraine Walker @LWalkerTeach

'Half (51%) of employers agree that there is sometimes resentment amongst employees towards women who are pregnant or on maternity leave.' (Equality and Human Rights Commission, 2018)

I (shamefully) admit to previously having jealous thoughts towards staff who left work on time, arrived on time, didn’t participate in evening events, confidently declined summer school classes, and received a year off work.

Dr Katy Marsh-Davies @KatyAcademic

It feels strange to talk about a global pandemic having upsides but as we hope we are approaching the end of many restrictions in the UK, it seems apt to reflect on what lessons we might learn from the life-changing experience we’ve all been through.  As a Business School academic, with a passion for exploring professional lives, I spent last year researching teachers’ experiences of working remotely.

by Lynn How @Positive_Y_Mind    www.positiveyoungmind.com

Could you be a great educational leader if you had more flexibility? I see leadership potential in women everywhere I turn in education. Unfortunately, many of these are woman who have motherhood and childcare to balance alongside their careers, many choose parenting over their career. If I needed to make that binary choice, I would choose the same but what if you could have both?

by Cara Carey @CaraCarey20

I’ve always been very career focused and loved my job as a teacher. In fact, I remember one colleague expressing surprise at my pregnancy as she thought I was more of a ‘career woman’… as if you could only be one or the other. But I’d known that I wanted children for as long as I could remember. I’d progressed to middle leadership fairly quickly, and at 30 when I fell pregnant with my first child, I was in my first year as Head of Sixth Form.

by Jo Pellereau @PhysicsJo

I am blessed to have two wonderful children, both the result of gruelling IVF procedures and following pregnancies dotted with the stress of hyperemesis, blood loss and a bout of post natal depression following the birth of my second child. The impact on my wellbeing and the toll it took at work is my primary motivation for undertaking a PhD in Education looking at fertility issues and how schools handle them.

Despite these challenges, at no point in the past almost 4 years have I considered my career to be over or even paused. It has taken a different direction than I thought, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have importance to me or to my sense of identity. In fact in many ways my commitment to education has been increased by my new identity as a mother.

by Emma Turner @Emma_Turner75

Flexible working needs modelling at all levels of responsibility, and if we are to avoid so-ing, then leaders have a duty to analyse who their flexible workers are and to see if they are representative of all levels, pay grades and responsibilities across their organisations. If we are to see flex as a realistic and aspirational model then it needs modelling at all career stages and in all roles. Flexible working should be seen as just that, flexible; it should be seen as a chance to shape, mould and develop existing norms and to innovate. It should not be seen as a second rate option to the premier glory of full time. It should also not be associated with specific levels of responsibility or roles.