Story 51

Age: 38

Teaching Experience: 5-8 years

Contract Type: Permanent

I completed my PGDE in 2018-2019 and my probation year in Angus in 2019-2020, cut short in the classroom by COVID and lockdown.I then had two years on temporary contacts with Angus Council, which started on the first day of term one and ended on the last day of term four, no continued service and no pay over the summer. At the end of the first year, I found out what schools I was working in after the summer on the second last day of the summer term.  I worked across two schools, commuting from one side of the area to the other which would have been impossible without a car. 

Each year, I applied for the few permanent jobs there were and then interviewed for temporary contacts for the subsequent year each spring. I applied again to Angus in April 2022 for the following year and was successful at interview, initially being told I had secured a permanent contact, and then having this withdrawn due to a ‘technical error’. That was one of the hardest days of my teaching career so far, the highest high to the lowest low in 25 minutes. At the end of the 2021/2022 session but was not placed in a school by the time I notified staffing I had secured work elsewhere.

In May of 2022 I applied to Dundee and was given a temporary contact for a year in ASN. This was then extended to two years in December of 2022. In May 2023 I applied for and interviewed for my own job, and was successful in achieving a permanent contact.

In October 2023 I applied to Angus again and was successfully in getting a permanent ASN contact in a school much closer to home.

I started back in Angus in January 2024 and I am finally settling to something that is safe and stable for which I am very grateful and I know how lucky I am. I could write for hours about the effects this instability has had of my mental and physical health and how misled I felt after leaving a stable career to return to university for my PGDE but if I’m honest it would do me more harm than good, so I won’t.