Career as Teacher

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Agree with you. I’m also a fellow panelist on the ranking panel. Ranking system is actually a relatively fair and meritocratic process. If an officer is good, he/she is good and most people will be able to tell the quality and range of his/her work. You don’t need a “loud” RO to fight for you if your work can speak for itself. The ones who fall in the fringes are those who do decent work but nothing to wow about because they are just doing their job. If you are just doing your job, you will get your monthly salary. Bonus is for your performance at work. A C grade is actually a “good” performance. Most pple forget that or equates “hard work” as “good work”. Just because you worked hard, or super long hours, it doesn’t mean your work is good. If you are given opportunities to showcase your skills, no matter how big or small those opportunities are, and you don’t make use of them well, you have only yourself to blame

This reflects the problem we have in the mindset of the management.

Teaching is a semi-white collar job. It is a frontline job first and foremost, and the real part of the job lies in teaching, which is what a TEACHER should be primarily doing.

If there is no teacher, there is no teaching, there is no learning, and there is no school.

But somewhere along the line, there is this corruption of ideology, where work appraisal starts to pervert itself and warp into the current situation where 'policy and planning' work are appraised more highly than teaching work.

A teacher with a heavy teaching load (and as a result has no time for other stuff), is appraised to have a lower performance than someone with a lighter load, and therefore have more capacity for "higher-impact" policy or planning tasks.

Teaching load is definitely not the same for all teachers. And even if they share the same number of contact hours, the profile of the class can significantly add on to the teaching load as well (e.g. grad classes, tail end classes, classes with special needs students).

During covid, when it's common to have teams of teachers 'wiped out' by quarantine orders or 5-day MCs, the impact of missing teachers became so obvious.

When teachers who tanked a lot of teaching load are down, and others have to cover their classes, it is really not easy to cover their load.

Those are the quiet workers who contributed most to the school. The school cannot function, cannot exist without teachers who work hard to teach their classes.
They are the ones delivering the most impact to students.

Those committees which are in the limelight, highly visible to school management, are not really that impactful. The fact that schools can stand down on CCA and other events for 2 years, is testament to how unimportant these things really are.

The management's mental model of what constitutes 'high impact' needs to change.

That quiet, overwhelmed teacher who needs to teach 5-6 high needs classes (or sometimes the entire cohort even), is no less deserving of an A compared to someone who is in the limelight planning high visibility programmes or events.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

This reflects the problem we have in the mindset of the management.

Teaching is a semi-white collar job. It is a frontline job first and foremost, and the real part of the job lies in teaching, which is what a TEACHER should be primarily doing.

If there is no teacher, there is no teaching, there is no learning, and there is no school.

But somewhere along the line, there is this corruption of ideology, where work appraisal starts to pervert itself and warp into the current situation where 'policy and planning' work are appraised more highly than teaching work.

A teacher with a heavy teaching load (and as a result has no time for other stuff), is appraised to have a lower performance than someone with a lighter load, and therefore have more capacity for "higher-impact" policy or planning tasks.

Teaching load is definitely not the same for all teachers. And even if they share the same number of contact hours, the profile of the class can significantly add on to the teaching load as well (e.g. grad classes, tail end classes, classes with special needs students).

During covid, when it's common to have teams of teachers 'wiped out' by quarantine orders or 5-day MCs, the impact of missing teachers became so obvious.

When teachers who tanked a lot of teaching load are down, and others have to cover their classes, it is really not easy to cover their load.

Those are the quiet workers who contributed most to the school. The school cannot function, cannot exist without teachers who work hard to teach their classes.
They are the ones delivering the most impact to students.

Those committees which are in the limelight, highly visible to school management, are not really that impactful. The fact that schools can stand down on CCA and other events for 2 years, is testament to how unimportant these things really are.

The management's mental model of what constitutes 'high impact' needs to change.

That quiet, overwhelmed teacher who needs to teach 5-6 high needs classes (or sometimes the entire cohort even), is no less deserving of an A compared to someone who is in the limelight planning high visibility programmes or events.

That said, because ranking is relative, there are also teachers who manage to teach multiple difficult classes well & contribute to high impact projects. Rare, but they exist, and in comparison, these are the ones who will stand out. Wish there would be a better system though

Originally Posted by Unregistered

I'm not a scholar, nor am I a KP. I know that there are fair KPs and SLs like yourselves, and I really respect you guys. Unfortunately, the truth is that good people like you aren't common. I wish more of KPs like yourselves can be part of my career.

I am a GEO4 who got a C with quantum 1.5 only despite doing school wide projects, and also a demanding workload. What is really fair or unfair? No one actually really knows because ranking is pretty much the least transparent activity in this system. KPs and SLs will cite confidentiality as the main reason, and I completely understand that, which is why I choose to just accept it.

However, because it is such a grey area, many politics come into play, because humans are still the ones running the system. When I was still back in NIE, a current school KP shared that ranking is one of the most controversial activities, despite the fact that they "try to be as fair as possible". He was visibly uncomfortable when answering questions from student teachers, and I suppose we can't blame him either, since there is always a higher power supervising the KPs.

Some would suggest a toxic panel and to change schools. But things are not so straightforward as to just "oh I can transfer, just need to wait 3 years". A colleague of mine has been trying and failing to transfer out every year due to "excess teachers" elsewhere. Another one could not transfer and was blocked due to "shortage of manpower" in the current school.

To some extent, we can only depend on luck sometimes.

I totally empathise with your situation as I was in your shoes a few years back in my previous school. I could only see the light at the end of the tunnel after I switched school. My previous school surprisingly gave me a higher grade for the year when I left the school, further convincing me that they actually wanted me to leave.

There are places which you just don't fit it probably due to the culture, people etc. Don't keep banging against closed windows and find a way out instead. MOE is bigger than just your current school. At least try to transfer once or twice before giving up on the system.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

That quiet, overwhelmed teacher who needs to teach 5-6 high needs classes (or sometimes the entire cohort even), is no less deserving of an A compared to someone who is in the limelight planning high visibility programmes or events.

In my experience (granted, it's only a couple of schools, so it's not universal) doing ranking, teachers who add more value to holistic development outcomes in higher needs classes than teachers who add little value to low needs classes will always be ranked higher.

Value add doesn't only mean exam results. Boosting conduct grades, improving school-parent working relationship, developing students' self-confidence or leadership skills, is also something one can declare in their EPMS and be validated for during appraisal.

It is possible to make high impact in difficult classes. But also must be thick skin to write in EPMS form, and be ready to give examples and show evidence during work review. I know many experienced, older teachers don't care about perf grade anymore and don't bother boasting about this type of good work. But this is aimed at those who think they are condemned to get C grade forever just because they "specialise" in high needs students.

Is it true that the enrollment numbers of teachers has slowed down over the years and MOE is only hiring scholars now? Wouldn’t it be one a huge problem in the future in terms of ranking etc?

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Is it true that the enrollment numbers of teachers has slowed down over the years and MOE is only hiring scholars now? Wouldn’t it be one a huge problem in the future in terms of ranking etc?

yes someone provided real figures here taken from mof last week abt destruction in numbers . thars real. no of course they don’t hire scholars only - not possible.
if you know or read widely enugh on broader trends in the economy u will understand why though. there is just not enugh manpower to go around.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

I totally empathise with your situation as I was in your shoes a few years back in my previous school. I could only see the light at the end of the tunnel after I switched school. My previous school surprisingly gave me a higher grade for the year when I left the school, further convincing me that they actually wanted me to leave.

There are places which you just don't fit it probably due to the culture, people etc. Don't keep banging against closed windows and find a way out instead. MOE is bigger than just your current school. At least try to transfer once or twice before giving up on the system.

Very interested to know how the new geo5a will be given to *ahem* deserving old-timers before throwing in the towel

Originally Posted by Unregistered

This reflects the problem we have in the mindset of the management.

Teaching is a semi-white collar job. It is a frontline job first and foremost, and the real part of the job lies in teaching, which is what a TEACHER should be primarily doing.

If there is no teacher, there is no teaching, there is no learning, and there is no school.

But somewhere along the line, there is this corruption of ideology, where work appraisal starts to pervert itself and warp into the current situation where 'policy and planning' work are appraised more highly than teaching work.

A teacher with a heavy teaching load (and as a result has no time for other stuff), is appraised to have a lower performance than someone with a lighter load, and therefore have more capacity for "higher-impact" policy or planning tasks.

Teaching load is definitely not the same for all teachers. And even if they share the same number of contact hours, the profile of the class can significantly add on to the teaching load as well (e.g. grad classes, tail end classes, classes with special needs students).

During covid, when it's common to have teams of teachers 'wiped out' by quarantine orders or 5-day MCs, the impact of missing teachers became so obvious.

When teachers who tanked a lot of teaching load are down, and others have to cover their classes, it is really not easy to cover their load.

Those are the quiet workers who contributed most to the school. The school cannot function, cannot exist without teachers who work hard to teach their classes.
They are the ones delivering the most impact to students.

Those committees which are in the limelight, highly visible to school management, are not really that impactful. The fact that schools can stand down on CCA and other events for 2 years, is testament to how unimportant these things really are.

The management's mental model of what constitutes 'high impact' needs to change.

That quiet, overwhelmed teacher who needs to teach 5-6 high needs classes (or sometimes the entire cohort even), is no less deserving of an A compared to someone who is in the limelight planning high visibility programmes or events.

Your observation is spot on.

Remove a couple of KPs who do not do much teaching and the system gets better for everyone in it.

I would even go as far to claim that preparing decent teaching resources that enable students to learn is harder than planning, doing admin and generally creating work for the sake of it for the KP's own KPIs.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

In my experience (granted, it's only a couple of schools, so it's not universal) doing ranking, teachers who add more value to holistic development outcomes in higher needs classes than teachers who add little value to low needs classes will always be ranked higher.

Value add doesn't only mean exam results. Boosting conduct grades, improving school-parent working relationship, developing students' self-confidence or leadership skills, is also something one can declare in their EPMS and be validated for during appraisal.

It is possible to make high impact in difficult classes. But also must be thick skin to write in EPMS form, and be ready to give examples and show evidence during work review. I know many experienced, older teachers don't care about perf grade anymore and don't bother boasting about this type of good work. But this is aimed at those who think they are condemned to get C grade forever just because they "specialise" in high needs students.

The scenario is not simply a comparison between teaching high needs vs low needs class.

The situation on the ground is that different teachers hold different types of portfolios, as different as apples and oranges. But management seems to prefer apple or orange over the other.

For example, take a comparison of 2 teachers of same age and same paygrade.

Teacher A:
Due to manpower shortage in the department, need to take on additional classes and graduating classes. Timetable is overloaded. In other areas, just an ordinary committee member, ordinary CCA teacher.
Burn 80h weeks doing T&L related stuff (lessons, homework marking, exam-related stuff, testimonial, additional classes for grad classes)

Teacher B:
Normal class load, or maybe lower, and appointment as CCA OIC and committee head/2ic. Placed in charge to plan and lead a major school event, for example, NE week leading up to national day, or organise the school's anniversary celebration and coordinating with the VIPs attending the event. Also burn 80h work weeks doing all these stuff.

In terms of time and effort, both teachers are definitely not slacking, and are working too hard.
But when it comes to appraisal, teacher B will be favoured over teacher A, because the system deems such non-academic work as being 'more impactful'.
Which is not necessarily true.

Just because an event involved the entire school population, got VIPs involved, it doesn't make it more important than learning in the classroom.

At the end of the day, if we ask the real stakeholders, the parents and students, if they were to choose to between lessons and school event, which would they think is more important, the answer is quite obvious.

The priorities are severely misplaced in the appraisal of teachers.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

The scenario is not simply a comparison between teaching high needs vs low needs class.

The situation on the ground is that different teachers hold different types of portfolios, as different as apples and oranges. But management seems to prefer apple or orange over the other.

For example, take a comparison of 2 teachers of same age and same paygrade.

Teacher A:
Due to manpower shortage in the department, need to take on additional classes and graduating classes. Timetable is overloaded. In other areas, just an ordinary committee member, ordinary CCA teacher.
Burn 80h weeks doing T&L related stuff (lessons, homework marking, exam-related stuff, testimonial, additional classes for grad classes)

Teacher B:
Normal class load, or maybe lower, and appointment as CCA OIC and committee head/2ic. Placed in charge to plan and lead a major school event, for example, NE week leading up to national day, or organise the school's anniversary celebration and coordinating with the VIPs attending the event. Also burn 80h work weeks doing all these stuff.

In terms of time and effort, both teachers are definitely not slacking, and are working too hard.
But when it comes to appraisal, teacher B will be favoured over teacher A, because the system deems such non-academic work as being 'more impactful'.
Which is not necessarily true.

Just because an event involved the entire school population, got VIPs involved, it doesn't make it more important than learning in the classroom.

At the end of the day, if we ask the real stakeholders, the parents and students, if they were to choose to between lessons and school event, which would they think is more important, the answer is quite obvious.

The priorities are severely misplaced in the appraisal of teachers.

That’s why some teachers prioritise committee work over remedial classes and consultations with students! Consultations and remedial add little value towards appraisal as compared to committee work.