Career as Teacher

Originally Posted by Unregistered

What I’m asking is what’s a real life example of a HOD with a larger portfolio. I’ve personally never seen a HOD promoted into SEO3. My personal suspicion is that allowing HODs to be SEO3 is MOE’s way to allow VPs to ‘step-down’/‘get reemployed’ without getting a pay cut.

Oh they do exist. Seen one with my own 2 eyes.

Does getting MSEA or Caring Teacher Awards help in promotion? Or nominated for Presidential Teacher Award will help in anything? And will HQ know about it after being nominated for a few times?

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Does getting MSEA or Caring Teacher Awards help in promotion? Or nominated for Presidential Teacher Award will help in anything? And will HQ know about it after being nominated for a few times?

doesn't matter if SLs don't like you. i got nominated for both but got C-

Originally Posted by Unregistered

doesn't matter if SLs don't like you. i got nominated for both but got C-

get c minus is almost GG already.

Would anyone mind sharing the joys and challenges of being an AYH / YH? Thank you in advance

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Anyone knows if there a minimum sub-grade you need to attain before you have opportunity to be considered for VP-ship?

Haha, the "hard limit" is GEO4, but the realistic lowest point is ~SEO1 because you must have been a confirmed HOD/YH/SSD, or Senior Officer/Asst Director, and performed well enough for at least a few years to be centrally identified by HR for VP-ship.

By the time this happens, an officer will more than likely be already SEO1 or 2.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Would anyone mind sharing the joys and challenges of being an AYH / YH? Thank you in advance

In most school, AYH/YH will also be part of the discipline/case management team. Meaning to say, teachers will come to you when they encounter issues managing students’ behaviour or communicating with parents. Day to day basis, you ensure that the level runs. Attendance monitoring, administrative work such as giving out whatever materials everyone dumps to you, meet the parents, briefing etc. you are basically the middleman for info dissemination.

Beyond that, you do need to support students with learning needs, look into programmes to address trends, build capacity of teachers etc.

Joy- if you enjoy working with students and leveling up staff
Challenges- sai gang and learning to say NO

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Thanks for the insight. I'm a current HOD in a primary school, and cannot agree more with what has been mentioned here. I know of outstanding HODs who remain as HODs and never got the chance to attend Vp Interview. Out of my cohort of NIE mates, only one of us is a current Vp appointed at 36 years old. And you guessed it right - he is an overseas scholar. I know of another who from a position of secondary school HOD was appointed as a JC Vice-Principal - also a scholar on the FLP programme. Just look at the linked-in profiles of many P and Vp - almost 80% are scholars.

This is my 13th year in service and at age 39, I know that I have reached the highest appointment I can possibly hold due to my non-scholar status. Truth be told, I have learnt to slow down and take things easy, do a honest day's work, don't short change the students and don't mess up. As HOD, admin work never ends. Much time is spent and wasted at management meetings, energies spent dealing with over anxious parents , weeknights and weekends on marking, ranking and appraisal, exam setting and a host of other duties. After some time, the 'passion' inevitably will fizzle out.

And for the GEO officers who are thinking that the renumeration of a SEO1 officer is good - let me share that on my year of being bumped into seo1 from GEO5, the jump was not more than $250 (excluding the typical merit increment). Although we do not come into the service for purely monetary gains, I would anticipate that MOE would accord better recognition for a milestone promotion such as this.

Fortunately, I have been thrifty in my years of working, and am considering leaving the service in a few years time to take on part time teaching/tutoring for a more well-balanced work life harmony.

Thank you for sharing your experience. I can totally resonate with your sharing.

I would consider myself to be doing well, Perf grades of As and Bs, appointed HOD early 30s, but the fact that I am not a scholar halted all progress possible. When I spoke about my aspiration with the SLs, they seemed clueless about how they could support me in my development. This is where I felt let down by the system and them, as farmers generally do not reap what they showed, unless one is contented with good perf grades and stagnant progression.

At the age of 40, I have no answers or anyone telling me that I am no longer in the rat race for VP-ship, or should I say that I was never in the race. It is this mentality and the need to portray themselves as the kind and supportive leaders that makes things unclear. I would rather be told upfront that I should not harbour naive thoughts than to slog day and night only to realised that I have thrown my youth away. Many would argue that one join the profession to teach, and the passion should keep him/her going. That is if you are not ambitious, and you feel enough being a good teacher.

With the HODs not going up, I feel sad for newer teachers who work hard and aspire to make advancements in the career. How many jaded HoDs will be willing to forgo the appointment/seo rank and step down from their position?

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Thank you for sharing your experience. I can totally resonate with your sharing.

I would consider myself to be doing well, Perf grades of As and Bs, appointed HOD early 30s, but the fact that I am not a scholar halted all progress possible. When I spoke about my aspiration with the SLs, they seemed clueless about how they could support me in my development. This is where I felt let down by the system and them, as farmers generally do not reap what they showed, unless one is contented with good perf grades and stagnant progression.

At the age of 40, I have no answers or anyone telling me that I am no longer in the rat race for VP-ship, or should I say that I was never in the race. It is this mentality and the need to portray themselves as the kind and supportive leaders that makes things unclear. I would rather be told upfront that I should not harbour naive thoughts than to slog day and night only to realised that I have thrown my youth away. Many would argue that one join the profession to teach, and the passion should keep him/her going. That is if you are not ambitious, and you feel enough being a good teacher.

With the HODs not going up, I feel sad for newer teachers who work hard and aspire to make advancements in the career. How many jaded HoDs will be willing to forgo the appointment/seo rank and step down from their position?

Yes, it is quite a sad reality for the average teacher who desires satisfying progression. The structure of our system inherently creates huge bottlenecks due to the large teacher:manager ratio at almost all levels.

Unfortunately there are almost no clear structures/provisions for non-scholars to rise above HOD. Those few who manage to do it are always "centrally identified by HR", but the processes underlying this central management of advancement are so opaque that even your school leaders may not have a very solid idea of what happens, and regardless they are explicitly not at liberty to discuss these with you.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Thank you for sharing your experience. I can totally resonate with your sharing.

I would consider myself to be doing well, Perf grades of As and Bs, appointed HOD early 30s, but the fact that I am not a scholar halted all progress possible. When I spoke about my aspiration with the SLs, they seemed clueless about how they could support me in my development. This is where I felt let down by the system and them, as farmers generally do not reap what they showed, unless one is contented with good perf grades and stagnant progression.

At the age of 40, I have no answers or anyone telling me that I am no longer in the rat race for VP-ship, or should I say that I was never in the race. It is this mentality and the need to portray themselves as the kind and supportive leaders that makes things unclear. I would rather be told upfront that I should not harbour naive thoughts than to slog day and night only to realised that I have thrown my youth away. Many would argue that one join the profession to teach, and the passion should keep him/her going. That is if you are not ambitious, and you feel enough being a good teacher.

With the HODs not going up, I feel sad for newer teachers who work hard and aspire to make advancements in the career. How many jaded HoDs will be willing to forgo the appointment/seo rank and step down from their position?

I agree with you totally. It's really a huge bottleneck. And I highly doubt HR is regulating the situation well at all. It's really not making the education service very 'attractive' in terms of growing young officers and allowing them to have progression in their career.

And I don't believe every scholar is that 'fantastic'. I've seen some really shitty ones who can't do their roles well but are just there because of the scholar status.