To the 190,883+ Women NUT members

Alison Long writes...

To the 190,883+ Women NUT members.*

* figures taken from SERTUC survey March 2004

76% of NUT members are women. Yet just 40% of the executive, and 12% of officers are women.

If you go to Conference you will see that the platform and the hall are dominated by men. Go to a fringe meeting, and chances are that once again men are making the running.

Does this matter? Consider these two facts:

• Secondary schools have a higher ratio of TLRs/teachers than Primaries.

• Primary schools have a higher ratio of women teachers than Secondaries.

You see what is happening here?

Most secondary teachers can get extra pay for extra responsibility. Their primary colleagues just get loaded with extra responsibly for no extra pay.

So where men are doing extra work, they tend to get paid for it. Whereas women are doing extra work for no extra money.

I could go on. Pensions. Promotion prospects. Provisions for Pregnant teachers. All too often women are keeping their heads down and doing their (pretty damn good) best while men are having discussions and making decisions on our behalf.

I believe it is time to hold our heads high, look around us and start to get active in OUR union.

Please let me know what you think. Am I just crying in the wilderness, or are there others out there who feel the same way?

Classroom Teacher will welcome views from other teachers. Email classroomteacher@yahoo.co.uk