Diary of a headteacher: Retention, budgets and elections

The Easter period always provides a timely opportunity for teachers to recharge their batteries, catch up on some lost sleep and spend time with their families before hurtling headlong into the summer term and exam season. However, not everyone is resting up for the full two weeks, indeed many teachers will have spent a number of days in school, organising and delivering revision classes for year 11, 12 and 13 students. It never fails to amaze me how teachers, up and down the country, continue to go the extra mile to support their students and this warms my heart immensely.

Conversely, it never fails to amaze me how politicians in our country seem to continually do everything they can to make our jobs more difficult and compromise educational provision for this generation of young people. This two-week break in the school calendar tends to also bring with it some educational announcements from the government and typically we also hear strong opposition from the teaching unions during their annual conferences.