Weekly meetings

coaltown1: I wonder if other schools (we are a primary) have a meeting of some sort every week. Some we have are an hour, some longer. Only one a term is a staff meeting, the rest are varied.

halfajack: I’m in secondary and we have departmental meetings (DMs) every week. They are one period long (55 mins). This is on top of whole-school meetings. We have our DMs timetabled - some have theirs after school or at lunchtimes. Any meetings should be included in your working time arrangement. You should be given advance notice of them, including how long they will take. I hear in some “unionised” schools staff will walk out when the time’s up, even if the head is still talking.

babette: I think we might have more staff meetings a term (maybe two) but the other weekly meetings (one per week) are the same length as yours and cover all sorts of time-wasting piffle for the sake of having a meeting.

coaltown1: We have a DM once a term after school for an hour, with a whole-school agenda! They are supposedly in our 195 hours but this is being questioned by our union. Some sessions are training for new initiatives and some are school-based training. We all traipse along without question.

cochrane1964: We are allowed 20 hours’ meeting time for DMs. If it is timetabled and we have sufficient time, I am prepared to stay the 50 minutes. Last year it was after school, so I only stayed half the time. If they want me to stay an hour, they should allocate the time.

www.tes.co.ukscotland.