News / Education
Teachers to strike at Kingswood school
Teachers at the John Cabot Academy in Kingswood are set to walk out next Tuesday during a strike over heavy workloads.
About 70 union members are expected to join the picket after talks broke down between the unions and the school, which is run by the Cabot Learning Federation.
Unions informed the school of strike plans on December 11 and have promised to strike again for two days on January 19 and three days a week after, unless a deal can be agreed.
The school, which was rated “outstanding” by Ofsted in 2009, said it had agreed changes based on discussions in December and the remaining grievances were to do with national policy.
Nigel Varley, joint secretary of the NUT South Gloucestershire, told Bristol24/7 further talks were due to be held on Tuesday morning in an attempt to avert the strikes next week.
Earlier this week he said there were still issues surrounding “excessive work load, performance management and directed time”.
The Cabot Learning Federation said: “The perspective of the academy is that the areas on which we have found resolution are local JCA matters, whereas the remaining open items are taken from the unions’ national strategy; while this also affects colleagues at JCA, of course, these items seem to be less specifically about our academy and more part of a broader national agenda.
It added: “Understandably, the leadership of John Cabot Academy is very disappointed and in many ways confused as to why the unions wished to escalate the dispute immediately to strike action, in spite of the short time that the issues had been live and the considerable headway made in in our first meeting on these matters.”
Teachers walked out in strikes at Winterbourne International Academy last year over issues with the senior management team. Beverley Martin, chief executive principal, left the school shortly after.
Our top newsletters emailed directly to you
