National Education Union

📢Workers Power 2025 is back for another year!

We will be discussing the theory and practical skills needed to tackling the crises facing working people today.
📅 May 28-30 (half-term)
📍 Central London

✍️Make sure you sign up before 7 May 👉tinyurl.com/2eea7m9k

This week NEU General Secretary: Daniel Kebede wrote to Bridget Phillipson to ask the government to provide support and guidance to educators in the light of the Supreme Court judgement on gender and sex-based rights.

Read Daniel’s full letter here 👇

Ofsted’s rebrand is not hitting the mark – teachers & parents deserve better.

We urge Bridget Philipson to pause the consultation and engage meaningfully with the profession.

We need an inspectorate that is supportive, effective & fair.

Most say Ofsted reforms are worse, 'alternative' consultation finds Nearly two thirds of respondents to a consultation set up to rival Ofsted’s own on inspection reforms said the changes were actually worse than the current framework. The ‘Alternative Big Consultation’ (ABC) was carried out by former senior HMIs Colin Richards and Frank Norris to gather respon...

Today marks 46 years since NUT member Blair Peach was killed by the police while protesting against the far right in Southall.

Blair was our brother, a great trade unionist, teacher and anti-racist activist. Now, just as he did then, our union will continue to stand firm against racism and the far right.

📢📢 Lead. magazine – designed for NEU leadership members.

Stay up to date with the latest news in the spring issue, anywhere on your mobile or tablet. 📰

Download your free app now.

Apple 👉 https://apple.co/42xJGe9
Android 👉 https://bit.ly/3HTR9eW

The NEU opposes the exploitation of support staff, including cover supervisors, in being made to do the work of a teacher. 73% told us they are forced to engage in specified work – beyond their contract – and 75% consider it to be effectively the work of a supply teacher.
🔗 bit.ly/3ECboPQ

75.5% of our support staff members said their workload had increased in the past year. In the same period, 57% reported that support staff numbers at their school had reduced, according to a recent survey.
🔗 bit.ly/3ECboPQ

Almost two thirds (63 per cent) of school support staff and over half of the teachers responding to our survey told us they personally provide and pay for extra food for pupils. Around two thirds of school leaders (68 per cent) said the same. 🔗 bit.ly/3EpI8fe

It's a wrap from in Harrogate.

Safe journey everyone.

See you in Brighton next year for !

📷 Kois Miah

NEU disabled members protested recent welfare cuts at . These cuts will push more into poverty and worsen job prospects. Half of children with a disabled parent already live in poverty. Poverty is scaring the lives of our children – 80% in our State of Education survey report pupils fatigued, many feeding them from their own pockets.

📸 Kois Miah

The demands of support staff on their time beyond contracted hours, and the impact of staff losses at their school or setting. 74% told us in a recent survey that their workload demands it. 30% put it down to a reduction in staffing at their place of work.
🔗 bit.ly/3ECboPQ

NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede has been addressing delegates in Harrogate at .

“I am proud to lead the largest education union in Europe and the third largest union in the TUC."

“We are LIGHTING FIRES of resistance – in multi-academy trusts, with employer-wide disputes covering both teaching and support staff.

“Through all your steadfast action, you have proved what we already know: That when we fight, we win."

“The vision I have for this union, is a union of a million members. If you are in the school and not in a union – you should be in the NEU.”

“I cannot tell you how proud I am of the reps and members across the Harris Federation who this year organised against hostile management to build a successful strike ballot.”

“While schools struggle to afford basic resources, whilst support staff are being paid poverty wages, and whilst teachers are leaving the profession in droves, some academy CEOs are cashing in. This is not just an injustice; it is a scandal.”

“Conference, we know – as professionals – that accountability measures and league tables are not the way to improve the life chances of our kids. Ofsted is only effective at measuring poverty.”

“This year we’ve seen the launch of our Arts and Minds campaign. The arts must be available in every school for every single child to learn and to enjoy.”

“Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves may say austerity is over, but in this union, we say austerity will only be ended by deeds not words.”

“Government say it would be indefensible for the NEU to take industrial action. Well, I say to this government, it is indefensible for a Labour Government, a Labour Government, to cut school funding. Because cuts hurt kids.”

“So, my message is this. If the STRB is not above inflation – if it does not address the crisis in recruitment and retention – and unless it is fully funded, then we stand ready to act industrially.”

“No teacher wants to strike. But we stand ready. The problems of tomorrow can be solved today.

“The refusal to commit to fund fair pay and the wider funding of education is not just a policy failing – it is a betrayal.”

“If there is money for bombs, for bullets, for hypersonic missiles then there should be money for carers, for those unable to work and for free school meals.”

“We stand with our sisters and brothers as they resist Trump’s reactionary agenda. Their fight is our fight. An injury to one is an injury to all.”

“We will not allow the populist or hard-right to dictate what we teach, how we teach, or who gets access to a quality education.”

“The NEU has always been, and must always be, a union built on solidarity.

Our strength lies in our ability to bring together – teachers, leaders, support staff, and educators from all backgrounds.”

“We are in a safeguarding crisis. And it is being fuelled by tech companies that prioritise profits over people, engagement over ethics, and algorithms over accountability.”

“We are a union, with a high moral purpose, united in our shared desire to improve education for every child, in every classroom."

“We are a union that stands up for what is right, when it’s right.”

Do you work in a school or college? Join the biggest education union and make your voice heard.

Join today for:
✅ Workplace representation
✅ Support and advice
✅ Access to training and professional development

Join us.👉 neu.org.uk/join

📢 Free NEU CPD: Why questioning techniques are so important when working with English as an Additional Language (EAL) learners.

Learn how open-ended questions, wait time, and scaffolding can help EAL learners engage and thrive.
🗓️ 30 April 2025
⏰3:45 - 5pm
📍 Online – open to all members!

The session will be delivered by Beth Southern, EAL consultant and specialist leader of education.

Register here.👇
https://neu.org.uk/latest/why-questioning-techniques-are-so-important-when-working-eal-learners

Why questioning techniques are so important when working with EAL learners | National Education Union 30/04/25 - Join this session to learn how our choice of questioning, and how we feedback to EAL Learners, can make a huge difference to their ability to participate and make progress.

Teachers and staff are supporting disadvantaged pupils in many ways.

78 per cent of teachers pay for learning supplies, like stationery, out of their own pocket, while 29 per cent of support staff provide help with uniforms. 🔗 bit.ly/3EpI8fe

In a recent survey of over 3,000 support staff members of the National Education Union working in state schools and academies in England and Wales, 72% of support staff members told us that they work in excess of their contracted hours. Just 1 in 7 are paid for those extra hours.
🔗 bit.ly/3ECboPQ

The School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) has made its recommendation and the report is sitting on Bridget Phillipson’s desk. We ask the Education Secretary to publish the report now and fund fair pay for teachers and our schools.