Flexible working: What are we doing and why is it important in education?
Posted 14th February 2024
At Dixons, we are working towards a nine-day fortnight for our teachers and looking at working models for our associate staff. 40,000 teachers resigned from state schools in 2023, which is almost 9% of the teaching workforce, and the highest number since these figures began being published in 2011.
Beyond this, large numbers of teachers were missing because of illness, with more than 3 million working days of sick leave taken last year, a rise of more than 50% compared with pre-pandemic levels in 2018-19.
Teaching is the hardest it has ever been, with tight budgets and complexities in our communities post-pandemic. It’s essential that we have a well skilled, well looked after workforce to take on this challenge: important for our teachers, and important for our society.
We know that flexible working has a strong positive impact on equality, diversity and inclusion: a way of life that we’re working on actively at Dixons to ensure our culture is one where everyone can belong.
We are working through the practicalities of flexible working right now: we’re in the process of modelling out flexibility within our academies. We are working through key questions around ensuring continuity for our students, fairness for our colleagues, and cost effectiveness. Throughout this work, our absolute focus is always on securing the best outcomes for the young people we serve.
Visit our Dixons OpenSource website to find out more and see what we have to offer: www.dixonsos.com