On social media recently, teachers have been venting their frustrations about the lack of opportunities for them to progress - both professionally and financially - unless they go for promotion. Some of them commented on the calibre of those seeking promotion or those in positions of management already, and it was not complimentary.

I understand where these frustrations come from, but as a PT (principal teacher) in Scotland myself, I couldn’t let it pass without responding. It is too simplistic to blame the current state of affairs on the existing cohort of middle and senior managers; in fact, the reasons for the status quo go back quite a number of years.

There’s a view, in some quarters, that those who seek promoted posts nowadays are somehow betraying their roots; there are stories of dictatorial PTs forcing staff in their departments to jump through hoops or of insensitive heads refusing time off for completely legitimate things. I am sure these things do happen, but there is clearly an underlying feeling of resentment about those who do these jobs, and I think I know some of the reasons why.

Background: Bring back principal Stem teachers, say Lib Dems

Report: Teachers demand ‘culture change’ in career progression

School faculties: A controversy that has been brewing for years

Chartered teachers: Why didn’t they last?

The view in 2003: ‘Faculties won’t do it’

From the archive: School faculties dilute learning, warns Swinney

This attitude towards promoted staff can be traced all the way back to the days of the seminal 2001 McCrone agreement on teachers’ pay and conditions in Scotland, when the number of positions of responsibility, such as assistant principal teacher and senior teacher, were cut out from under those who were doing them. Suddenly, the number of potential pathways that a qualified teacher could take were lost - and yet the work that these posts had been designed for was still there in abundance.

For headteachers, the stark reality was that they still needed people to do these jobs and, understandably, the kind of people best qualified to do them refused because they would essentially be doing them for no extra money - and with a much more limited chance of moving on to one of the newly job-sized PT roles when they did crop up.

So, it was young rookies like myself who took on these jobs for no money and the chance to put it down as experience. My first role like this was as an acting pupil support teacher that I shared with another colleague - we were given a couple of extra periods per week as payment - and off we went, doing the best we could but inevitably, making plenty of rookie errors along the way.  

As you can imagine, there was a lot of animosity created owing to this type of thing - you now had teachers that had been in the door two or three years with the level of responsibility normally bestowed after 10. When the few permanent posts did come up, previously experienced staff were frozen out unless they wanted to take a pay cut (many were on conserved salaries that would later be taken away). And, anyway, as the years went on, you had to do this sort of “apprenticeship” to even get a look-in at interview.

On top of this, faculty heads were created and this meant that a number of smaller promoted posts were lost forever as discrete subject departments were brought together in broader faculties. I remember joining a school were departments had been newly combined; it was not an exaggeration to say that the formation of faculties massively injured the working life and relationships in the schools that adopted them.

We did have chartered teachers for a time. However, those who could afford to pay for the various modules that were needed for accreditation were few and far between. Many who managed to get all the way to chartered teacher status were left disillusioned as they were not given the same respect as the previous senior teachers had enjoyed. Instead they were given remits that no one else wanted, and which they themselves had wanted to avoid by not going down the management route.

When McCrone was later reviewed and revised, these jobs were lost and staff were put on to conserved salaries, with many of them refusing to do any more duties because, well, would you?

And now, years down the line, the practice of getting (often) young and (always) hugely enthusiastic people to move into these roles continues. Exasperated headteachers try to balance their ever-decreasing staffing budgets and stressed-out PTs rely on the goodwill of their already overworked departments to keep things going. And yes, they do often hope for “a keen probationer” - not because they are on some power trip but because there is only so much a full-time teacher can do and not drop the ball with their own teaching commitments.

This deficit model has been set up to wring every last bit of hard work, loyalty and decency out of all involved. It’s time we stopped pitting ourselves against one another, propping up the shoddy system in doing so, and instead, cast our ire in the direction of those who have the power to do something about it.  

I work with and have worked with lots of intelligent, dynamic, innovative and enthusiastic teachers who do not want to move out of the classroom as I did all those years ago. They are interested in pedagogy, research, transitions, mentoring and coaching - a vast range of areas that need dedicated and motivated people to help shape and develop them. Most middle and senior leaders support their colleagues daily and would definitely appreciate experienced and financially rewarded teachers staying in the classroom. This pathway should be reclaimed for today’s professionals to tread once more.

Sammy McHugh is a teacher of English who works in Scotland. She tweets @MsSammyMcHugh. This is a version of a piece originally published on her blog