Trouble at Stafford College?

A

AndrewRSmith

Newbie
Sleaze afoot at Stafford College, the chair of governors is likely to be removed next week and a little bird tells me the staff are having a vote of no confidence in the principal. Hardly a shock though, she's making redundancies to recover some of the £300k she's spent on consultants with no tangible benefit (many would say actual detriment).
 
tek-monkey

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
Tell me about it, I had to interview for my own job with a pair of consultants costing nearly a grand a day each. They have already said our department restructure won't save any money anyway!

I find out tomorrow if I'm redundant...
 
Andreas Rex

Andreas Rex

Banned for smiling
AndrewRSmith said:
Sleaze afoot at Stafford College, the chair of governors is likely to be removed next week and a little bird tells me the staff are having a vote of no confidence in the principal. Hardly a shock though, she's making redundancies to recover some of the £300k she's spent on consultants with no tangible benefit (many would say actual detriment).
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I know a fair few people who work at the college in some capacity or other, so have heard over the last couple of years how things have gone downhill rapidly from ALL of their perspectives. Stafford College used to have a good reputation...big shame, and complete travesty.

This deserves its own thread.
 
tek-monkey

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
It is a real shame, and we've lost some great staff over the last year or 2. I've lost 3 line managers in the last 12 months alone!
 
Glam

Glam

Mad Cat Woman
My daughter in laws mum used to be a lecturer in IT at the college. I believe she was one of the first to go in redundancies a while ago.
 
tek-monkey

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
Glam said:
My daughter in laws mum used to be a lecturer in IT at the college. I believe she was one of the first to go in redundancies a while ago.
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We've had some form of redundancies most years since I got there, this one feels different though. For the majority of us only we applied for our own jobs, the only actual loss is to be a 20% reduction of hours for one staff member, yet they wasted a whole day interviewing us all for the roles regardless and then make us wait 4 days to hear if we are allowed to keep them. Interviews only happened last time where multiple people contested a role, this feels almost personal. Like they are trying to wind us up, and it is working just not how they planned. Instead of a scared workforce she has created a baying mob, the union reps have never been so busy!

bpelectric said:
Hope you survive tek fingers crossed
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Thanks, will see what happens. Worst case scenario I get some redundancy money and maybe get the chance to finish building my pond while I look for a new job!
 
A

AndrewRSmith

Newbie
I am led to believe that 3/4 of management have expressed a preference for the principles removal, and another* senior manager may have quit over the whole thing.

* Several exits over the last year have been as a direct result of disagreements over the direction of leadership, from both management and curriculum.
 
Glam

Glam

Mad Cat Woman
tek-monkey said:
We've had some form of redundancies most years since I got there, this one feels different though. For the majority of us only we applied for our own jobs, the only actual loss is to be a 20% reduction of hours for one staff member,
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They made d-i-ls mum redundant, along with several other lecturers, all with years n years experience behind them, and kept the inept ones, the ones that weren't paid as much. From what we've been told too, the quality of the teaching went down at the same time. Obvious really.
 
tek-monkey

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
One person was asked to take a £2k cut to do the same job, she chose redundancy instead. £2k is a lot to lose when you're on less than £20k to start with, it could buy you two consultants for the day.......
 
proactive

proactive

Enjoying a drop of red.
I sometimes wonder whether the real aim of the principal isn't to get the whole place shut down.

A more cynical person than I might speculate that she could be in the pay of the local secondary schools so that they eventually get to keep all post sixteen education (and the dish that comes with it) in their sixth forms.

Such a shame. I loved the place when I went there and it had a justifiably cracking reputation.
 
tek-monkey

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
TBH the schools were scaremongering the kids way before our principal was, I've heard from many a student the lies their schools told about us. As long as the staff are allowed to actually teach the college can be great again, but most haven't known if they were coming or going for the last year or so due to all the changes going on.
 
proactive

proactive

Enjoying a drop of red.
tek-monkey said:
As long as the staff are allowed to actually teach the college can be great again, but most haven't known if they were coming or going for the last year or so due to all the changes going on.
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There is a school of management that believes that an insecure workforce will work harder and so results will improve.

Sadly these people are arseholes.
 
tek-monkey

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
Just been thinking about this, my productivity has plummeted in the last few months. I still do a fair amount, but I'm that pissed off by the way we're being treated that I don't do any favours. I used to work late despite not even getting the time back, now I won't work a second I'm not paid for. I used to volunteer things I realised I could do that would help, now I stay quiet as I don't want to help 'them'. Could just be I'm a bastard, but I suspect I'm not the only one!
 
Lucy

Lucy

Well-Known Forumite
Oh, judging by a Facebook comment I saw from someone I thought everyone was safe. I obviously read between the lines incorrectly.
 
tek-monkey

tek-monkey

wanna see my snake?
Lucy said:
Oh, judging by a Facebook comment I saw from someone I thought everyone was safe. I obviously read between the lines incorrectly.
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Nah, the MIS and exams team (which I'm part of) find out tomorrow. A few have already took voluntary redundancy, if offered the same job with a pay cut as others have been I shall do the same. There are further ones to come, less than 20% of the support staff with posts at risk have had their areas targeted yet. I think the teaching staff already have, pretty sure they were finding out this week.
 
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