ANGER IN THE CLASSROOM
CONSIDERING the overcrowding in classrooms and the 14.,../accretion of administrative duties, teachers are over- worked; considering their great responsibilities, they are under- paid. Certainly they have grievances, but they should be care- ful not to alienate the general public on whose good will the bettering of their lot in the last resort depends. Their reaction to the proposal to increase their superannuation contributions by 1 per cent is undignified and unwise. Teachers may be tempted to think that if society is prepared to grant them a standard of living less favourable than that of many industrial workers, they may as well behave like industrial workers; but it is precisely this attitude which can outrage the keenest trade unionist Who expects different standards in the teacher of his children. Sir David Eccles's admonition at the weekend may have been somewhat lacking in tact, but it contained abundant good sense. The Government, in its attempt to improve the present superannuation scheme, has gone a long way to mollify teachers. If they imagine that by refusing to collect national savings in schools and by other petty 'strikes' of the sort they will win the public's sympathy, they are mistaken; and they are further mistaken if they think that by mounting a £100,000 publicity campaign to express their present mood they will improve matters. Action of this sort will neither hurt the Government nor gain them support in the country : the losers will be the school children, and that will scarcely endear the teachers to their parents.
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