Need advice? Get in touch

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1 Need advice? Get in touch NAHT is proud of the advice and support it offers members. Whether you need an example policy to adapt for your school, advice on parental complaints or need representation, we re here to help. This booklet explains how. There are three easy ways to access NAHT advice and support: Visit: Call: The way in which calls are handled at NAHT headquarters in Haywards Heath has been revised recently. Members can now call a single number to access professional advice, membership support or to reach reception. By calling members are presented with a menu, so that their call is routed to the required service as efficiently as possible. Callers will hear three menu choices: 1 for professional advice. 2 for queries relating to membership or subscription. Or, remaining on the line to be connected to reception. Triage system The single telephone number allows NAHT to operate a triage service on calls. This means it is able to make best use of the skills of the individuals working at NAHT and its team of specialists can focus on matters that require their particular skills. Specialist advice Professional advice calls are directed to the specialist assistant team, who will be able to answer many of the calls. If they cannot answer your query, you will be offered a telephone appointment with a more senior specialist advisor who will call you at an agreed time. Any calls where your employment is at risk are immediately forwarded to the relevant regional officer. If all lines are busy, the initial call will be picked up by the member support team, or there will be the option to leave a voic or to hold. The NAHT also employs three solicitors who can offer advice where necessary (see page 4). For specific Wales and Northern Ireland queries: NAHT Office for Wales: NAHT Office for Northern Ireland: Please have your NAHT membership number to hand when you telephone the Advice team. To reinforce this change, NAHT has also increased the amount of information on the website ( As a result, members can find much of the information they need online without the need to call on the advice team (see page 8). Lines are open from 8am From 1 December 2011, the helpline is open 8am to 6pm Monday to Thursday, and until 5pm on Fridays. At times of reduced demand, such as the Christmas break and during August, the service will operate 9am to 5pm. Please note that for calls before 9am and after 5pm it may be necessary to make an appointment to speak to a specialist.

2 Triage system: quick and efficient Our triage system sets us apart from other unions, says Alastair Jenks, the NAHT s head of member services and delivery. We introduced a triage approach to our advice calls in April so that we re able to make best use of the skills of the individuals we have working for us. It means the key specialists aren t swamped with calls that others could deal with. We ve also increased the amount of information on the website. The idea is that members can find much of the information they need online without the need to call one of our specialists. Under the new system, a new representation and advice team works together in a tiered way to solve members workplace issues. Previously, lawyers, regional officers and those with expertise in education management, salaries and pensions worked separately to a large extent. John Hakes, the NAHT s director of representation and advice, says that the system allows the Association to deal quickly and efficiently with the majority of queries. At one extreme, we have three lawyers who would automatically deal with any referrals to the General Teaching Council, for example, along with criminal cases and employment tribunal cases, says John (see page 5). Other calls may relate to how to manage a disciplinary process, exclusions, admissions or academy status (forced or not) and parental complaints. In terms of hot topics, John says there have been several calls recently about the new agency worker regulations, which came in on 1 October NAHT is also fielding questions on the new Ofsted framework, coming in on 1 January But with increasing amounts of information going online, the hope is that in the longer term members will be able to find the answers to many of their queries online at We hope members will go to the website first, says John, they ll be able to find model policies, advice and guidance, for example relating to school pay and complaints about Ofsted. An awful lot of calls are advice on HR issues/employment issues so the example policies enable members to modify them for their schools. Alastair says that he s proud of the depth and breadth of the NAHT s advice team. He adds that the Welsh office has also employed a specialist assistant to deal with its variations. Also regional officers in Northern Ireland that would pick up calls specific to that country. The system is flexible too. The telephone menu allows the inclusion of other options if there is a surge in calls on a particular topic. A recent example was including a message to direct members to the pension s calculator on the NAHT website if their call related to calculating the potential loss on their pension, rather than those calls affecting the provision of other professional advice. We haven t finished yet, either, says Alastair. It s still evolving. We always monitor the calls to see what they re about. It s useful for us to pull together a regional picture, perhaps on assessment, and we can sometimes see that a particular local authority isn t being overly co-operative, and once we have some stats, we can take action. Advice in numbers 260 the specialist assistant team at busy times calls a week to 140 number of bookings for the specialist advisor team each week during term time average 19 Regional officers across England, Wales and Northern Ireland 4 Specialist advisors, as the name suggests, they have specialist knowledge and are experienced at helping NAHT members 4 Specialist assistants with a good level of understanding who can answer many queries 4 People in Member support who act as an overflow for the specialist assistants and who will benefit from knowledge transfer/training as the system develops 3 Solicitors who are experts in education law 2

3 Meet a Specialist Advisor Name: Jan Myles Location: Haywards Heath Experience: Jan has been with NAHT for 19 years and has just submitted her doctorate on education, focusing on inclusion and special needs. Could you explain your role to members There are four of us in the specialist advisor team. We write advice documents, monitor policy changes and update members on what they need to know. We also represent members at LA or national level if there are issues. In terms of advice, we operate a call system whereby if members need to talk to a specialist advisor about something that can t be sorted out at earlier levels or with model policies, they can book a call with us. We provide bespoke advice for the members and we re also involved in training the specialist advice assistants, and offering training sessions at branches, and representing NAHT to the wider world. What kind of things do you advise members on? Yesterday, my calls included a sexual assault; blackmail; a child that had an accident at school and was unlikely to pull through; a parent who was refusing to keep their child at home although the school had issued an exclusion which is a lawful act, let s remember. Then there was a head teacher who was trying to arrange a phased return after having chemotherapy for cancer, but he was having difficulties with the expectations of the employer; another couple of calls were on school trips; one on children with suspected Asperger s and referrals; staff to pupil ratios in early years; a PRU assistant head at risk of losing their job; another call was where a head had to attend as a witness where a parent was taking the LA to a tribunal and the LA was the employer. It s huge in terms of variety and complexity. That was just the one day. Are members appreciative of your efforts? We get a lot of appreciation from members - heads work in isolation quite often and don t have anyone independent to discuss things with. The current arrangement, whereby they have an appointment - it s like a GP surgery - it s planned and they know it s coming. It puts their minds at rest. The Batphone The NAHT advice team has a special Batphone that is kept free from other calls to allow Branch officials and Regional officers to gain rapid access to specialist advice for urgent queries. It means they are able to ring a dedicated number to obtain the advice they need when supporting members. 3

4 Meet an NAHT solicitor Name: Richard Winterbottom Location: North West Experience: Sixteen years with NAHT, formerly in private practice. Why did you join the NAHT: My father was a head teacher and heavily involved with the Association in Oldham. I don t think I d even have known about the job ad if it wasn t for him. Could you explain your role to members? I m one of three solicitors at the NAHT. The other two are based at headquarters, while I m a remote worker in the north of England. Between us, we handle all the employment law cases across England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It might be unfair dismissal, wrongful dismissal, constructive dismissal and advice on whether to take an offer or not. We also handle all proceedings in the General Teaching Council; if there s a judicial review of public authority decisions; personal injury work; breach of contract work. We also hear from members seeking advice on complaints by parents, or seeking advice on how to discipline a member of staff. If they receive a letter from the GTC, they do tend to think the worst-case scenario, which is that they might be stopped from working in their chosen profession, so it is very serious. Are you constantly on the road? No, the majority of my time is office based as we are able to use , the scanning of documents and faxing. With technology as good as it is, I don t have to be on the road all the time, although there are times you have to prepare members for a hearing or a tribunal or a court case, so you need to sit down and go through documents together. What changes have you seen over the years? Society is a lot more litigious than it was when I started in People are more encouraged to complain, there s more of a consumer mentality. When I was at school the idea that you could complain about anything that had gone on there was an alien concept to most people. Now, people are keen and ready to complain. It makes a lot of work for our members and in turn they look towards the Association to support them through the processes. Members impressed by triage system Following the introduction of the triage system, 113 members who used the service in the first few weeks were asked to complete a short survey. 97% felt their call had been answered in a reasonable amount of time very quickly (46%); quickly (35%) or in an acceptable time (16%). 88% of members found the appointment system convenient; very convenient (48%) and convenient (40%). 85% of members requiring specialist advice were able to speak to a specialist advisor within two working days. In addition, 32% of queries were answered by the person who initially took the call. 4

5 Meet a regional officer Name: Gareth Newbury Location: South Central England Experience: Regional officer for 11 years, previously head at a secondary school in Southampton. Could you explain your role to members? A regional officer s role is to advise and support members who have serious issues in employment or complaint terms. It could be related to parental complaints, staff complaints of health and safety. Effectively, it s an A-Z of supporting and advising members and ultimately representing them in formal situations. Do all regional officers have a background as a school leader? Not at all. I got into it through interest in union representation work when I was a head teacher, but the regional officer team there are 19 of us around Wales, England and Ireland come from a range of backgrounds. Some have come from a human resources background, some from local authorities. Others have been solicitors or have come from non-education unions such as Unison or the GMB. We have a wide range of backgrounds and we receive training to build upon our existing skills. After 11 years in the role, has much changed? There has been a lot of change in the past 10 years, but some things remain the same. There will always be parental complaints and staff grievances. We have also been through phases where redundancies have become an issue in terms of local authority reorganisations, for example. The current big issue is that schools are under huge pressure in terms of standards, therefore heads and senior leadership teams are under huge pressure to raise standards. Unfortunately, at times local authorities can take the view that standards aren t good enough and look to effect change. That s happening across the country and the academies programme is a prime example of that. The political message of academies is that it s about ensuring the best schools which we have no problem with but the way it s being done is rather hard-edged at times, if I can put it that way. NAHT is supporting members and branches around the country by trying to ensure that any changes to schools are done reasonably and properly. Do you get much feedback from members? Some members are good enough to contact Russell Hobby, the General Secretary, to appreciate NAHT work s across the board, which is very is satisfying. NAHT members can be assured that we always do the best we can in any situation. What effect has the move to a triage system had? Prior to this coming in, there were a lot of what I would call general advice calls coming in to regional officers. Since April, however, we re getting fewer calls about the myriad day-to-day things that go on in schools these are being handled effectively by the headquarters system. This means that the calls and queries that come out to the regional officers are more appropriate to the kind of work we do and the experience that we have. The best part is that members get a faster, more appropriate response. NAHT counselling and support line Your NAHT membership also entitles you to use a helpline provided for the NAHT by the Teacher Support Network. A specialist team of coaches, advisors and counsellors, based in its Cardiff office, can provide services over the telephone and online. They are extremely experienced at the particular forms of stress that occur within a school context and are uniquely able to deliver appropriate responses and interventions. A number of staff are Welsh speakers. Telephone: Website: enquiries@teachersupport.info 5

6 Some examples of our new advice publications available on the web site This guidance aims to help and advise you when you are contacted by the media. A separate document Working with the Media 2 is also available offering information on how to promote your school and its achievements. This document deals with the issue of when the head is absent from the school and what can or cannot be required of other staff members. This leaflet aims to provide guidance to help you practice more effective, well-planned, procurement and ensure the very best value for your school or academy. 6

7 This guidance is intended to help school leaders avoid problems regarding parental conflict by being fully aware of legal requirements, best practice, and the experience of others. Ensuring your school has good procedures in place will avert many problems, as will awareness of the right steps to take in certain situations. This document is intended to help by taking you, step by step, through the general principles of the redundancy process that the head teacher and governing body must take. Model Policies 7

8 Guide to advice on the NAHT website NAHT has had advice for members available online for as long as its website has existed. However, with the reorganisation of the advice teams came the realisation that more could be done. We have really beefed up the advice side, says website manager Julie Cully. We have worked closely with the advice teams to see what was needed and have created a new discrete advice area. All advice is now in one place and then we have a search advice option which is much more intuitive than previously. It s very much like Google or Yahoo where you can search for individual words or an exact phrase and that s either just in the advice section or across the whole site. Previously, NAHT had relied on printed advice and telephone help, but as using the internet is usually the norm for members it s become an expectation and it is often the first place they look. The new system is more efficient all round, says Julie, there is a mass of information online, with more being added all the time and our specialist advisors can talk to people about complicated issues that can t be handled in a sample policy or an FAQ document. Feedback NAHT has set up a Linkedin group to provide feedback on the website. We are looking for a group of members who are internet aware so that they can help us an a regular basis so they can feed back their thoughts and we can improve our advice offering. 1 Heath Square, Boltro Road, Haywards Heath, West Sussex RH16 1BL Tel: Fax: info@naht.org.uk Website: 8