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Colchester-Institute

This is a message for those looking at the Progress and Destination post at Colchester Institute.  The role started in Sept 2016 with 12 PDT posts, as of now (November 2018), 16 PDTs have come and gone and people don't stay in the role long.  There are many reasons for this:

We are continuously 'reminded' that we are not teachers, even though the position requires teaching towards a qualification in British Values.  We have asked for clarification on the meaning of 'delivery', but we have not received it.  Group tutorials utilize teaching skills and it is frequently required for you to prepare your own material.  We have the same responsibility as lecturers (and more), yet only paid 17k on a support staff contract. Elsewhere, PDTs are recognized as teachers, paid more, given the option to achieve a PGCE, and given a teachers pension.  I have tried to progress at Colchester Institute and hit brick walls every time.  You are not only not encouraged to progress, you will be actively discouraged to do so.

All PDTs who have worked here have loved their job. Working with the students is very rewarding and the curriculum areas are supportive.  However, issues with senior management make it a very stressful place to work, with numerous members of staff off sick with stress because their workload is making them ill; they cannot cover the vast amount of staff sickness whilst dealing with their own workload.  Nothing is put in place to help with this and one particular senior manager suggested that if you refuse to cover classes (even if it is due to not coping) you will be in breach of your contract and disciplinary procedures will be started!

Some PDTs have faced bullying, only to be told by senior management that they cannot move departments.  This has caused PDTs to leave when they would have stayed if they were transferred to another curriculum area. 

PDTs work hard at improving attendance to GCSEs and main qualification, yet they are never mentioned in the Principals talk.  We are never recognized for our hard work.  Attendance to GCSE exams brings the college money but we haven't even been thanked for our part in ensuring attendance. 

Colchester Institute is rife with nepotism, and the senior management team have barely any education experience between them.  Being observed in a lesson and given feedback by someone who has never taught isn't effective, just a box ticking exercise.  

If you are considering a job as a PDT, consider another college, at least until Colchester Institute sorts the role out.

A great place to work with approachable Principal who is always about., unlike other colleges I have worked in, where the principal is remote or even unknown. 
  The main let down here is the indecision on a policy about having mobile phones in the classroom. Teaching becomes secondary to constant phone use management in the  classroom. This means learning is interrupted regularly. 
  I have seen charging lockers in other colleges that benefit both learner and teachers, as the phones can charge while they are locked away for the lesson and the lockers are in clear sight of everyone in the room.
 Some sort of directive on this matter would make a world of difference and underpin he positive learning environments it promotes.
Students are generally polite and personable, just not self-disciplined with phone use. When focused, the students are the most enjoyable part of being in the classroom.

- Business like atmosphere in the morning as everyone is getting ready to start teaching
- I  have learnt to work with others as a team and sharing ideas and resources. Approachable colleagues when I have a problem in my practice and i need to get advice from more experienced staff.
I enjoy working at Colchester Institute  as the other members of staff are very supportive and they respect and value my contributions such that I feel being part of the organisation. 
All sessions run on time and the learners are very respectful and are actively engaged in their learning. The courses are well run and there is collaboration in teaching and sharing of teaching materials and resources. The most enjoyable part of my job is getting positive feedback and  evidence from my learners to show that  set learning outcomes have been achieved. The hardest part of my job when i fail to achieve the intended outcomes of my sessions.

May just have been bad luck that direct manager was lazy, and passed some of his roles to me, when I spoke about struggling with extra hours/work life balance I was told on two occasions that it’s part of the job.  When I handed in my notice the area manager offered me a two thousand pound raise as I was doing more than I should.  I still left, due to my poor direct manager.  The only 121 I had in 6 months was while at a urinal in the toilet. 

Training good at Institute, difficult to manage students who don’t really want to be there.  No clear rules of mobile phone use in lectures by students, I personally found little support for a new teacher, which could have easily been addressed by proper 121s.

A focus on passing students to release further funding rather than on merit, and achieving results through hard work and effort.

I really enjoy this role but it is agency work and very different from positions I have held previously. I really enjoy working with people from diverse backgrounds in a professional capacity. I am working on a 1 to 1 basis and working with small groups of students with barriers to learning. My direct manager is very helpful and accommodating. I have not had any direct contact with senior management. This is a big learning curve for me as until recently never worked in an educational environment before although I have mentored staff.before. The other members of the Learning support team are extremely friendly and helpful. I really enjoy the rewards you get when you make a breakthrough with a student with barriers to learning.

i would arrive around 9:00 am then go to the office i was working in, then speak to my manager. she would then give me documents and the like and inform me on what i would be doing in most cases transferring data to PC and creating excel spread sheets with various data on them. i learned what it was like in a office environment and important organisation skills. my manager was great she was clear in what i had to do and was supportive in my decisions. my co workers were also very warming and friendly towards me and i felt welcome almost instantly. the hardest part of the job was most likely keeping to the time schedule as the work load was often fairly large and keeping organised and on time was key in my success. the banter between co workers and myself was defiantly something i enjoyed.

For someone new to teaching I found it very poorly supported and my role was predominantly isolated from other staff.
No proper teacher training was given until after approximately 2 months of tutoring.
Communication was very poor throughout all levels of management, appraisals were unclear and intermittent. Certain members of the lower management were lazy, unprofessional  and unhelpful.
Based on my experience of Colchester Institute I would not recommend taking on a job in teaching there.
In addition I’m not sure that most of the courses in Construction benefit the students in terms of progression into actual jobs for non apprenticeship learners.


Worked for the institute for a year as a learning support worker they don't deserve a star. Very unprofessional teachers, racism. Rude pathetic enviroment to work in. I heard a teacher telling students why do foreigners come to this country what are you teaching young people. The same teacher said just because you speak a language from the jungle that doesn't count as speaking many languages and that was health and social care department where they pride in teaching British values what a joke. Some teachers in that department manage people by bulling and evil gossiping in the office.

As a teacher, you are expected to do so much. Every week there are more useless jobs you have to do on top of the necessities that are important for the students. Management does not manage. All they do is disappear for 'meetings' and you're left to deal with angry parents, angry students, angry colleagues, and everything else. 

Student behavior is horrible, and they know they can exploit the system because they know the teachers are powerless. The disciplinary process is slow and requires management a lot of the time, which of course, they're not there, so unruly students will exist in the class.


Varied job roles over the years but enjoyable. I gained many qualifications along the way met nice people that are life long friends.
Culture frustrating as constant restructures that unsettled staff to the point the college became unproductive and lost good staff.
The best part of job was working with young people to mke a difference to development alongside working with schools and employers.
Management became poor over the years as too busy cutting costs rather than looking at the need for development and looking after staff.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Lecturer 66 salaries reported	£36,448 per year
Teacher 2 salaries reported	£30.54 per hour
Trainer 16 salaries reported	£34,525 per year
Tutor 10 salaries reported	£28,327 per year
Personal development coach 11 salaries reported	£29,487 per year

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