Hi there,

I am an alternative route probationer who's just worked 88 days off my probation in a primary school. The position stopped naturally at session end. 

Now I'm on the lookout for a new and hopefully chunky post and am applying left, right and centre within 2 councils in Scotland. However, I have bumped in to an odd situation, unless I am misunderstanding the term 'fixed term'.

My previous job was advertised as a temporary job (5 months maternity cover) within council 'A'. I'm now applying for what I believe is the same thing in council 'B', but they call the posts fixed term and they tell me, that they treat their fixed term posts as permanent posts and do not let provisional registered probationers apply for them; i.e. in council B I can only get work via their supply pool.

In council A, they seem not to have an issue employing provisional registered probationers on temporary (fixed term) posts. I am therefore very limited to get work in council B and also councils seem to treat provisional probationers differently.

Has anyone else come across this situation, or can someone explain why these seemingly same kinds of posts are treated differently?

Am looking forward to your responses. 

Kind regards,

KC

Hi Kjestine,

Unfortunately, as this is an employment issue, GTCS can’t offer any advice. Each local authority establishes its own policies regarding the contracts they are prepared to offer registered teachers and provisionally registered teachers.  Ideally, in order to complete your probationary requirement, we’d hope that you’d be able to widen your search area and apply for posts in other local authorities, but we understand that this is not always possible.

Maybe other Alternative Route probationers on this forum have had some experience of this that they could share...?

Best wishes,

Lesley