Is a four-day working week for teachers really feasible?- Jayne Dowle

In plain English, under the present rules, teachers must be available for work on 195 days each year, made up of 190 days when pupils are in school and five staff training days. Head teachers can direct full-time teachers to work for up to 1,265 hours spread across those days.

Academies are already able to offer more flexible working practices, but government figures suggest that, in practice, almost all follow the national pay and conditions framework, including the 195-day requirement.

Teachers would remain committed to being available for the same number of hours, but could compress their days from five to four. Pupils would still be required to attend school five days a week, with teaching rotas adjusted to ensure that all classes are covered.

It’s understood that a 2025 government report which found flexible working to be a “prominent factor” in encouraging teachers to stay in the profession has been a big influence.

However, Powell’s idea does not seem to have taken into account the views of those who really matter - teachers themselves. According to a new professional survey, the majority simply do not want to work a four-day week.

They would be far more interested in having the flexibility to take days off spread throughout the term than committing themselves to a day off every week, says Gráinne Hallahan, head of community at Teacher Tapp.

Currently, teachers cannot take personal holidays or time off during term except in exceptional circumstances and at the discretion of the headteacher.

Teacher Tapp, an education research group which surveys 12,000 teachers daily, also said teachers could reject plans for a four-day working week because squeezing the same workload into fewer days would do little to tackle their biggest concerns. These already include burn-out from working long hours every day, including time at home preparing classes and marking pupils’ work.

Hallahan also questioned whether schools had sufficient staff to make compressed weeks work. She said head teachers already struggled to timetable part-time teachers and accommodate requests for flexible working.

She adds: “We’re not talking about increasing the number of adults in school and increasing the number of teaching staff to allow this to happen.”

Also, it’s common sense that if a teacher takes Fridays off for instance, their to-do list is not going to miraculously shrink over the weekend. It will simply mean that when they go back to school on Monday, they will have even more things to deal with - anything could have happened in their absence that requires immediate attention.

Plus, amid record rates of absenteeism, many teachers are expressing their concern that a four-day week is hardly setting a good example to pupils.

“I’m not sure that it’s a child-centric decision,” one headteacher told the BBC. “Where the government is putting a lot of pressure on schools to improve attendance, what implicit message are we sending society - that students still need to be in for five days, but staff will only need to be in for four? That does concern me when persistent absenteeism has doubled since Covid.”

There is also the argument, particularly in primary schools, that pupils will suffer from a lack of continuity if their class teacher is missing one day a week.

I certainly recall my own children at primary age absolutely relying on their beloved teachers to be there every day. They found any changes quite unsettling.

For many youngsters, especially if their home backgrounds are troubled, their class teacher is the one adult they can rely on every day of the week. Would anyone wish to be responsible for introducing a measure that could unsettle the most vulnerable?

What’s more, critics are accusing the Education Secretary of piecemeal tinkering around the edges.