Workload audit

A workload audit that can be used to collectively identify workload issues in your school.

Published: 07/05/2025

Workload bargaining toolkit

Guidance and resources for workload bargaining in your workplace to reduce teacher and support staff workload.

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Teachers are free to use their professional judgement when deciding how to plan lessons.
Teachers are not obliged to submit lesson plans to members of the senior management team or anyone acting on their behalf.

There are strict and agreed limits on pupil tracking in your workplace.
There is a clear and identifiable purpose for collecting this data.
Your school has reviewed its data collection practices to ensure they comply with the DfE Workload Advisory Group recommendations.

There is a shared agreement about what manageable, meaningful and motivating marking looks like in your school.
Teachers are not required to provide feedback in a particular style and can exercise professional judgement in how they provide feedback to pupils.
There is a marking policy in your workplace that has been agreed with you and your colleagues and complies with the NEU guidance.

There is a limit in your workplace of one report per year for each of the pupils you teach, in writing or using an electronic comments bank.
The communication strategy with parents has been agreed with staff to ensure it is in line with DfE guidance and does not add to teacher workload.

There is a limit on the number of observations to a maximum of one per term or three per year for no longer than an hour in duration (NB there may be certain exceptions, e.g. for trainee teachers and early career teachers – formally known as NQTs – intervention, and those on formal capability).
Observations are part of a collegiate, professional dialogue.

The appraisal policy has been agreed with you and your colleagues.
Appraisal objectives are SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timebound) and limited to three per year.
Data driven targets are excluded from appraisal objectives.
Annual pay progression is automatic.

There is a maximum limit of one meeting no longer than an hour per week in your workplace.
Meetings are included in the directed time calendar, which has been agreed with NEU colleagues in your workplace.

There is a directed time calendar, which has been negotiated and agreed with NEU colleagues, in your workplace annually.

Teachers have their contractually guaranteed minimum ten per cent PPA time clearly identifiable in their timetables.
PPA time is in blocks of one hour as a minimum and can be undertaken off-site.
PPA time is protected and teachers are not asked to carry out other duties during that time.
Teachers are free to determine how PPA time is used.

All new management-led policies and working practices are workload risk assessed and agreed before they are implemented.
All existing policies and working practices have been reviewed to ensure they are necessary and workload-light.

Teaching staff in receipt of a TLR also receive dedicated time in their timetable to support the discharge of their responsibilities.
Teaching staff who don’t receive a TLR are not obliged or required to undertake management activities.

Teachers are only obliged to cover “rarely, and only in circumstances that are not foreseeable”, ie in genuine emergencies and not for planned absences.
HLTAs and cover supervisors can only stand in for teachers on a strictly limited basis.

Teachers are not required to undertake supervision of pupils during the lunch break.

Teaching staff are not required to invigilate any public examinations, including GCSEs and SATs.
Teachers are not required to invigilate any ‘mock’ examinations where the school has reorganised the timetable to replicate the external examination process.

Your school has agreed not to undertake mock inspections and/or mock deep dives to prepare for Ofsted.

Teachers do not routinely carry out tasks that do not require the professional expertise and judgement of a teacher.

Transfer of admin/clerical tasks currently or previously undertaken by teachers to support staff must not require any support staff to work beyond their contracted hours.
Support staff have up-to-date job descriptions that accurately reflect the work they do.
Support staff are not required to work beyond their contractual hours, and, if they are, they receive the appropriate overtime payments.
Support staff are given high quality professional development and Inset days are focused on whole school development.

We know that each workplace is different and there may be other workload concerns you would like to raise as a union group.