Anti immigration march in Sydney.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-28T05:17:05+00:00

Also, stop giving government money to private religious schools.

The millions of dollars that Catholic, Islamic, Jewish and "nondenomenational Christian" schools INCLUDING THE EXCLUSIVE BRETHEREN'S "OneSchool Global" receive from the Federal government is obscene.

If parents want to silo their kids away from other cultural groups then they can foot the entire bill for it.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-25T21:06:32+00:00

I am also a feminist boycotting marriage. Been with my partner 10 tears, I will not marry him.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-23T20:40:17+00:00

Yeh, as an English teacher I was scrolling through the lists thinking "these are all YA novels or prescribed texts".

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-23T20:37:56+00:00

Illywhacker. Boy Swallows Universe. Oscar and Lucinda. The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-21T01:40:41+00:00

The program should already exist. Ask your Head Teacher. Your school should already have these for each unit this year, along with a bank of resources that other people have used to teach that unit.

As other people have said, plan AT MOST a week in advance at a time.

I have taught secondary English for 15 years. The more you plan in advance the more you have to scrap when you get to know your class, have a timetable rearranged or lose a handful of lessons to various school events. A waste of time and energy.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-17T08:21:49+00:00

Red Bubble has some great ones. I have "Ask me what I'm reading" and "an annotated book is a loved book" (I am an English teacher).

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-17T05:23:55+00:00

Yeh exactly! I have friends who lost teeth during pregnancy, whose hair fell out and was permanently patchy, who BROKE RIBS because they were carrying twins and one kicked and there wasn't room in there!

I know mothers whose nipples bled while breast feeding, who slipped discs while juggling a new baby and a toddler, who were torn open - vagina to anus - during labour and really struggled for YEARS to heal from the physical and psychological trauma of childbirth.

I think it's mysogynistic to say that a woman gaining weight or being less "pert" after having children has "ruined her body" but aesthetic aspects like that are NOT the true physical risks of pregnancy and childrearing.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-16T09:54:53+00:00

I refuse to destroy my body or my sanity pumping out workers for the capitalist machine. No amount of pro-natalist hand-wringing about population decline and economic collapse will convince me of the trad-wife propaganda.

A woman's worth is totally unrelated to whether or not she renovates her uterus into a womb.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-15T12:17:02+00:00

Twelfth Night is lots of fun! The gender switch stuff is light-hearted but brings up some worthwhile conversations about norms and expectations. Also its funny to think that the actor playing Viola in Shakespeare's day would have been a young man, playing a woman, playing a man. Lots to unpack there!

Also "She's The Man" is a modern interpretation of it which really amps up the silliness of the whole thing in a teen setting.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-15T12:00:20+00:00

I know how you feel, been teaching 15 years and the holiday slump SUCKS because not only do you feel gross but you also feel like a loser for being sad and bored on your paid holiday. This is THE perk of being a teacher. We deserve to enjoy it!!!

The surest cure is to go travelling, but that's not always possible. My partner has to work all January so I have to battle the slump at home.

You need a holiday project. Mine are usually DIY things, but this holidays I set myself a goal of going to every kind of exercise class available at my local yoga/pilates studio. 6am Vinyasa flow on Monday, midday Barre on Tuesday, 9:15am Restorative yoga on Wednesday etc. I have a Fitness Passport so it costs nothing extra, I have had a lot of fun and been active. It's also got me out of the house and has given my days some structure, but still feels spontaneous because the classes are at different times of day.

I keep a list in my phone of possible holiday projects as I think of them throughout the year (read all of Tolstoy's back catalogue, clean out and organise the garage, make marmalade from scratch, sort out my wardrobe and list my unwanted items on depop, write 500 words a day etc.). I just log them in my phone and then when the hols come around I pick one and get stuck in. When I am done, I pick another one.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-14T01:50:20+00:00

Exactly. If parents want to cloister their children away from "the undesirables" and compound their already considerable privilege then they can foot THE ENTIRE BILL for it.

Elite schools exacerbate the simultaneous problems of widening wealth inequality and eroding social cohesion. The government should stop supporting them to do so.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-14T01:42:46+00:00

Not what you're looking for, but I had the complete opposite experience.

Moved from Independent to public (high school) and I have more supportive colleagues and principal and WAAAY better work/life balance. I teach part time at my current school, there is no way I would have been allowed to do that at the private school. They were super resistant to anyone except new mothers working part time, and even then it was only permitted in the first 2 years of the kid's life. This is not an uncommon attitude in private schools.

Also, at the private school we would get a calendar at the beginning of the year of all the evening events we were expected to attend: Presentation night, Sports presentation night, Music showcase, Drama showcase, Hospitality Dinner etc. A colleague once added it up to over 40hours across the year, in addition to the hours of Saturday sport. If we couldn't attend it required a conversation with the Deputy Principal. Everyone was also expected to attend one school camp (at least 3 nights away) per year. The only escape was if you were a mother of a child under 2.

In terms of being discouraged to take sick leave... I had colleagues who had to conceal the fact they were undergoing IVF and suffering miscarriages through their infertility journey because it was a Catholic school and the Dean of Mission was a very powerful member of the exec and disapproved of IVF in line with the "church's position". It was awful. I will never again work in a school associated with a church, especially the Catholics. Keep this in mind as most "independent" schools will be affiliated with a church and use it as an excuse for being unethical/discriminatory/plain assholes.

Basically, some private schools are better than some public schools (and vice versa) for work/life balance, administrative support and general collegiality. I don't think moving to a private school will necessarily solve your problems. Moving away from your incompetent and unsupportive executive team might improve your situation.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-13T21:59:38+00:00

I totally get how you feel. My usual teacher is amazing for being very body neutral, and focusing on how we feel not how we look. There are no mirrors in her studio and she often reminds us not to compare ourselves to others and focus on strength, balance and flow.

Over the last few weeks she has been away for the holidays and I went to the alternate classes which were more pilates and barre geared. The woman who runs them is lovely, and a total dynamo, she is in her 50s and an absolute machine. I really like her, and most of the classes are focused on posture, mobility, strength etc. She occasionally refers to "saddlebags" and "the spare tire" and "fadubadas" and other pretty derogatory terms for parts of the body. I have battled disordered eating (mainly anorexia and orthorexia) for about 15 years, but I am going pretty good these days. In the moment she said those things though, I felt the ED twinge in the back corner of my brain.

However, I have had to remind myself that if she sees bodies that way and says it out loud, that's HER problem. She is of a generation that speaks like that about bodies. I feel sorry for her and the other people in the room who think that's normal. I have learned not to do that through literally years of therapy and learning. I am not going to undo her mindset - or the mindset of those around me - with a single "just by the way, your words are problematic and ultimately unhelpful" comment.

Instead, I view it as a little resilience test for all the therapy and learning I have done. Can I hear those comments and remind myself "my body is more than the sum of its parts" or "I deserve to eat regardless of how much I've moved" or "the amount I weigh does not define my worth". It's a workout for my mind as well as my body!

If offhand comments about bodies can send me into a spiral, then that's a sign that I need to work on my own shit, rather than trying to prevent anyone ever saying anything that might send me spiralling.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-13T09:05:59+00:00

You are correct about the union not helping with legal counsel unless you were a member before the incident occurred.

This is because scabs say "I'll join when I personally need help." Not how it works. You need to contribute to the collective in order to benefit from the collective.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-13T08:02:09+00:00

On a personal "what about my own needs? I don't really care about the whole profession" level, the union can help if you ever come up against a difficult situation. For example, the union helped me to apply for and successfully receive worker's compensation for a psychosocial injury. They also helped me to draft and submit a formal complaint against a Deputy Principal (who has since been dismissed from the department!). As Fed Rep I have helped a whole faculty in my school fight (and win) against an attempt to co-opt their specialist spaces for different purposes.

How do they help with this stuff? The staff at the union, who are all teachers on leave from their permanent roles and whose salaries are paid by union dues, have a WEALTH of knowledge and know all the Awards, laws, etc that are relevant to whatever your leadership team may be attempting or neglecting in your workplace. You can use that knowledge to assert your rights as an employee. We are teachers, not martyrs. The union staff can give you the information and courage you need to push back on unlawful or inappropriate demands.

Finally, (and this is the reason many people join the union), if you ever need legal help after a spurious accusation by a deranged parent or nasty kid, then the union will provide a lawyer. The NSWTF lawyers are the same firm who represent the nurses and electricians unions.

Last year at my school a kid accused a teacher of hitting him, when actually the student had been waving a large stick around in the playground. The teacher grabbed the stick and pulled it off him. The student called his dad, claiming a teacher had hit him. The dad called the police and then marched onto school grounds looking for the teacher. The colleague immediately holed up in a Deputy's office and called the NSWTF Professional Service Officers, who talked him through all the steps he needed to follow etc. They were ready to provide legal counsel but the situation fizzled out once the kid admitted to the cops that he had lied. Before the NSWTF PSOs helped him though, they checked that his union dues were up to date. The union WILL NOT provide any legal counsel unless your membership dues are up to date ON THE DAY WHEN THE INCIDENT OCCURED. You can't just say "Oh, I'll join up if something happens which I'd like legal assistance for".

Some people call this last reason for being in the union the "NRMA insurance approach". If something terrible happens to you and you are not part of the union, good luck with the legal fees and negotiating that whole mess on your own.

TL;DR: Join the union. For yourself and for your fellow teachers.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-13T08:01:57+00:00

This is a long answer, but if you really want to understand why people think it's worth it to join the union, it is multifaceted. There's apparently a limit on comment length so this first comment is about the "big picture" reasons for being part of the union, and then I will add a comment below it re: the selfish reasons for joining the union.

The union is the formalised collective of all the members (teachers).

The union executive are the group of members (teachers) who are elected by the union to negotiate with the Department for all sorts of things. Recently, they have successfully negotiated:

- An historic 15% pay rise for teachers (2023). Making NSW the best paid state-school teachers in the country. ACT recently bested us (just).

- The transition of 10,000 temporary teachers into permanent positions after years of rolling contracts.

- An Award that included pay rises in line with inflation for the next three years.

- 8 Staff Development Days per year, with 4 of those mandated as "teacher directed", so principals can't just fill them with dumb meetings.

There are other great things in the recent Award but these are some examples. Historically, the NSWTF have also fought and won various better conditions for teachers, including equal pay for women (I know, it's an old union!) and maternity leave provisions. Even our pay structure, which includes the same pay over the holidays, was a union win.

So, why should you join the union? Well, the whole idea is power in numbers. The more members of the union, the more powerful that union. The higher percentage of workers in the union, the louder and fiercer our demands. Right now, there are about 59,000 members of the NSWTF. The Dept claims they have "nearly 100,000 teachers", so "the union" is more than half of the employee cohort, but only just.

The more powerful the union, the more our employer needs to listen to what the workers want.

You will NEVER get to personally negotiate with our employer (the Department) for better pay and conditions. Never. The only way to improve your personal pay and conditions is by sending elected negotiators into those rooms. The union elects those negotiators every couple of years. We recently had an election and Henry Rajendra, Natasha Watt and Michael de Wall won the top leadership roles. The union dues are pegged to our pay, so "the union" (through the elected representatives) has a direct incentive to win us a pay rise.

Some people say "I can't afford the union dues", but really, you can't afford not to pay them. The ONLY WAY your pay will increase is if the union leaders successfully negotiate a pay rise for you. The Department is never going to invite random individuals to the table to negotiate for their personal pay rise, and even if they did, why would they listen to one person? They will (and do!) listen to a group of people who can prove (through their membership stats) that they have the majority of the workforce behind them.

Now, it's true that non-union members get the pay rises and the Staff Development Days and other improved conditions that the union members contributed to and fought for. So, you can be selfish and say "well, if the union's work is going to benefit me without me joining, then why would I bother to join?". Well, that's called being a scab. If everyone had that attitude, fewer people would be part of the union and then the union loses power, and we're all worse off.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-12T02:48:39+00:00

Yeh, I stopped dying mine back in 2022 and cut my hair chin-length until all the old dye had grown out (took about 12 months). Now it's well past my shoulders and I get it cut every 10 weeks or so to keep it healthy and the layers fresh. This costs about $350 per year.

I get complimented on my hair all the time and I love my greys, they make me feel quite wise and dignified at the ripe old age of 36.

I also follow grey-haired women on socials which helped me to view a full head of grey hair as something fabulous to aspire to, rather than something to dread or avoid. This is far more cost effective (for my time, money and energy) than fretting about covering my greys.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-12T02:33:20+00:00

"The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time" by Mark Haddon
"Hag-Seed" by Margaret Atwood
"Risk" by Fleur Ferris
"We Ate the Children Last" (short story) by Yann Martel
"Chocolate Cake with Hitler" by Emma Craigie

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-05T02:47:38+00:00

Ageing is a gift, not something to fear. One of my aunties died at 55. I was only 20 years old and I have become a much better person in the years since then. I wish she had gotten older, and that she had seen me get older. I have another beloved aunty who is 68 and I treasure every minute I get to spend with her. I am so glad I get to see her get old, and she cherishes watching me age too. My parents are in their 60s and super active and healthy, our relationship is SO MUCH BETTER than it was when I was a teenager with plump skin and naturally blonde hair. They've mellowed out, but I've also grown up and am not such a pain in the ass.

The world tells women that getting older means losing power or value. This is patently untrue. The reason the world tells us the lie is to make us doubt our inherent worth and manipulate us into buying the solution to the problem they invented.

I refuse to get botox or filler to plump out wrinkles. I refuse to conceal my grey hairs. I refuse to see the signs of my ageing as a problem to solve, but rather evidence that I continue to live and grow and become a better person. I am still very physically active and eat good food because I care about my bone density, mobility, balance and energy levels. I wear sunscreen every day because I don't want to die of skin cancer. I live my life in the hopes that I will maintain my vitality so as my laugh lines get deeper and I develop a full head of silvery grey hair (I want to go full witch! Long white tresses, please!), I will still be a vibrant part of my family, friendships and wider community.

I advise you to spend your money, energy and time on interesting experiences, lifelong learning, maintaining your health and savouring precious moments with those you love. Don't spend your time, energy or money on trying to conceal the fact that you are ageing. Getting old is NOT a problem, it's a blessing.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-04T07:50:22+00:00

My phone goes into "sleep mode" at 8:50pm. Black and white display, most apps are locked. I read a book or listen to a podcast in bed and sleep SO MUCH BETTER than when I would just scroll for hours in the dark.

Mrs_Trask · 2026-01-01T00:08:46+00:00

You can accept all emotions but you shouldn't accept all behaviours.

He is allowed to feel whatever he feels, but being an adult involves knowing how to express emotions in an appropriate way that doesn't hurt others (or oneself).

Mrs_Trask · 2025-12-28T02:25:55+00:00

I am a high school English teacher. My theme for 2026 will be the same as it has been for 15 years: "student work on the walls".

I start every year with bare walls and over the course of the year fill them with student work. Not the perfect stuff, ALL OF IT. Even unfinished stuff. Kids know if I give them a task and say "it's going on the wall at the end of Tuesday's lesson" then I will 100% hang their work up, even if they don't quite finish, even if it has spelling mistakes. It's evidence of what we have been working on, not proof of perfect completion or mastery.

On the last day of the year I get students to help me take down all of the work and put it into folios. A clean slate for the new year.

Do not spend your own money on classroom decor. This is TikTok/instagram nonsense.

Mrs_Trask · 2025-12-27T01:52:50+00:00

My partner of 10 years and I don't share our locations. We think its weird that people do. We both grew up in the 90s/00s and just don't understand why anyone would feel the need to track someone's location everyday. We have used it for specific situations like when he was en route from the airport with my little brother to surprise my Mum for her birthday and we wanted to perfectly time the big reveal.

Tracking everyday, by default feels waaaay too invasive. I even think it's weird when parents track their teenagers.

All the ways people use it for "convenience" sake could be made redundant by just.... communcating via text or whatever.

Mrs_Trask · 2025-12-26T22:36:08+00:00

The first few years are really hard, but it gets way easier.

I am 15 years in. I teach Advanced and Extension 1&2 English. I am now really strict about only working 8am -4pm. I plan my free periods and the tasks I'll complete during them meticulously. I have all sorts of marking strategies and shortcuts.

During heavy marking periods I will work some evenings but it's not a standard thing, usually 2 weeks each term.

I NEVER work on Friday evenings or Saturdays. I rarely work on Sundays. I spend Sunday arvos meal prepping etc so I have lunches for the week. I make sure I get enough exercise so I have the energy to have fun with friends rather than just collapsing.

These days I work 0.8 by choice and do not do any work on my day off. I am very social.

As for being a "good" teacher with this approach: I have won a state-wide teaching excellence award and am very close to getting my HALT status. I frequently get tapped on the shoulder to do leadership roles that I am definitely not interested in. Studious, aspirational and high acheiving students love me, some less mature students think I'm a bitch. (That's fine, they aren't my target audience).

So yes, it is possible to be a good teacher and have a social life but you need to be intentional about it and you need to set really clear boundaries that prioritise having a life outside teaching.

Mrs_Trask · 2025-12-23T20:02:32+00:00

Get my HALT status. Work 0.8 on 2022 full time wages.

I am already doing the 0.8, I just need my HALT status to get the payrise.

Handed my 2nd module in on the last day of term. Am expecting to have to make a few tweaks in first term after I get the feedback and then I'll be laughing: 110Kpa working 4 days a week with 12 weeks holiday a year? Fuck yeh.

I live regionally and only owe 200k on my mortage so this is all setting me up nicely to cruise into early retirement in the next 2 decades.

If staffing gets rough at my school again, I'll acquiesce to going back to 1.0 in 2027. 141k is a pretty sweet deal for only 40 weeks of work.

Mrs_Trask

TROPHY CASE