There are a number of things that strike me as supremely wasteful in the teaching profession, not least the mountain of paperwork that I am obliged to keep related to the job. This photo is basically the content of one term of a three-term course and this isn’t all of it, there’s quite a lot more that my poor shelf can’t cope with. You have to keep files and files of “evidence”. Evidence of when you sneeze. Evidence of the conversation you had in the corridor with a teacher when in fact all you wanted to do was make a dash for the loo…or whatever. It’s all got to be kept, filed, indexed, numbered and available at all times for public scrutiny.

That’s not to mention the mountains of photocopying paper that end up discarded every day or the fact that some schools can’t afford the cost of recycling so they bin everything despite the schools being run by the councils, who are measured on how much rubbish goes into landfill and pay by the suitcase-ful of taxpayers’ dosh to recycling companies to recycle household waste. I’m completely shocked that council procurers didn’t include recycling from their own premises as part of the contract but it seems, if my sources of info are correct, that they don’t.

Anyway, the world would be a better place of this paper was still part of a tree but there you go. Who am I to say?

Oh and yes, my (home) office is Barbie pink and yes, it was me who was responsible for painting it that colour.