Having met the threshold for strike action, my colleagues and I have now completed five days of industrial action over December and January. I am one of two NEU representatives at Wyke Sixth Form College in Hull and myself and my fellow rep are so pleased with the action staff members have taken. We have seen great picket lines, despite the freezing cold temperatures, on each of our strike days and a real determination to fight for a fair pay deal. Every one of our members who have walked out believes in the same thing: that we deserve exactly the same pay award as colleagues in academised sixth forms. That the government have created this bizarre two-tier situation is beyond common sense to us and we are all increasingly frustrated with the lack of response.

Our January strike days were particularly effective because we managed to get some local media presence. A few colleagues and I spoke to the local BBC news and were on various radio stations across a couple of days, and an article about our strike action was also on the BBC website. This has given us some hope that we are getting somewhere. As teachers in a non-academised sixth form college, we feel like a very small group of professionals, and easily ignored. However, as one of my colleagues told the BBC, we (along with teachers in all sectors) are the backbone of society: without us, there are no doctors, nurses, lawyers, engineers. So, we keep on fighting. For the pay, but also to stand up for our profession. If you want good teachers, you have to pay for it.

Hannah Coulson, Wyke NEU Rep