Asked to resign

Resign! Sorry

The HT has NO POWER to tell him to reign.

What would happen if your daughter needed pastoral support?

I work in a school and there are certain jobs they won’t allow me to do in case it causes a conflict of interest because it is also my sons school. I find it frustrating that I can’t do certain things because of it but at the same time I don’t want to have to reprimand my own child or his friends. In this instance the HT is being ridiculous. Unless all of the pastoral staff have a child in the school, it’s really quite easy to ensure your husband isn’t working directly with his own child.

How can HT expect your DH to do pastoral care for his own daughter ? Clear safeguarding conflict of interests: one of the jobs of pastoral care staff is to help kids cope with problems at home.

The staff member should be able to handle that too.

Well, I do think it is particularly uncomfortable if working in a pastoral role to be responsible for your own child’s year group - far more difficult than just working as a classroom teacher, where you will not actually be the official person to go to for pastoral support, anyway. You are not going to be able to get involved in investigating any accusations of bullying or bad behaviour involving your own child without immediate accusations of bias by the other children and their parents, for a start, so you will undoubtedly be less effective as a pastoral support worker for that year group. You may also make children feel uncomfortable about coming to see you and disclose information to you in the first place, because they know of your relationship with another student and don’t trust you not to let something slip, or behave differently towards them if they happen to be a friend or enemy of your child - they might see you as building up ammunition against them, or being prejudiced against them if they confide in you, even in something unrelated directly to your child. And, of course, due to these two things, you may cause problems for your own child and their friendship groups. In conclusion, it wouldn’t be much of a problem in any other role, but it really doesn’t take much effort to see it is a problem if your specific role is pastoral support.

HT sounds like she has another agenda - jumping straight to what she said isn’t a good sign. I would look to move to a different school before he is pushed..

I think most teachers can deal with this professionally, the problem might come from the parents who will feel able to 'consult' the teacher out of school about their little cherub.

No doubt happened numerous times in the past and never been an issue.

I'm a teacher and I teach my year 7 daughter maths. It's not been an issue at all and I've dealt with pastoral issues involving her or her friends.

Having good relationships with other kids in the year groups parents can be very helpful.

As long as he has a "teacher bestie" that he can get to double check him occasionally to make sure he's being fair, or to witness certain conversations it will be fine.

Having worked in military schools overseas where lots of teachers' children attended it's likely that the teacher will find himself going out of his way not to be accused of favouritsm! It was an odd situation thinking back, many of the teachers came to our house and our children had no problem with Miss/Mr in school then first names out of school.

I'm very surprised at the school. I've worked in many schools and at each one the first rule is you do not work in the year your child is it. It's very unprofessional of them

I've twice taught in my DCs' year group. I never taught them (the SLT member responsible for timetabling ensured that) but I did teach their friends. It was fine, and my kids were fine with it too.

There was only once incident when a pupil told my daughter that I was horrible because I'd given him a detention. She told me about it and my heart sank. I asked her what how she felt and she said she wasn't at all bothered. "I told him that you're a teacher and teachers are meant to be horrible"

Loads of teachers teach at schools where there children attend, so they have to teach their child's friends, give detentions to them etc, do parents evening with parents they know etc. It can be a little uncomfortable, but it's normal. Yes the school may well be able to swap the staff around to different years, but there may be some reason why the Headteacher wants certain members of staff with certain year groups. Your DH just needs to deal with it.

I would actually be concerned about a member of staff who had a kid in the school, who felt they couldn’t deal with children or parents who they know outside school. It suggests an inability to draw a professional line between life outside school and at work. Working in a school means you really need to be able to do this.

agreed.

Did you hear this from your DH or did you ever see any emails from the head to confirm this.

indeed, the current situation, anything in writing or all this is your DH telling me what’s happening?

OP says he is not a teacher. He is a pastoral support worker.

People working in schools need to be professional. They can be professional with children they know from outside school and parents too. It is perfectly possible. Staff in schools often have their own children in school and manage fine.

This is not someone who is being asked to teach a subject to classes that contain their own child. They are not a Head of Year etc. They are a support worker.

OPs DH has expressed their concerns. The Head isn’t prepared to move them to a different year….and we cannot know all the many moving parts invovled in allocating staff. Essentially, as the Head says, this is the job. The DH can continue to do it, or choose to leave. There is absolutely no good reason why they cannot do it.

I would actually be concerned about a member of staff who had a kid in the school, who felt they couldn’t deal with children or parents who they know outside school. It suggests an inability to draw a professional line between life outside school and at work. Working in a school means you really need to be able to do this.

What a simpering wet lettuce.

Can’t adapt to a change to an entirely reasonable change

What's the easy solution? Any solution I see is disruptive to multiple staff and whole year groups of pupils.

They won’t heat if it because I suspect they don’t rate him for a reason and this is a valid reason to channel him out

I think there will be more to the OP’s DH time at the school that that op hasn’t been aware of

There is very easy solution to the issue but the Head won't hear of it, bad management/

She is threatening him. And being a poor manager.

He would like to do his job well, so has flagged up a conflict of interest for him and potential difficulty for his dd as a student.

He should take good notes, ask for HT's objections in writing and contact the union for advice.

I don't think that is the main issue. Imo the conflict of interest lies in that the role is to provide support which may not only be personal in nature but also involve issues between pupils and also pupils and staff.

So can op's dd's close friends feel comfortable going to her dad if they have issues with the dd? Who would the dd have if she has issues with her family? Or issues she does not want to discuss with her parent? Whether or not ops dh is professional or not might his being a parent of their friend make classmates feel awkward discussing personal issues etc and then there are concerns about nepotism - yes conflicts can be managed but all seems a bit unnecessary when just switching people round could be the easiest solution and removes any level of awkwardness for the students as Well as the teacher.