Teacher leaving due to bullying SLT

A lot of the experienced strong teachers are being bullied out their jobs at the moment. It’s been going on for a while. You’re not alone

This happened to me many years ago and I'm so sorry, it really did a number on me and ended up with PTSD.

You do need to speak to union as others have said, they can negotiate an agreed reference and also give you advice if you want to take a case to early conciliation and possibly tribunal. I'm a union rep now in a different job and I think you'd have a case. Go on ACAS website as well and look at your options.

See your GP and get signed off for stress related to bullying.

I’m sorry you’ve found yourself in this position. FWIW, in the right school the job isn’t toxic like this. I was bullied by a member of our staff (not SLT) and they backed me up 100% and resolved the issue. Our SLT are great mostly (no one’s perfect!) and it makes all the difference.

My advice would be to think carefully about your next move; don’t burn any bridges. You absolutely can leave if you think that’s best, but try to do it on good terms. Think of it as a blip that won’t affect your career whatsoever!

I think that is what they do and hope to mould the NQTs to their will. The HT that bullied me out only stayed two years and moved on to better things.

When I finally quit, my HT advertised my post for a lower job-sizing point, even though the school roll had increased.

I've been gone 6 years. I've had 6 replacements. The HT is now gone, but the lower wage that he set is still there. People are being asked to do too much for not enough money. I don't want to out myself, but Scottish teachers will get this.

Our middle managers had to run faculties. Unusually, I was qualified to run all the departments in my faculty. (In my day, you could come out of teaching college dual qualified and I added to my qualifications later.) My HT dealt with me by cutting my management time and making my job impossible.

When I was replaced, my successors got their management time back, but the increase in school roll meant that there were more pupils and teachers to manage. On top of that, if they'd compared notes with other middle managers with smaller faculties, they'd have discovered that the other middle managers were paid more. (The jobs were all re-sized during my last term. Because I was "retiring", I was excluded from the process, so the SLT took the opportunity to downgrade the position.)

In addition to the above, my successors were not qualified to manage all the departments in my faculty and would have found the job much more difficult. (The SLT attitude was that you were merely managing and they expected the class teachers to do management tasks that they weren't paid for. Most of the staff in my faculty weren't daft enough to do that. I never asked them to do work outwith their remit.)

It's happened to people I know. A husband and wife - both teachers.

I never understand why SLT do this. It may save money, but it's so hard to fill roles now. Unless, of course, flogging NQTs for a couple of years and then replacing them is their business modell. But NQTs are so hit and miss, especially with how teaching is now, even if they are cheap.

I'm sorry - it's awful.

My doctor said he could have signed me off for the 3 months I needed to get my TP but wanted to see me more frequently as he was concerned. I think he thought I'd harm myself but I wasn't going to I just couldn't leave the house or stop crying for the first few weeks it was that bad. The Union said I should rescind the notice I had already given and get full sick pay for 6 months but I couldn't do it. I didn't start to feel myself again until I was free of them. I had been at that school for 27 years and the new HT completely undermined my confidence in less than half a term. I saw the old HT and she couldn't believe what had happened.

@Teachergoing take a breath.

You have rights.

Even if you don't want to work there, protect yourself first.

Autism is a trade union issue
Autism is an issue for trade unions, because:

Most autistic people can work, including in ‘normal’ (whatever that may
mean!) workplaces.

Please, look at this site

Remember that its not you its them.

At this point your only allegiance is to yourself and to put your physical and mental wellbeing first.

Go off sick with Work related stress and see what your Union has to say,

Re the witnesses, if the union takes this up, the witnesses will have to be produced. This opens up CCTV in corridors etc.

I agree with @FoxRedPuppy the accusation that things happened because your brain works differently really alarmed me OP. Please please please raise this with your union, this is very ableist and inappropriate.

On a wider point (and not really a top priority for you right now) if they can say that to you, what’s stopping them saying it to a child.

The union will make sure that correct disciplinary procedure have been followed. So for instance you should have been given notice of a disciplinary meeting. Should have been able to have a member of your union present. Should have been able to record it as part of the allowances made for your autism.

Shouting at you in a classroom on your own with no notice is bullying. If you left as a result of this that might well open them up to constructive dismissal.

You should have a clear set accommodations made for you autism on record at the school and any 'management' which falls outside this is discrimination.

If you don't have these accomodations in place then the school is guilty of disability discrimination.

You very very much need to talk to your union because you might not need to go off sick with stress but perhaps refuse to work in a hostile environment.

Also if they believe your disability caused the problem then it is their failure to make appropriate accomodations that is the liability here.

I know you probably don't want to say .... But what did you do? I'm in no way justifying the shouting, that's unacceptable but SLT sometimes have a really hard job managing staff who are underperforming. I'm not suggesting this is you but you've obviously done something wrong from your original post. It's hard to judge because you haven't said what it is.
SLT get complaints from parents about ineffective teachers and from colleagues when staff aren't pulling their weight but then people don't like it when they hold people to account. It's a tough job.

The same thing happened to me OP.

I was 10 years into my career and just couldn't do it any more. I was jumping through every hoop they conjured up in front of me, and it was always something else, then something else.
I spontaneously handed in my notice on a random Tuesday in June, and it was the best thing I ever did.

6 years on, I do supply full time, work in a holiday club during school holidays, and do a bit of tutoring in the evenings. The money works out almost the same. These past 6 years have been the happiest of my life.

Happy to chat if you want to DM me.

I voted YABU as your union should be able to help. Apart from anything, if you have ASD they shouldn't be blaming your brain for something, but taking steps to ensure you have understood correctly.

That said, look for a better school. They are out there and you don't deserve to be on tenterhooks at work; if you aren't relaxed it'll make teaching harder and compound the problem.

Please drop me a message about this before you do anything. Been in a very similar situation.

This.the union may well be able to help you. Do you have any other evidence of poor practice from SLT? Don't worry about the 'witnesses' for now. This must be as a result of many incidents not just one event. Gather your evidence before you go on sick leave. Would you TAs support your evidence? Try to see if there are any other people in the sane position at school, make subtle enquiries. It can't just be you. You can't just walk away from your teaching career without a fight.

The Unions can't do much. The only advice i was given was to stay signed off with sick pay as long as possible and then leave. I just wanted to be shot of the place as soon as I could. I was approaching 60 so retired and took my TP although I had to wait another 6 years for my State Pension.

Ousted usually send out staff questionnaires as part of their inspection.

Talk to your union. Workplace investigations and situations are not like criminal cases. Plenty get sorted with no witnesses.

You are disabled and they are possibly guilty of discriminating against you.