Was My Colleague Totally U? I think She was..

[CaptainCrunch]

Hi everyone,

Long time lurker, first time poster.

I am a Learning Assistant in a Primary School, we returned on Wednesday for an inservice day. There were 2 boxes of chocolates wrapped up on the staff room table with a card in a sealed envelope on top marked "To support staff".

We went off and did some training and came back for our break to see that the one of the boxes had been opened, almost completely finished and our card opened too, the envelope scrunched up beside it.

We were a bit annoyed as the teaching staff have form for horsing all the goodies before any support staff can get near it (they take their breaks before us).

With the agreement of my colleagues I wrote this note on the staff room whiteboard:

"Hi, just to say the chocs were specifically for support staff..we have no problem sharing them, but would have preferred to open the card and gift ourselves" and signed it from all the support staff.

The next day I walked into my class and a box of chocs was on my desk, turns out it was my class teacher who had opened them.

She was absolutely horrible to me and said "I'm really pissed off about that note, I've replaced the chocolates". This was in a very nasty, abrupt tone.

I said it wasn't about the chocolates it was because it was clearly marked to us and had been opened without our consent.

She then said "Well, I didn't read the envelope properly, I thought it said to ALL staff...there's a ridiculous divide between the support staff and teaching and shit like this doesn't help".

I was really stunned. We get on well together and I really admire her but I thought this was completely uncalled for.

She is correct in that there is a bit of a divide...mainly because a lot of the teaching staff treat us like second class citizens, some can barely bring themselves to say "good morning".

I'm not going to let it affect our professional relationship, but she's really gone down in my estimation and it's left a bad taste.

Am I being U to let this bug me so much?

[Sunnybitch]

june WTF

[CaptainCrunch]

Most of us are on just above minimum wage and some have young DCs they have to collect from school.

We're not in a position to stay late for meetings.

[LalaLyra]

it gets petty when people start excluding others from eating things.

In the OP's school that doesn't seem to be the case when it's the support staff being excluded though, and that's probably the crux of the issue - not these specific chocolates, but just that it's happened again.

[CaptainCrunch]

As I said in my note to the teachers, we had no issue with sharing them. If we had opened them up ourselves we would have left the rest for the teachers at the next break. Sharing isn't the problem, it's having stuff taken from you without your permission.

And Marshy, not meaning to sound "moany", just explaining a situation I am fairly powerless to change.

[Asskicker]

It really is all childish...leaving notes to express annoyance at eachother isn't an adult way to deal with these things.

They shouldn't have done it, a mistake was made. That doesn't mean you note wasn't PA or childish

[Asskicker]

but it was agreed by 7 people

All 7 people are involved in this childish destructive environment. It's not surprising you all agreed when you were all annoyed at something that had just happened.

[whattheseithakasmean]

I think the note was the only reasonable communication option, as the individual who opened the chocolates was unknown. The teacher's response was, I agree, childish.

[KitKat1985]

Hmm I can see both sides of this to be honest. I work in a hospital and there is a long-running divide between some of the day and night staff. When I bring treats in (e.g at Christmas) I label them 'to all at X hospital'. Some people insist on labelling their treats as 'for night staff' or vice versa. I personally think it's petty to do that and encourages a bit of a 'them and us attitude'. That being said, in your instance, you and your support colleagues were the recipient of the gift and not the giver so it's not your fault who the chocolates were addressed to. I can understand you being a bit miffed the chocs were opened though, but the note on the white board was possibly a bit much and encouraged a bad working atmosphere.

[StealthPolarBear]

The truth fairy I refuse to accept that the teacher had just enough time to open the chocolates and offer them round, but not enough time to glance at what was written oh the envelope. That's convenient...

[Marshy]

The chocolates incident is a symptom of underlying issues. The op has said that no one is happy, there's lots of sickness absence and lots of people looking to leave. No surprise really from what's been described.
You need good management but in the absence of that at least have an open discussion with your class teacher op. Let her know how you're feeling and that it's not really about the chocs as such. If she's the good professional person you say she is then hopefully that will get your main working relationship back on an even keel and perhaps she can influence things a bit with her teacher colleagues. ...or a least put a few of the biscuits aside for when you come in for your breaks

Good luck. It makes my bit of the NHS sound positively idyllic!

[CaptainCrunch]

Asskicker, not disputing that it's childish, but it can be difficult to cope with this sort of environment and keep rising above it when you feel very disenfranchised on a daily basis.

[CaptainCrunch]

Marshy we worked well all day together yesterday and the day before. The children in the class come first, we were polite and kind to each other. It just shocked me that's all, I had her on a bit of a pedestal before this.

[Namechangenell]

I don't think you did anything wrong, OP. The teacher should have been suitably mortified that she'd taken something that wasn't hers, apologised profusely and replaced it. End of. Whether one of you is in a 'senior' role to the other is irrelevant. It's bad manners to take something belonging to something else, even accidentally. In other areas, some might call it stealing. The gift was labelled for you and your colleagues and you should have benefited from it. Because of the teacher's actions, you didn't. Shame on her for not having the guts to apologise. Sounds like a case of attack being the best form of defence to me.

[Allisgood1]

It's sad but no unusual that there is a divide between teaching staff and support staff. I work in schools and have seen this in varying degrees.

This is a case where both the OP and teacher could do with How to win friends and influence people by Dale Carnige. Seriously, buy it. It will change your life.

[CaptainCrunch]

..not because she took the chocolates, the fact she didn't just say "really sorry about that, I didn't read the card properly" but instead was really quite unpleasant and acted as though we were in the wrong for even mentioning it.

[tilliebob]

Our support staff including my fab team of PSA's have their breaks before the teaching staff . Our whiteboard is used of all sorts of messages, so a note isn't unusual, although it's usually more of the "please pay your tea money" variety. That teacher needs her fortune telling though - being sulky about being in the wrong isn't professional or attractive.

[shazzarooney99]

The sad thing is writing messages on the whiteboards creates more of a divide, it should be staff as a whole, not he she,them, us, what does that do for the children?

[CaptainCrunch]

X post with Namechange, that's exactly how I felt, thank you.

[peppielillyan]

Fight over chocolates.... like you are damn poor not to get yourself more...

[WeAllHaveWings]

tbh I wouldn't even have asked who opened the chocs, I would have just taken one. They were sitting on the table in the staff room, probably looked like fair game and if it was "them" that opened them I would give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they just hadn't noticed (and everyone is sick to death of chocolate after Christmas anyway!)

This attitude of asking all the support staff who opened the chocolates to find out who did it and then complaining when if was found to be one of "them" is childish and doesn't help an already unhealthy divide. If you continue to play tit for tat on such minor inconsequential perceived slights it will only get worse.

[Potatoface2]

its not just a box of chocolates though is it.....if it happens all the time its unfair....where i work we have a divide of day staff and night staff....before christmas we where all left 2 boxes of biscuits....one said 'to the day staff' with a card and the other said 'to the night staff' with a card...i was given them in the morning just before going off duty....by the time i went in that night both boxes were nearly empty...just the horrible ones no one eats left (about 4 biscuits)...the night staff are always overlooked....all the day staff had free wine....night staff nothing...its always the same, but we are seen as petty if we mention it....but then they are only people i work with so i dont care what they think of me....greedy pigs

[morningtoncrescent62]

OP, your workplace sounds horrible - a nasty, divisive 'them-and-us' kind of place where disrespectful behaviour by some members of staff to others goes unchallenged by a management that lacks the will and/or capability to address it. It's a relief to know that you're looking to move. Not knowing your locality I've no idea how hard or easy it'll be to find alternative employment, but in the interim and for however long it takes, you have to get on with your CT and manage to get yourself through the day without being on the point of spontaneous combustion half the time. Which is why I think you've got the two options I posted before. Either let it go by you, accept that you work (for the time being) in a nasty environment and don't let it get to you. Or challenge it assertively, at least with the CT. I'm not saying that either of these is easy to do, but letting it eat you up without doing anything about it will be very destructive - for you.

For the record, I think the teacher was wrong in the first place but in the interests of maintaining what was a good relationship I'd acknowledge that the note on the board might not have helped matters and give her another chance to put it right properly. As for the teachers who treat support staff like second class citizens, there's absolutely no excuse for that. Shame on them, and shame on management for letting it happen, but it sounds from your response to other posts as if that won't change. In which case all you can do is remind yourself it's their problem and then leave as soon as you get another post.

[Marshy]

Bad working relationships only make a difficult job even harder. I try to remember in my day to day working life that I can be more effective by building bridges not barriers even though there are times when I really want to push someone off the bridge as they are very irritating

That doesn't mean being a doormat though. My advice would be to find ways to apeak up foe yourself op. Don't leave notes

[TheSnowFairy]

I think you were very U to leave the note, you will be the talk of the teaching staff.

Was it really worth the bad feeling that has ensued?

[Sofiria]

I think YANBU. I've worked in a team where teachers and TAs respected each other as individuals, albeit with different roles and responsibilities within the school. If a hypothetical box of chocolates for support staff had been opened by a teacher from that team, none of the TAs would have minded, because of the culture and sense of belonging to the team we had.

I've also worked with people who want very clear delineations between teachers and support staff - often teachers/managers who have worked with one 'bad' TA and so thought we were all incompetent as a result. Passive-aggressive whiteboard notes much worse than yours were common. Your colleague's nasty tone when talking about the chocolates makes me think it's closer to this kind of situation.

(I'm much happier now, having left that school!)