This headteacher is right - so why suspnd her

[Whysomanyexcuses]

This headteacher has said what many parents have been saying yet suspended .....
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8463765/Sunderland-head-teacher-suspended-saying-staff-sat-home-doing-lockdown.html#comments

We need more head teachers like this - our children have been failed.

YABU - she should say nothing - let it go - ignore the ones who have done nothing to help children
YANBU - she is correct to say it as it is - children have been let down

For people that won't read the Daily Mail I have added a schools week online story ....

Her point was “to some extent. You can’t lump everyone together as if they are all one type…some teachers are coming up with the most imaginative, amazing things…and other people do sit at home doing nothing. I won’t defend those people.”

No different to what many parents have said across the country. Some very good provision with hardworking, imaginative teachers and some poor provision.

I don't think she was suspended for speaking generally. The issue lies with speaking about issues with her own staff in a negative way publicly.

In the article it says she talked about a member of staff struggling to do all their usual days because of childcare issues, in a primary school with only a small number of teachers that person could be very easily identified. I wouldn't like my boss airing issues with me on a radio station.

It's her job as the head to manage her staff. If she's talking about her own school she's failing.

If she's talking about another school she's either speculating or sharing confidential information.

The school where I'm a governor is v busy. The secondary where my child is, has been doing lots.

If she was my head, I'd be really cross.

@Justheretobeclear

She's absolutely right. My husband is a teacher and he hasn't even been expected to do anything. But, in teaching, she's an idiot for thinking you can say anything against any member of staff. The unions have all the power and they'll have her blood for even thinking that any teacher isn't perfect. It's the same as how you can't say a bad word about people on benefits or women who choose not to breastfeed - they're completely untouchable.

This is so far removed from the truth it is difficult to believe your husband is actually a teacher.

It's certainly clear that you don't understand anything about education or teaching unions.

Sounds like scores being settled to me. Isn’t she due to leave anyway? A poor manager who feels frustrated by things like directed hours, contracts and employment law perhaps?

She wasn't expected to defend them, but if she was unhappy with the provision being made it was her job to sort it out, not complain to the media about them!

I'm a primary school teacher and have not done much work until the last few weeks. I'm now back in with key worker children full time.

We were given strict guidance from our head to not do any online lessons, we completed packs of home learning each half term and online challenges pretty much daily on the school social media. I've also spoken to all parents from my class on the phone a few times to catch up.

The amount of work that I've done has in no way been my choice and I don't appreciate being called lazy for not having done more. If my headteacher made comments like this about his staff I'd be swiftly looking for a new job.

Mentioning childcare issues as a negative for not being able to come back is awful. Clearly she has no respect for her staff or their personal situations.

My own daughter is looked after by a grandparent, not in formal childcare so should I have broken the rules to be able to go back to work? Put my extended family at risk for my job? I don't think so and have no regrets about my choice to not be in school until recently.

In her 15 years at the school, Wood has overseen its transformation from ‘inadequate’ to ‘outstanding’.

That should be praised. What an amazing head and not tainted because she merely spoke the truth.

What an amazing head and not tainted because she merely spoke the truth.

Again, OP, spectacularly (and embarrassingly) missing the point as to exactly why she’s been suspended.

I’m sure you’re right. I’m not a leadership/management expert, but there must be some here...can anyone point to any literature or studies that highlight the effectiveness of motivating your staff by publicly slagging them off?

YANBU - for some reason I was under the impression that UK was a democracy with freedom of speech (especially when the HT was just echoing the parents / colleagues... 🤔)

Inn my quote above I missed that she was replying to a comment that 'all schools had been working hard'.... they were discussing parents views that some schools had offered a really good provision and for others parents were upset/angry with what their children had been offered... so generalising about what was offered in the main.

@Whysomanyexcuses

In her 15 years at the school, Wood has overseen its transformation from ‘inadequate’ to ‘outstanding’.

That should be praised. What an amazing head and not tainted because she merely spoke the truth.

Last outstanding in 2011? Not convinced. How do you know she’s telling the truth? Do you have knowledge of the school?

I would suspend her too.
She has a right to hold whatever views she likes but she is basically badmouthing her own staff and trashing the reputation of the school publicly on the radio.
How is that going to be for staff morale and for the school's reputation?
If she thinks her own staff are lazy she needs to deal with that internally not go on the radio.
If she was speaking more generally then she is very unwise and showing poor judgment as a) she cannot know what other staff at other schools are doing b) it will still be taken as a slight by her own staff

This is ridiculous. You can’t just not manage your staff and then badmouth their poor performance in a public forum. If you think there is poor performance then deal with it. If you don’t, then you’re just as poor a performer.

It doesn’t matter a jot whether she was right or not. She has let those children down by her own failure to manage her staff properly.

She shouldn’t have said it, and she deserves to be reprimanded for it. As a head she should know that staff do what they are guided and supported to do, so if she is referring to her own teachers, then it’s her management of the situation that has caused the problem.

If she’s referring to staff in other schools, then she should have blamed other Headteachers for some staff achieving very little. I agree that some teachers have been lazy, but they are not the majority, and where they have been lazy, it will be because they haven’t been given proper guidance from their heads on what they should be doing.

Some teachers may have been doing nothing, but not all. My Son’s teacher and the other teacher from his year group have been setting work and have been available for queries throughout. Other teachers at his school have all been active.

If this Headteacher thinks the teachers at her school have been doing nothing why did she not address it with them and tell them what she expected of them? It’s a shameful failure on her part, not something to be complaining about to the media.

Its massively unprofessional to come onto the radio and badmouth your staff, it completely undermimes her staff.

You just never ever do that.

If a Dr went on the radio and said 'some nurses are wonderful, but some are lazy, I work on ward B in X hospital' youd quite rightly understand why that was massively wrong

I am not embarrassed at all. I know exactly why the school's governors suspended her - a complaint was made that she made 'potentially disparaging comments' about her staff. An investigation is now underway.

After turning the school around from an underperforming school to an outstanding school she was leaving anyway. We all know that it is incredibly difficult to deal with underperformance. She had the guts to say it's time we talked about the elephant in the room.' She was reading out texts and messages from parents with concerns about their children's education. At least she wasn't scared to talk about it. Every workforce has individuals that deliver and those that don't and when the chips are down those differences are really highlighted.

@Whysomanyexcuses

In her 15 years at the school, Wood has overseen its transformation from ‘inadequate’ to ‘outstanding’.

That should be praised. What an amazing head and not tainted because she merely spoke the truth.

Just because it might be “the truth” doesn’t mean that sharing information about her own staff in the media was right. Rather than do that she should have dealt with the issues she had with her staff as any other manager in any job would.

I suspect a few of her staff has reasonable issues preventing them from working in school (such as the childcare example she gave) and instead of being supportive of them she chose to speak to the daily mail who has branded teachers “lazy” in their headline.

She should have sorted any problems with the staff and taken action if needed. You don't discuss staff in public when it is your job to lead and be professional.

She is failing if her staff are not doing their job and she has not taken action.

She has tarnished the reputation of all her staff and the reputation of the school.

I wonder how this thread would go if the truth that she’d come out and spoken had been about parents and not teachers.

I am pro-teacher and those at my DC school seem to have been doing a good job.

However, despite this being a very unpopular view, I disagree with the way the unions are handling it. I think the govt have been unclear in comms and lacked planning (under statement of the year) but the NEUs 5 point test would basically see the whole country still at a standstill, let alone teaching staff.

Don't bother calling me a teacher basher as I am far from and no I don't read the daily mail.

She was generalising, following comments from parents about their own experiences.

However, once someone makes a complaint she was obviously suspended so that the complaint can be investigated.

She’s the manager of that school. If she has a problem with the behaviour of some members of staff she needs to address it with them, as their manager, in an appropriate setting and in a professional manner not slag them off on local radio.