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

It's her fault. Before we even knew we'd be doing lessons online we were sent a massive list of stuff to do. I'm not finished with it, yet have been working pretty hard (time taken up making 140 videos since mid April). To be fair to my head, she did say 'try and have a 2 week easter break when you're not on the rota', and 'it doesnt bother me when you do this stuff, but it must meet the deadlines.. do it now or do it in the summer, just do it'. So, treated us fairly I think.

I'm middle management in my school and it's part of my responsibility to keep my staff busy too. One slacker a bit due to internet issues in a new build block of flats, but he is further down the list of tasks than I am.

So she brought her school's name into disrepute, criticised members of staff who may have protected characteristics and linked that criticism to appraisals, which is blatantly threatening staff in public, and very likely has previous issues with staff that the Governing Body is not going to discuss due to non disclosure/confidentiality agreements and settlements - it would not be a surprise to find out that there's been systematic bullying, staff leaving teaching altogether, mass departures and the like where they have a head with such an abrasive and undiplomatic personality.

Interestingly, for teachers who wish to reflect on expectations of teaching, registrations and applications for private schools are up quite significantly according to the Times this morning. I don't want to be pushed into goady mode, but an increasing number of your successful students the easy to teach students, with family support and encouragement on tap, the ones that make you look sucessful and get your A grades are considering schools that actually teach.

This is a tricky one. I am a teacher and i have been in since lockdown began, we have a lot of key worker children and several staff are shielding. What I have found hardest is the lack of fairness in the distribution of work and how difficult some members of staff have made it for SLT. From what I have witnessed, it is impossible to make anyone come into school. We’ve had staff members refuse to come to school and there is nothing that can be done. They are also refusing to use video software to teach as they feel it is invasive. What this means in practice is that 60% of staff are doing 100% of the work. It is hard and it is incredibly difficult to maintain that professionalism and not say things that may be regretted later on. So I empathise with this head and I think it’s a sad state of affairs when you can pull a school to outstanding and get rewarded in this way. This woman will have worked her socks off year after year... I can understand why she has snapped at this point and said something she probably should not have.

"I don't want to be pushed into goady mode..."

Best sentence ever on a teacher bashing thread.

YABU. She's the headteacher, the leader of the school. Surely she SHOULD be suspended for not organising her staff and other resources to get some learning done? If everyone has been at home doing nothing when they should have been doing something, she's a pretty poor manager!

She badically went onto the radio and announced she had failed in her role as a head teacher. She didn't manage her staff, she was responsible for ensuring they had enough work to be busy enough and she should have had private conversations with those who weren't.
She has potentially brought the school into disrepute

mrsfassbender given that it will be confidential, you don't know the reasons that staff 'refused' to come into school. Shielding is a pretty important reason, isn't it?

The reason that 'nothing can be done' about this is because everyone who could work from home was advised to.

Were all staff offered thorough training in video software and given a robust risk assessment and detailed policies and procedures to explain what was expected of them I wonder?

We'd go private next year if we weren't half way through A level. School provision has been awful - of course we live in the leafy subs and our kids are not deprived so we won't get extra help, teachers and the school have let our kids down. I hope their time off was worth it

You clearly did not read the whole of that Times article.

@UserErrorMessage

We'd go private next year if we weren't half way through A level. School provision has been awful - of course we live in the leafy subs and our kids are not deprived so we won't get extra help, teachers and the school have let our kids down. I hope their time off was worth it

Yea it’s a real piss take when deprived kids get support isn’t it!

Argh posted too soon...

The questions that should be asked are why she didn't manage her staff when they were working from home. What were the expectations for the staff working at home, did she at any point attempt to deal with these staff.
I teach, i am really angry at staff not pulling their weight, i am not management so can't deal with them but am angry they are being paid but not doing their job, i am working unpaid on days i don't do to ensure there is work and feedback given that day because they choose not to.
However this head could and ahould have followed protocol and dealt with this instead she went to the papers, why?

To be fair children who aren’t deprived deserve teaching too.

I don’t remember teachers going on strike, do you? I remember a global pandemic where the government closed the schools, then dithered about reopening them.

On the face of it as their manager she's incompetent if she can't make them pull their weight. She needed to resign.

In reality I work in a neighbouring town and there's a lot more to this, but simply put, she's been on her way out the door for a while now.

If teachers to in her school are doing nothing that is a failure of her leadership. She should be doing something about it not whining to the press that she can't do get job properly. She definitely should not be bringing the school into disrepute

Love how much Mumsnet hates teachers. It’s reassuring.... the world has changed, climate change, pandemics...but Mumsnet still hates teachers.

@XingMing

Interestingly, for teachers who wish to reflect on expectations of teaching, registrations and applications for private schools are up quite significantly according to the Times this morning. I don't want to be pushed into goady mode, but an increasing number of your successful students the easy to teach students, with family support and encouragement on tap, the ones that make you look sucessful and get your A grades are considering schools that actually teach.

Why would you think we need to "reflect on expectations of teaching?" The vast majority of us are perfectly well aware of what they are, and have been working hard to fulfil them during this unprecedented global disaster, as directed by our Head Teachers, who are attempting to work as "directed" by the Government (haha).

You are entirely wrong to suggest that it is the "easy-to-teach" students that make us look successful (I'll pass over your spelling error). It is teaching and improving the life-chances of the not-so-easy to teach students that is the mark of a good teacher.
Oh, and the fact that we state school teachers, in the main, need to be actually qualified to teach. And we might have had a better chance at doing some of what many private schools were able to offer, had the Government not starved us of funds for decades.

fair play to her - someone has to point out the elephant in the room

Blah, blah, blah...next!

*59Bestbe

Love how much Mumsnet hates teachers. It’s reassuring.... the world has changed, climate change, pandemics...but Mumsnet still hates teachers.*

And MNHQ won't do a single thing about it.

averysuitablegirl

I am aware of the reasons. I was not referring to the staff who are shielding.

You’re quite right about advice regarding working from home. But now schools have extended to three year groups alongside key workers, it is not feasible for those who are not shielding to continue to do work from home. Those who are shielding clearly will continue to work from home. The school is safe and the bubbles are smaller than government guidelines recommend.

Yes to policies, risk assessments and video training. This has all been detailed and exemplary, we are fortunate to have brilliant tech support and we’ve had tutorials and practice meetings.

But I am not being pushed into goady mode, and I am a qualified teacher. Super-aged too. The profession has lost too many people like me; I qualified at 53, and no busy school wants a 53 yo NQT who was successful in another (academically demanding) profession, who is likely to question received wisdom from management, or the daily data download.

Understandably, they want malleable 25 year olds, who have never left education before they start teaching. Because they can be frightened into toeing the line, for promotion.

So we are flipped off, but some of what I have learned from people and books during my 63 years could be passed on if schools were more open to offers of support. I don't really want to teach full time, but I would happily do small remedial classes in English or basic maths for free, but having offered to do so locally to a resounding silence, I assume no school needs ANY help. Private schools accept a lot more input from parents and other benefactors gracefully, as useful for their students.

well we have experience both at childs secondary school. Some amazing videos and lessons that are engaging and motivating with feedback and marking.
AND some truly lazy teaching with lesson after lesson of powerpoints with no marking and no feedback at all!! in fact teaching yourself GCSE via dull powerpoints is not motivating and whats the point doing the questions if no one looks at them and you have no idea if they are right!!!! i have actually lost all respect for that teacher.