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

The difficulty is there are myriad untouchable reasons a member of staff might give for not performing to expectatations during lockdown, so accountability is impossible to achieve and attempting to apply disciplinary procedures is laughable.

Internet not working well, not got the equipment you need, other member of staff haven't given you the information you need to do the next step, spent hours trying to resolve one particular issue, when in fact it only took minutes, another of staff had more involvement in a particular matter...etc.etc

Some of these might be legitimate, but of course it is often impossible to tell. The people who are working well from home are conscientious and proactive, the ones that aren't are finding reasons, excuses that are nothing to do with them and that can't easily be discredited. Their conscientious colleagues would have found a work-around.

The people who are working well from home are conscientious and proactive, the ones that aren't are finding reasons, excuses that are nothing to do with them and that can't easily be discredited. Their conscientious colleagues would have found a work-around

Ridiculous assumption.

She’s obviously not management material. She is responsible for leadership of all departments. The ultimate responsibility lies with her. She has failed at her job.

@echt

The people who are working well from home are conscientious and proactive, the ones that aren't are finding reasons, excuses that are nothing to do with them and that can't easily be discredited. Their conscientious colleagues would have found a work-around

Ridiculous assumption.

Why?

If you find yourself sitting at home not doing your role because you haven't been given the direction, which is a point made by many in this thread.... surely, as a conscientious person, you call that out and say 'I'm concerned here - what can we do, as an organisation, to make sure we are all performing our jobs properly and doing our best for the children we are tasked with educating?'

But perhaps nobody is mean to say anything, or call anyone out? And perhaps that is the reason this Head is getting it in the neck? Because they didn't do a good enough cover-up job for the failures they saw happening.

...meant to say anything... not mean

@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.

What the fuck! First of all "the same as how", excellent! Secondly, Go ahead, say what it is would would like to say about people on benefits, or mothers who don't breastfeed. I'm sure everyone would love to hear your thoughts.

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

Textbook case of a lack of critical thinking skills.

I blame the teachers.

If the Head of my children's school went on the radio to criticise the teachers at their school i would think "Wtf why on earth don't you manage and deal with them professionally" instead of whingeing about them to the media to get your 5 minutes of fame in the Daily Mail. I wouldn't be impressed and would hope they'd stand down.

If you find yourself sitting at home not doing your role because you haven't been given the direction, which is a point made by many in this thread.... surely, as a conscientious person, you call that out and say 'I'm concerned here - what can we do, as an organisation, to make sure we are all performing our jobs properly and doing our best for the children we are tasked with educating?

But that's not what you said in the post I respond to. You said that those working well are proactive and those who aren't aren't, worse they make excuses: a false syllogism.

Surely she meant, they were 'sitting' at home doing nothing - not sat.

I hope she doesn't teach English.

Misses point of thread.

Have only read OP
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There I've spent more time typing that than I did working today

Ok have read it now. Did the head seriously want staff to sit in the school building doing admin while at a time when everyone who could work from home, was meant to work from home?
Teachers could only access childcare if actually working with the key workers' children, not to enable them to work from home more easily.
Sounds like someone who just wanted them under her eye to monitor them.

She's leaving. That's why she has behaved in such an unprofessional manner. There's no way she'd have opened her mouth if she wasn't. This incident also highlights her failings as a good manager; she doesn't get her own way so she goes moaning to the media. The staff at her school must be thrilled that she's leaving.

One day a week, two days a week, three days a week............. nothing would have been good enough for her until staff were in five days a week. Under the circumstances the staff had to put their foot down.

Teaching has nothing to do with this.

"But she ran into problems when she tried to ask people to come in for three days, and suggested that teachers could also use their time to prepare powerpoint presentations about their performance in the year so that they could have their annual appraisals."

So at the height of a pandemic, when most Heads and employers were trying to minimise the number of people in their school/place of work and encouraging as many staff as possible to wfh, she asked hers to come in for a third day to create PowerPoint presentations about their performance over the past academic year?

They were already coming in for two days - one day to provide childcare on a rota, one day to create homelearning materials.

I would bet anything that they would have happily gone in for a third day if it was to teach, provide childcare or do something that couldn't be done from home.

But she was asking staff to send their kids to childcare, maybe not even their usual school or childcare provision if that was closed, to produce a PowerPoint about their performance? I'm not surprised they said they'd rather do it from home tbh.

She handed her notice in in January and leaves in July. It sounds like a last vindictive slap to those who stood up to her. Of course her comments were unprofessional, showed lack of leadership on her part, brought her school into disrepute and would have allowed parents and the local community to identify the teachers in question.

She sounds awful, and I imagine there’s quite a lot more to this picture. Of course she should have dealt with her ‘lazy’ staff internally; why talk to the papers? But it fits the Mail’s anti-union narrative nicely, and gives some people an opportunity to leap to the ‘teachers are lazy’ generalisation yet again. Of course some are; that’s true of any profession. And many aren’t. And no single anecdote (‘She’s absolutely right. My husband is a teacher...’j proves anything.
I bet her staff loathe her, and for good reason.

Really don’t understand why they let schools/leadership off the hook during this by removing scrutiny of Ofsted etc.

Education is not an optional industry and provision has been uneven. All schools should be held to account for children’s education during pandemic.

Instead it just seems to be a great finger pointing excercise with no lessons learned and no sharing of best practice.

“She's like a whistleblower for education as a whole - I imagine she feels a larger duty to children and parents everywhere. The silence and refusal to point out the larger problems because you are expected to have the backs of your colleagues even when they are failing - that's a bigger problem to me.“

Same. It’s impossible to raise concerns about poor practice without losing your career.

Whistleblowing is not for the person who can resolve the issue. Whistleblowing is for her poor bloody staff who have clearly been working under an incompetent Head. As I’ve said many times, my (state) school runs brilliantly. Parents are very pleased. This is down to clear leadership which set out high expectations early on. We haven’t been expected to come into the building unless necessary because that’s the right call during a pandemic. She’s trusted us to do the right thing and we have. We are currently teaching a full curriculum in school to three year groups with great work being sent home for the others. If staff have genuinely downed tools there is something very, very wrong with that school. Teachers care about children. Trust me, all we bloody talk about is wanting the best for our class. For a teacher to actively refuse to teach / set work something has gone horribly wrong.

the problem is that there seems to be a number of workers who are using any unordinary situations to their advantage and take the piss.

They can do with confidence because they know that anyone pointing out they are taking the piss will the one to get disciplined.

Its very stressful for managers who are in charge of insuring that customers are still receiving the services they are expected to deliver when you know your staff is taking the piss and sometimes the stress will make you snap.

Unless this woman has a history of being a bully to her staff, it's likely to be what happened. Shame to these people!

The thing is, teachers also have kids you know. I WFH and finally have my kids back and in the beginning my OH reduced his hours so I could work, but this meant using holiday entitlement without actually having one. I have a 1 year old and 5 year old, so they really need attention and I have had to neglect them so much just to get my work done. For a period when OH reduced his hours, I really couldn't work to the best of my ability, and still can't now as my youngest is still home one of the days I work and has been teething/ill. I have felt at breaking point, especially since I had to educate my reluctant 5 year old too and could barely scrape an hour a day.

If a teacher is childless and doesn't have vulnerable family members, then fair enough, it is lazy, but if they have kids who aren't in school themselves I can see why resources have been a bit thin on the ground.

Through this whole pandemic, working parents have worked extremely hard and nobody, including employers, seems to acknowledge how hard it has been for them. Many others have just sat around complaining about them and how bored they are. They just have no idea.

YABU - some teachers may have done nothing. Some teachers have been working as much as before. DS school the teacher has been up late at night marking work, I get the notifications of their comments.
Teacher friends have been working creating resources so that all of their students are being pushed. One teaches secondary English and has been sending me things for DS that’s how much differentiation they have been doing, DS is no where near Secondary age and they teach only GCSE years.
I’m sure the same is true of all professions some people are working and others are skivving. My DS hasn’t been failed by this, his school have tried desperately to ensure there is work and that all children are seen and speak to a teacher to do welfare checks. There are some children in his school who have failed to do any work in this time, I know who I think has failed them and it’s not the school.

The job of the head is to lay down the expectations - we do this, this and this. I’m not saying it all falls onto the HT but they need to lead.

We have been told not to mark work therefore I don’t. If we were told to mark work, I would.

If the HT wants the staff at her school to do certain things she needs to direct them. It’s pointless pretending otherwise. If she is meeting mass resistance then TBH that’s unusual and suggests the demands are not reasonable.

And I’m saying that as someone who does think some schools have been crap.

@Blingllama

*“She's like a whistleblower for education as a whole - I imagine she feels a larger duty to children and parents everywhere. The silence and refusal to point out the larger problems because you are expected to have the backs of your colleagues even when they are failing - that's a bigger problem to me.“*

Same. It’s impossible to raise concerns about poor practice without losing your career.

Actually there is. However, going on radio to blast your staff is absolutely bullying. She should be suspended and it should be investigated. As a head teacher she can raise poor practice in the normal way. It’s surprisingly easy to get rid of a teacher as observations are subjective so what one person might think is a great lesson can be observed as a inadequate lesson by another.