Beyond fucking angry about our primary school

[Whattheactualhell123]

This article has just
appeared in our local paper about my kids primary school - I'm so upset for the kids and the remaining staff sticking it out.

https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/local-news/former-teachers-slam-toxic-culture-27669063

Rumours have been circulating and heated debates launched on the school whattsapp from time to time about the new head.

In all honesty what power do we really have to make any changes for a better learning environment for our children and the teachers?

. Is it ever really possible for a head to be removed from their post because they have behaved so badly towards their staff?

What would you personally do if this was your kids school?

If you are a teacher or support staff (apparently the PA had an awful time too!) who has left this school due to this person I am so sorry that you have been so utterly failed in your profession. ❤️

Sadly, this kind of behaviour is endemic across many professions. I'm a nurse and previously worked in a lovely ward, our senior charge nurse was fantastic, great morale between staff and we were genuinely like one big happy work family! Unfortunately our SCN retired and a new one was appointed. She was a huge bully, spoke to staff like something stuck to the bottom of her shoe. So many knowledgeable, experienced staff left which ultimately had an impact on patient care.

I would think that if the parent body kicked up enough of a stink, then coupled with this already negative media attention, the headteacher (or whoever exactly the person in question is) could be removed or at least put on a warning. I'm not sure of the exact procedure you should follow as I'm in Scotland and I'm aware that English schools have different school structures ie governers etc, but there has been some really good advice on this thread already.

Such a shame as ultimately, it's the children who are affected by this.

A warning to parents. Ignore the ofsted reports and look at staff turnover for schools when chosing. I've chosen my dds school for next year based on staff turnover and length of time the head and other staff have been there. A spread of ages in the staff has also played a part in my choice. Its a good school, others in the catchment are outstanding but the staff turnover is much higher. The local oversubscribed outstanding school had a new head 2 years ago and is staffed almost entirely buy very young staff, the SLT are all late 20s or early 30s apart from the head, there are no teachers over 35 there.

@worriedmummyself you should change the logo - you shouldn't use the school's official one.

So if you get a ton of anonymous signatures, what then? You need names not anonymity and most people won't do that, especially if their children are at the school.

I had something like this once. Worked in a happy primary school, great staff morale, very low turnover as everyone was happy. Most staff were women in their 30s and 40s so plenty of experience.

Head retired. New (male) head in his first headship, had been deputy in an inner-city school with high turnover. He was the worst human being I've ever met. Immediately started trying to bully people out. Didn't like working with experienced teachers who might (politely) question reasons for changes.

His sort of changes included cancelling all post-SATs treats for Year 6 like leavers' trips, end of year shows, etc "because they should be on timetable doing the regular curriculum every day till the end of year 6." He complained that the staff at his previous school had never moaned about working till 7pm so we were obviously all lazy. He liked to catch people alone in their classrooms after school so he could harangue them about what crap teachers they were and reduce them to tears. Every day there was someone sobbing in the staffroom. He was horrifically misogynistic and spoke to women with contempt. Suddenly people who had only ever had Good or Outstanding judgements on their teaching were being told all their lessons were inadequate. He wanted to get rid of expensive older teachers and replace them with cheaper NQTs/ECTs.

Within 18 months of his arrival the entire staff (bar one) had left and he was running the school with only (mostly male) NQTs and supply teachers (word had got round the area, no one wanted to work there). I left, obviously. Parents were appalled at the mass resignations of staff.

I am happy to say I now live hundreds of miles from him and hopefully will never see him again. I've worked in three schools since then and all have had much better morale and management. After we all left, his school was academised and the trust who took it over brought in a female executive principal who overruled all his decisions. Hope he hated it!

I became a school governor after a change of head. The previous head had been fantastic and it was a lovely, nurturing school.

The new one was a nightmare - very inexperienced, micromanaging and she appeared to have modelled herself on Dolores Umbrage. At the end of her first year she had retained just one member of staff, the least experienced one. She had been fast tracked into becoming a head and it was a terrible mistake. She slowly - and with a lot of resistance from the governors - changed so many of the very great things about the school. I resigned from being a governor after a teacher had been appointed to teach year six who was totally unsuited to the role. She turned out to be as bad as everyone predicted. It was a miserable final year for so many of the students.

The school went from very good to special measures. It was shocking how quickly things changed and I was horrified at the spitefulness of an immature and out of her depth leader. She should have been fired at the end of the first year but by then it was too late really as so many staff were leaving.

My dgs began secondary this term. He was on his third day when the head got arrested and charged with sexual abuse.
The same head had been accused of bullying 3 years ago and still kept his job.

It’s awful to think teachers will be upset and anxious when they should be able to enjoy their work and inspire and encourage the pupils in their charge.

They don't have to be. But they are public documents and must be made available to anyone who asks to see them (excluding confidential minutes, which should be a separate document).

My goodness, my sister went to that school, decades ago though. So weird to see it suddenly like that.

Sounds to me like long term, entrenched members of staff couldn't adapt to the New Broom tbh.

I left teaching the term our new head started, nothing to do with her it was already planned. Very quickly what was a successful, happy, family orientated school became a very unhappy place ro work, with very low staff morale. Colleagues were told they were luars, she played each off the others, and 3 amazing staff left due to bullying, 1 completely left teaching.

The head quickly moved onto another another , larger primary where exactly the same issues emerged. Staff refused to go in to ANY meeting with her in a 1:1 situation because of the bullying and lies spouted.
Eventually staff (not just teaching staff), unions were involved and they did a vote of no confidence in the head and basically she left before she was kicked out. She willnever teach again. Head of governors also left because he said the school had lost faith . and he didn't want it to affect the school. I don't know the ins and outs of what the governors knew etc.

My friends who had left school 1. all had a celebratory drink that night. Its wrong that 1 personcan affect so many.

This could be the case of old entrenched teaching not being happy with new leadership, or it could be new leadership wants certain teachers out, but coming up to 30 yrs since I qualified I have NEVER guard of numbers like that leaving a school which would seem to me that the new regime /leadership could be the problem.

Modern Britain - where bullies thrive. This situation is repeated up and down the country in workplaces.

The advice from professionals if your boss is a bully/narc etc = leave workplace yourself to get away. That’s what those teachers did. Who can blame them?

Bullying is rife in schools, staff are worst than the children sometimes.

I second what others have said. This is so common in schools. My last school had a really horrible head and almost all the staff left. It was an utterly toxic place to work.

Omg I worked at a Cambridgeshire school that sounds very like this one! Horrible

This is very common unfortunately. It is normal for a few staff to leave when there is a new management team. However, it is a bad sign if many staff leave. A good leader should be able to take the staff with them. They should be able to recognise and value existing strengths as well as develop any weaknesses.

I worked in a secondary as support staff in a professional pastoral role. Never. Again. I’ve never met so many mean girl bullies in one work place. Many of whom had only ever been educated in a school to then work in a school. I have honestly never seen anything like it. Interestingly my old school can’t even get cover teachers in such is it’s reputation.

Impossible to tell without knowing the full situation but I was getting 'sour grapes' undertones from the teachers statements in the article. Combined then with what the Council said about Ofsted and I suspect it's more likely that the new head was brought in purposefully to improve the teachers who were coasting and failing already.

Just going to ask again for those that seemingly support the head

A couple of questions to those that think that the teachers that left are just upset at being found out to be coasting/crap/bullies.

Do you really honestly believe that they have all been put on improvement/support plans?

Do you really believe that they are all crap teachers and they don't want to work?

Do you really believe that the head has done everything in their power to support these teachers as they are required to do in the school's policies?

Remember that this is 30 members of staff.

What I read here is a school that has been badly led for a number of years. Staff have not liked it but have become very resistant to change because change means challenge. It sounds like there is a very negative culture amongst all staff. Changing a negative culture in a school is the hardest thing to do. Turning around a school with a positive culture that needs system change is much easier than turning around a school where the culture is so negative.Anyone coming in to change this will upset the negative staff. It is natural that there will be a significant turnover of staff during this time. When someone says 'I used to love my job....' what they often mean us 'I came in, did what I liked, how I liked and no one checked up on me. Now they do I don't like it.'

I work with new Heads in challenging circumstances. They all face resistance from staff when they take over schools- often the leadership team has embittered people who applied for the job and were not appointed and do not support the Head. Or they have new and less experienced people on the SLT and staff resent that and the people are still learning how to manage challenging staff. If the staff have been very anti the previous Head and his/her systems, the middle leaders have probably also done a weak job and are now being asked to step up and work differently and don't like that. New systems never bed down easily- some staff, often stuck in a rut, unwilling to do anything differently staff will resist them. It will be a tough couple of years. Teachers are quick to complain in these circumstances and what will happen is:

Some will get onboard quickly recognising what is needed.
Some will take a while but see the sense and buy into it.
Some will be unhappy and leave. The Head will appoint new staff who will support his/her ways.
Some will be remain and be very resistant but will have to make a decision- either get on board or leave

A strong Head will win over staff. They do have to make tough decisions. The ones who refuse to be won over and continue to be difficult and shit-stir will end up leaving one way or another.

What you are omitting to mention, though, is the scale of departures. I would be very surprised if the issue is not bullying management.

But I read the article as to say that there had been a bullying culture there already which might mean an entrenched group of employees running the show and then throwing their toys out the pram when they got called out by the new head? Maybe the old staff were the problem?

This.

Ive been in a similar school. New headteacher started in September - school was ofsted good. Within weeks - I as deputy head was shouted at and called a bitch in front of pupils. By November he had 13 formal complaints against him and had reduced 15 staff at least to tears. He was ‘left for personal reasons’ ie paid until December and ‘asked to leave’. Three years later he pops up as a headteacher for a school 100 miles away…..

why aren’t parents speaking up - if you pull out a 100 children and demand some answers - yes I can see the headteacher will be asked to go - but who will you get as a replacement.

You need to demand a parental consultation meeting with the governors / academy trust to air your concerns

bullying happens in outstanding schools, and failing schools.

don’t listen to press briefings listen to the staff and your child

is it a happy place to work ?

Could be

could be head of governors

?

bullying culture is not good for anyone

Just before my DC started at primary school, a new head teacher started and many, many teachers left en masse. New head teacher employed lots of her colleagues from her old school. I have been very unsettled by this toxic behaviour and have been wondering if I should move my child, so it's interesting to see this post and all the replies saying how common it is.

I wouldn’t be surprised if some of these ridiculous comments are coming from these type of bullying leaders. On what planet is it likely that 30 teachers all weren’t up to their job and left because the new head teacher wanted them to work harder? 🙄
I’ve been teaching for many years and the vast majority of teachers I have worked with are amazing and extremely hard working. I can probably count on one hand the number of ‘lazy coasting’ teachers I have worked with. It’s a constantly scrutinised profession with far more expected than most other careers paying a similarly poor wage.
Unfortunately OP, as others have said, this bullying culture is very common in schools at the moment and you are right to be concerned. If they have all been replaced by young teachers then this will be another red flag.