To resign over a wedding?

[dancingrainbows]

It seems a bit crazy, but I work as a teacher.

A close relative has decided to get married on a Monday and I work Mondays. My school does not allow time off (even unpaid) for events like this at all, it just isn’t permitted.

My options are

1. Lie - my worry with this is that if I am ‘caught’ the repercussions are serious.
2. Resign. If I handed my notice in now I could leave at Christmas.

i don’t actually think I’d have a problem getting a new teaching job but I am currently part time and don’t want to lose this - it’s rare PT posts are advertised - and also getting settled in again somewhere is a pain. It’s a WWYD really. By the way I know not all schools are as inflexible as my current one but it really is.

OP, if it's about attending a family occasion, surely there will be plenty more of those - Christmases, birthdays etc - that take place on a weekend? I don't think it's reasonable to prioritise your attendance at a weekday wedding over the running of the school. Presumably it would cause them problems and / or expense to have to cover your absence. And where does it end? If they gave time off to you for a wedding that is not your own, will the floodgates open?

People lose their mind on wedding threads on MN, always assuming that no one could possibly want to go to a wedding and that the bride and groom are selfish inconsiderate narcs rather than maybe other close relatives have commitments that mean a weekend wedding is impossible.

OP you sound like you’d really like to go to the wedding and really dislike where you work so I’d absolutely leave the job over it.

i’d frame the position as something your manager Shiism be attempting to resolve “this wedding is very important to me, is there an option aside from resignation”

If they got married on a Tuesday then all their family could be there. I'm assuming they've book the full week off themselves, so a day later isn't going to affect anyone really, and it will ensure you can attend without having to quit your job.

Unless you want to quit your job?

The inflexibility of your school is one of the reasons why there is a teacher retention crisis. There has to be some consideration that teachers will simply need time off during school year that are out of their control. Personally, I'm at the stage in my career were I would not work in a school where there was no flexibility in this regard.

If I was in a school like this I would just tell no one and call in sick on that day and the day after. Wouldn't feel guilty at all. Even if they found out, highly doubt they would fire you over it, due to aforementioned teacher retention problem. Would easily get another job as good teachers are getting scarcer.

It's not that black and white these days. Due to teacher shortages/retention rates schools are more flexible about things like this these days wherever possible. It can be difficult when multiple staff want to attend something at the same time (like carol concerts and sports days) but close family weddings would certainly be permitted as unpaid leave in a lot of schools.

We do expect an awful lot of our teachers don't we. I'm sure the world wouldn't crumble if each teacher was allowed one or two days a year off for family issues etc.
DH taught all his life and we lost count of how many funerals (and a couple of wednesday weddings) he missed.
That aside, I think you'd be mad to resign over it.

Don’t lie - you won’t enjoy the day worrying about being caught out.

Talk to the leadership and ask to find a solution such as swapping days ect. There must be a way to resolve it.

I'd ask for the time off now, paid or unpaid-preferably paid. I'd make it clear to the HT I will be going to this family wedding regardless.
I'd make a massive fuss over it actually and get the Union involved, digging my heels in.
Don't lie because someone will find out.

I certainly wouldn't be paying for my own supply like another poster.

Oh there are numerous ways @Blueblell but they won’t, I would bet my house on that.

I do need to have a think. If it wasn’t for the fact it’s PT I would just resign. As it is it isn’t the end of the world if I am a SAHM for a bit but long term that may not be best. We shall see. I do have until the end of October (ha!) to make a decision one way or the other.

Have a look what's available in your area. Do you have a teachincounty website?

There might be schools advertising for part time positions to complement other part time staff they already have. Just have a look to see what the situation is "out there" realistically.

Teachers are leaving in their masses, mental health in the profession is at an all time low. There are not enough teachers. Maybe it's time schools found a way of giving teachers time to be a family member - e.g. attending their own child's sports day, attending a funeral/ wedding of a family member. So many teachers go above and beyond, so many teachers have taken my children on overnight trips over the years- very much doubt they get all that time back. Schools can't have it both ways.

OP, you don't have to justify your reasons to anyone here! If you want to resign and go to the wedding, and can afford to do so, just do it. If recruitment is really so difficult at the moment, you should be able to find another job easily!

My school, you wouldn’t get paid leave for it. Even a senior leader had to take unpaid leave for his own wedding.(enormously swish venue, difference between term time day and weekend or holiday was in the thousands)

Would they be just as inflexible with this much notice? There is ages to get something else sorted out.

Do you think, you actually want to resign and this has prompted these feelings to the forefront again.

A supportive, flexible and understanding manager, I believe is vital in any employment and usually comes with a brilliant team.

Maybe now is the time to find that supportive,flexilbe and understanding workplace. They do exist. Good luck and enjoy the wedding.

There is a third option speak to your employer or your teaching union. People are human, not robots, life gets in the way and occasionally, not often, sometimes life events require us to show up and attend. I don't mean to be rude but you are a teacher not a brain surgeon. For me it wouldn't be a resigning issue, however, I wouldn't want to work for an employer who was that inflexible and lacking in humanity.
Please don't do as suggested and call in sick that is just inexcusable from my perspective and I can guarantee photos will get posted on Facebook, which someone you work with will see, and you will get caught out.

This. You've got more power than you know.

You could be honest with the head and say you want this day off to celebrate, it is your hill to die on and you would consider leaving your job in order to go to this wedding, but you know they're finding it hard to recruit right now, and you do actually like the job and the hours. Is there a compromise to be made?

If you want to keep a local, part time job that suits you, I’d just pull a sickie and make sure nobody tags you in photos on social media.

If teaching isn’t working fir your life (which it sounds like it isn’t), look for another job and pull the sickie anyway.

I certainly wouldn’t quit over this.and I agree with pp that it’s weird your relatives are getting married on a Monday and assuming you’ll be there. I work in a sector where I can’t take time off easily and I’m only going to the evening do of a family wedding next month, as I just wouldn’t be able to take that day off and didn’t even bother asking.

@dancingrainbows ask school first. Then, depending on response, if you want to leave anyway start looking seriously and make plans to go ‘because you want to not just because of the wedding’ - if the wedding is just the last straw it’s fine to plan to resign.

Are you taking your kids out of school for it?

Seems ridiculous to have a Monday wedding to me, puts everyone out.

This - worse case sounds like you can afford to be SAHM but with some looking and planning there may be better options for you if you do decide to go.

OP says her kids aren't school age yet - wonder if that another factor for her though inflexibility with her own kids as they start school.

I’m baffled by the posts saying that teachers should have a small bank of days to take off during term time for weddings, concert tickets or to book their flights early. On top of the 13 weeks school holidays available to them!

It’s been about 6 years since I chaired the finance committee in a couple of local schools but I doubt the situation has improved much since then. If a school has a teaching staff of say 8 qualified teachers and it costs the school say £300 per day to get a supply teacher in, that’s £5k a year they need to find to fund the 2 days off each teacher can have.

That needs to come from their income budget not their capital budget. So they can’t choose not to resurface the playground or replace class furniture or IT equipment to give the teachers this time off as these are all capital spends. It has to come from the classroom budget or headcount.

So what some of you are saying is that the children should not have an opportunity to go swimming beyond the statutory minimum required/have music lessons/the school admin will have her hours reduced/there will be even fewer stationery resources on the classroom. It’s not an option to leave a class unsupervised for a day and I doubt as parents you’d be happy if your child’s learning was being interrupted because classes were being routinely split up and distributed around the school because their teacher was taking extra holiday.

Whilst teachers do of course do prep during some of the 13 weeks non timetables time they get each year, they do still get significantly more annual leave than most working people already.

I would request it and state clearly that you will be forced to resign if it's not granted if you are serious you would do this.

Then apply for your own job when re advertised starting in the day after the wedding 😂