Friend and Continued Work Absence

[GentleWord]

I have a friend who has some mental and physical health diagnoses. She qualified as a teacher more than ten years ago. She has worked in different settings - state schools, private schools, and preschools.

Since then, she has had a few jobs as a teacher, but on average, she has up to half the time she is employed off sick. This does become an issue, and mostly she has to move on.

Never quietly. It usually goes through legal channels and I know the company have settled at least twice.

Before, I didn't think much about this, but now I have reason to think about schooling, I don't think it is fair that she keeps taking jobs that she cannot do. I'm actually unsure how she manages to get a new job with her history but apparently schools have only very recently been demanding of the last reference and now you can give "bad" references.

I don't think it is fair on the children to have a teacher who is so unreliable. I don't think it is fair on the staff. I think after a decade, it should be clear to her and her family that she cannot be a teacher. However, I think they cling to her profession as a status thing.

The same pattern is occurring again where shw is started to have repeated and medium term absences from a job she started last year. I think this time I should be a bit more honest with her about her career and the other people affected by how she engages with her job.

Unreasonable - dont say anything and just support her

Reasonable - find the words to say that teaching isn't an appropriate career choice.

You are right OP. Someone who has a realistic expectation of being unable to complete less than a year in work without needing significant time off has no business placing themselves into children’s lives in such a prominent way.

Of course teachers have the same right to be ill and need time of work as anyone else and it is up to their employer, not them, to minimise disruption, but to be a good EY teacher you have to care about what you’re doing, because the bare minimum just isn’t enough. If she doesn’t care about children receiving a consistent reception education. then she can’t be a good teacher.

All the people sticking up for this woman would probably feel differently if it was their own 4 year old being taught by a random mixture of cover/supply staff and TAs for weeks at a time.

I didn't say they had no money, ever, to pay for cover. They have to find the money from somewhere, until they can't I suppose. The school she works at is finding this money to cover her absences. That doesn't mean it is an endless pot of money. Usual short term sickness or a longer term leave in unusual circumstances is definitely something that should be covered. Long term going off sick, not coping with the job, coming back and then going off with the same thing again and again in different schools (so not just one bad one or one where she wasn't a good 'fit') is a problem.

But surely in that case they just hire a replacement. The school isn’t paying for her and a cover teacher if she’s left and gone to another school, so they’re no worse off.

I think part of this is them accepting that their daughter is quite severely disabled by her mental health problems. The issue is that they'd have to reflect on their (ongoing) part in why she has those issues.

Because the doctors don't class her that way. There was a whole thing about her vaccine classification over covid.

But isn't this what has been happening and then she's sued the schools? Of course after she's gone she's not on the payroll, but she's on another school's payroll and the situation is repeated.

So she’s struggling to cope with MH issues caused by her parents by desperately trying to stay in a job she can’t cope with because they forced her into a professional degree?
That doesn’t make it any better, OP.

Nobody forced her into a degree. She went to uni because that's what most people do after they complete their private education. She wanted to have a career in teaching. She feels entitled to be a teacher, even if she isnt very good at it because she cannot consistently attend.

Oh and she's in her 30s.

And in that time, the children cope with the disruption. How is it fair on them?

It sounds like she needs to medically retire tbh but she's doing what's best for her, like everyone else - because relying on benefits doesn't make for any good quality of life it's so little.

This has never been true in the 19 years I’ve worked in the education sector

@GentleWord you sound resentful of your friend. Why did you put IBS in quotation marks? Do you think she is malingering? If she had a chronic condition like rheumatoid arthritis or MS and had to be off work frequently would you also see this in the same light? Or is it because her issue is mental health that you are so concerned about her ethics?

FWIW the T&C in most teaching posts have declined as academies can opt out of Red Book conditions. My current teaching job offers almost no paid sick leave at all (at least for me; maybe the HR or management positions get a better deal) and holidays have to be booked (during school holidays, of course). So I doubt your friend is coining it while on sick leave.

Oh, and if you use your sick leave up by July it doesn’t just reset in September. You have to do time in work with no absence before it will reset.

I think you are getting a rough ride here OP and don’t really understand why. Yes, everyone is entitled to feel ill or struggle with their health and feel supported. The key here is that it’s a repeated pattern and your friend sues her employers when they have finally had enough! It’s a pattern that doesn’t put her in a good light at all. And for everyone saying “oh there are toxic workplaces and that probably is making her ill”, when it’s more than one or two in someone’s career then it’s usually the person that is the common denominator and the problem.

She needs to grow up and stop blaming other people for her own decisions!!! And get a different job that doesn’t affect children’s futures!!

Ohhhhh won’t someone think of the chillllllllldren!

Absolute nonsense.

Why do you think you're so flippant about children having a decent education with a consistent educator? How far does this callous attitude towards children's human rights extend?

You seem confused about what a friend is.

No I think I am just over enabling someone in harming the education of many children. I get that some people think that friends are people who support you no matter what you do wrong but once we grow out of our immature toxicity, we know otherwise.

Oh, for goodness’ sake. Dramatic much?
Your question should be directed at the school, if you have an issue with that, and it should be “why are you not providing suitable cover for someone off sick so that their education is not interrupted?”
That’s on the school, not on your friend. If anyone is “failing the children”, it’s the school.

How are you over enabling her?

As others have said, it's the responsibility of the school to ensure the children get adequate education.

They cant provide consistent cover when the absence is so unpredictable. The people that suffer are the children.

Yes and she purposely makes it hard for them to do so by concealing the extent of her incompetence so they hire her at their own detriment and at the harm of the kids.

She is not incompetent, she is unwell.
If she was incompetent she wouldn’t be given the jobs in the first place.
God, you’re awful. Absolutely bloody awful.

That’s what agencies are for. If they are choosing not to use them or provide suitable cover, it’s on them. Not her. Why are you making excuses for the school when clearly their cover processes are what are “incompetent” here?
And I thought you said her absences were lengthy, in which case the school have plenty of time to source replacements. Make your mind up.

She's incompetent now? Do you sit in the classroom with her as she teaches to assess her competency?

You haven't said how you're over enabling her.

I think there are jobs where this kind of behaviour ie looking after number one and not evaluating what you can cope with, repeated indefinitely, is maybe more justifiable. But when the job is something like teaching where the people losing out don't have a choice as to whether or not they are there and actually the repercussions of them having a sub standard experience are possibly long term then it is really very selfish. Employers are not always the ones at fault. What makes you think they aren't trying to find good cover? Yes presumably she was given the jobs because the schools thought she was/would be a good teacher. But a teacher who isn't there isn't teaching anything, and how good she is at the job becomes irrelevant.