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.

Yes someone who cannot consistently turn up to work to teach is incompetent.

She gets the jobs because she is qualified. When they find out she is incompetent, they want rid of her.

No they're not, they're unwell. A completely separate issue.

You STILL haven't said how you're over enabling her?

Agencies do not provide consistent cover. They provide cover. Could be different person every day. If you are frequently absent at short notice, they will be very pushed to find the same person to cover your class at short notice. The people who suffer are the children. She's at home on PIP, whatever wages she manages to keep, extensive savings and an education provided by teachers who showed up to teach.

Enabling her is supporting her in applying for more teaching jobs and not being honest about how unethical it is to mess around with people's education because she thinks she has the right to be a teacher despite her mental health issues that stops her being present.

If we are giving this woman the benefit of the doubt here, then we know full well that you cannot plan for poor mental health episodes. She is presumably hoping that she will not fall so ill that she can't work.

People's mental health can improve dramatically; many people make full and permanent recoveries and work is often a key factor.

So she either keeps trying, or gives up her life's work and writes herself off, which I expect would have a devastating effect on her mental health.

I refuse to believe that she has been let go as often as she says she has for the same reasons, and not a single employer has picked this up through referencing before hiring her. Any employer that's on them.

Well, she does have the right to be a teacher if she wants to, is qualified and schools hire her.

We absolutely should be supporting people with health conditions into work, not writing them off and sticking them on a till in a supermarket.

But given that you clearly don't feel that way, stop 'over enabling' your friend and tell her that she's incompetent, has no right to be a teacher, takes time off when things get difficult and is blagging her IBS.

Oh she's either trolling or an absolutely horrible friend/person, 100%.

Of course not.

I don't think not approving of someone's choices automatically makes you a bad friend. This is an anonymous forum after all and she's just venting some frustration. My relative who is like this is very hard to talk to with regard to her working life because she does absolutely think she has a right to being a teacher, the pay packet and other not so immediate benefits of being a teacher because she trained as one, but the reality is it's the idea of the job she's in love with and not the reality. She has got round the reference situation at least twice by going to work for an agency after leaving a permanent job. They asked for her former employers as references but sent her out on cover within a couple of days of her registering both times, presumably before the references came back. By this time the agency doesn't care any more what the old boss has to say if the school they are supplying is happy with her, and the schools she worked in as supply were happy with her short term stints, and she went back to some a few times. I'd imagine this is where the ok reference for the next permanent position came from. But in a permanent position the same thing happens as in the OP. She is, apart from this, a very nice person though.

You think you've grown out of toxicity?

Yes hence why I can see past my friend's wishes to the needs and rights of children I don't even know. I don't just blindly support my friend in exploiting people.

Support isnt giving people a job that they cannot do so that they can harm the education of others. Your mental health issues dont give you the right to negatively impact other people. Especially children trying to get an education.

If caring about the education of children makes me a horrible person, so be it. There should be more horrible people like me.

Yes. If it means you cannot show up consistently where continuity and consistency are vital, you have no place in that job. It doesn't matter why.

It makes sense that when her lawyer dad took most of the places to court after they dismissed her or she felt she had to leave before she gets sacked, they negotiated that they'd not put any of it on the references. I've always wondered why they re-employ her and figured that they simply cannot be giving her any reference at all. Now I see they just gave her one with dates of employment.

You're looking at her references now?

You seem awfully intent on centering yourself in the middle of your friend's life. Please leave her alone, she'll be better off with someone who actually has her back.

No, i assumed that schools require some sort of references and as I know that her last jobs ended very badly, I know those references couldn't have been good.

Someone or some people in this thread suggested that when you take a former employee to court, you can arrange for them not to reveal details about your employment other than the dates you were employed. This makes sense to how she is managing to get new jobs, even after the safer recruitment shake up this September.

They are restricting the former employer's ability to give factual references so the new employer has no idea of her true history

If I were to ever even not reply to a text within a timely fashion, she would have a major meltdown. The last thing she wants me to do is to leave her alone. She has EUPD and I am one of her favourite people.

I thought you said she left every time, not that they got rid of her. You’re tripping all over your story now.
This entire thread is just a not very well disguised bash at people with chronic illnesses. This friend does not exist.

Ahhhh, there it is. The “she’s on PIP” bingo ball.

How do you know so much about the practice of teacher agencies when you work in a
completely different profession? Music production or something, wasn’t it?

What a bizarre thread.

The OP comes across as obsessed with her ''friend'' in way that is completely unhealthy.

Or she has made the whole thing up...

And what happens when talking therapies (IE IAPT IE CBT IE the only thing NHS offer) tell you you are "too complex" for their services?

Bur not complex enough for the community mental health team to take you on?

Yes private is an option, the cheapest I have found is £60 a week....which on the surface sounds cheap but when you're disabled and can only work part time £60 is more than a 3rd of my weekly wage. And that isn't left over after my rent and essential bills. As in I literally CANNOT AFFORD IT.

I agree, it sounds like she’d be better suited to supply teaching where she can work when able to