To feel awful for my sister, i don’t know how to help her?

[DurableMatts]

My sister is a primary school teacher. She has been Job sharing her post for the last 3 years (2days 1 week and 3days the next) she is now ready to go back full time from sept as her dd will be in school. ( and will be attending the school she teaches in) she is so nervous to notify her school because the woman who has been doing the job share with has had a really tough time lately and has had to leave her dh. Now I know this woman probably will be able to find another job but it will be a drive away and you guesses it (she doesn’t drive) she lives a short walk from the school. She knows this other woman is very emotional and has herself all worked up over how she will react to the news. When she renewed the job share last year the other teacher made a flippant comment about how after all this time she considered the job share a given. She is sick at the thought of it all kicking off this week and I’m so worried about her.
We are in Ireland and this is how the system works here, a job share usually is a post shared by someone who owns the full time post as such.

I haven't rtft but we are in NI and a friend who is a teacher reduced her hours until her DS went to primary school - she was only allowed to do the reduced hours on a temporary basis for up to 5 years before either returning to full time hours or making the reduced hour arrangement permanent (whereby they would have recruited someone permanent to fill the remaining hours). It sounds like a similar arrangement. The teacher who covered the reduced hours temporarily will (should) know that it was always a temporary arrangement.

She thought last year she would have another baby and stay part time but her husband’s illness has changed her plans. Do keep up x

It is the Headteacher's job to tell the job share that it finishes at the end of the contract. I'm sure there will be ample supply work in the area and most schools are reachable by public transport or in my own case by bike. I did supply teaching in primary school for many years and it has many advantages over the class teaching. It can be very challenging but the way to do it is to go with projects to cover the class for the day [open ended] in case there has been nothing left for the class to do. I feel sorry for your sister because one builds a very close relationship with the job-share partner, so that the change overs run like clockwork and in fact the children benefitted greatly. You can't help other than to let her talk about it, and off load how she is feeling about it. She could think about writing to her job share explaining the circumstances and how grateful she has been for the support and companionship they have shared over the time they have worked together. I hope it resolves itself amicably or else the children are in for a very unhappy time.