Fellow teachers- AIBU re. Capability Procedures?

[Flouya]

Hi,
As an NQT, after about one term, I was threatened with Capability and jumped before pushed. I have a theory about what really happened, but would you care to give me your wise insights? I will provide some details that may (or may not) be relevant.

So, (not recent)
NQT, started before Christmas.
3 teachers in the year group- an experienced teacher, another NQT and me.

I had a Maternity contract, ran until end of Summer term.

Dont remember exat dates but in roughly this order these evemts took place:

I was given bottom set English- when I started.
I am also given bottom set Maths.by I think Feb aftwr half term.

Around this time maybe, im told by my mentor/deputy that they will support me with planning. Im happy with this, as I take criicism well and was happy to have some 'support'. Some efforts were indeed made to 'support' me.

Later in the term, Head says that there is good news and that the maternity lady who I was covering for until end of July, is able to come to my class straight after May half term, 5 days a week so that she can supoirt me in class, with planning, lear ing everything. I was soo grateful. What an expensive resource to be using on supporting me. And they have already done things to suooirt me, so this is just amazing!

Maybe a few days or a week later, (so about 2 weeks before May half-term) I am called into the Heads office. I was told that despite me being on a
'Support Plan' I have not made enough progress. Im confused cos ibthought Maternity lady was going to be lart of that supoort, but ok. This is when i realised i wasnt just being supported but was on a
'Support Plan'. I had never heard of this before. And still didnt understand the significance of it.

As a result, I was told, that the following week, on Monday, (the laat week of befire breaking up) we will have a Capability meeting and I can bring a Union Representative if I want and they will be discussing what other steps they can put in place or something, cant remember exactly. No idea what it all meant. So stressed! What's going on? They pull out a whole list of things ive not done well e.g. ' On x say in x lesson, during a learning walk, we noticed that...'

Spoke to a teacher friend in the evening. She said they want to get rid of you and you need to get out before they put 'Capability' on your record. She said do whatever it takes, even if it is going off sick until your contract ends, but do not allow them to put you on Capability!

I cant do that- go on sick. Doesn't sit right with me. Next day im discussing with another colleague- 'im not sure what my options are, is it better if I leave' etc, etc. In confidence, so I thought.

Pretty soon, Deputy comes to my room. And says we heard you are thinking of leaving. If YOU want to leave we will 100% support that. I say 'Oh, ok but what about serving my notice, how long would I need to do that? (as i only had 2 months to go) she said 'You dont need to serve your notice' 'ok, I replied, so when do you want me to leave?' ' You will be leaving end of next week' she replied. Meaning the last day of term.

Im then called into the Heads office pronto, so she can clarify that THEY are not telling me to leave next week, but if I CHOOSE to leave next week THEY will fully support that and that they can, as a gesture of good will cancel the Capability meeting on Monday. But if I choose to stay, then the Capability meeting will go ahead on Monday, and they just wont be able to change it. It is out of their hands! And that they wont pay my notice because I am CHOOSING to leave next week.

I speak to my Union. Hand in my notice. Not allowed to tell the students. They were informed on Friday via a letter. I was too sressed and compliant to go against that.

So if you have got this far- thank you. Do you see anything obvious about why this all happened or is it just what they told me?

Oh, also, they had an Ofsted the following term which had a poaitive outcome.

YAbu- They gave you support, you just werent good enough. They had no choice.

Yanbu- There were hidden reasons beyond what they told you.

Surely it's as simple as they were trying to get rid because the m maternity teacher was coming back?

You were absolutely stitched up like a kipper. I'm so sorry. There are brilliant schools out there and there are absolutely shitty schools out there. You got a shitty school.

You say you were an NQT, if this is the case, it sounds like this happened quite a while ago as it's been ECT for 4+ years now. I would advise that you contact your union and also seek legal advice. Unfortunately, I don't think much will come of this; if you were still in the school your union would have fought very hard for you (your NQT provider would have too) but essentially on paper, it looks like you resigned willingly. You could go down the route of constructive dismissal however - it certainly sounds like you weren't fully aware of what was happening to you.

As a general rule of thumb, if the word 'support' is ever used, be wary. It is rarely support for you and it's code for "we tried everything we could before we threw the book at them" (without necessarily giving you much support). Bad schools/heads, throw support plans around like sweets. I've rarely known a support plan have a positive outcome for a teacher. Secondly, teaching is a minefield of political backstabbing. These are your colleagues, not your friends and most will sell their own granny for a chance to be 'in' with the head. Be very careful of who you talk to in confidence, it is rarely confidential.

If you still want to teach, find a lovely school. It's honestly mind blowing how different the job can feel when you find the school that's right for you.

Support plans are being notoriously misused in teaching, there’s a lot on social media about it. I’ve seen it happen time and time again. Not once have I seen one administered fairly but the odds are stacked in the favour of the employer and it’s a brave person who holds them to account.
Don’t torture yourself trying to work out what you did wrong. Look up all the other people who have been through it - some with decades of successful teaching behind them. It really isn’t you, it’s a broken system with far too many bullies in positions of power.

Mat leave returned earlier. You were collateral damage. Terminating contracts in the public sector is difficult, normally due to financial reasons. This was an “easy” way for them to do it. The threat of being put on capability was enough to sway you to voluntarily leave.

That said, why are you bothered by this several months later? It’s done now. You made a choice, no going back, learn from the experience and move on. Build your resilience from this experience. Get curious on what you’d do differently next time, if anything. But don’t regret your decision

As an ECT you’re very cheap, and I’m assuming you have a reference from this job? Move on, some schools are horrific, and you just started with one of those.

You got out. Absolutely the right thing to do. Move on now.

I’m intrigued as to what the union rep said.

This sort of thing happens all the time in schools.

As for the union, they probably said just to get out- their MO seems to be to extricate people rather than actually standing up/fighting against people being treated badly.

I know (multiple) teachers who have been threatened with capability, have made the first moves towards standing up against it and have then been offered (and taken) a pay out (eg 2-3 months salary) and signed an NDA to leave quickly and quietly.

Are you still teaching OP?

As others have said, if you were an NQT this was years ago - I think I’m right in thinking that the 2019/20 band of trainees were the last NQT’s so this is pre-Covid.

The maternity cover came back. They needed you gone. You made the mistake of chatting in the staff room about going and that was what they wanted.

This is a strange post…

Teachers are expensive and you were no longer required so they may found a way to manipulate you out of the building. It is unfair. But it does happen. That said, you possibly were failing to meet your teacher standards. We don’t know you, and we never watched you teach. It will always feel unfair to the person who is on the support plan.

Your friend is right about capability - always leave before you are placed on it - but I find it exceptionally hard to believe you didn’t know you were on a support plan. Did you not have to sign something? Your targets will have been discussed with you prior to starting this and you will have had a meeting with your mentor.

I am also assuming this was a while ago as it is ECT now, and this is a two year programme. NQT stopped being used 5 years ago.

Also what do you mean you taught initially bottom set English then given bottom set Maths? Were you a primary school teacher where you just worked with intervention groups. That is unusual in itself. It is exceptionally unheard of for an ECT to be given classes out of specialism, particularly mid year. And even then, you would nearly never, ever be judged on that out of specialism lesson.

Not so. A maternity cover is the easiest contract to terminate as it is absolutely clear that the contract ends when the person on maternity leave returns to work. Public sector or not.

Yes this was my first thought too. They didn't want to pay two of you so they wanted you gone and fast.

I can't say if the Support Plan and Capability stuff was a convenient way of helping push you out or if there was some merit in it, but it's a bit of a coincidence that those terms only started to be used after they heard ML teacher was coming back early. (I've heard that's not uncommon, to come back after May half term, work 6 weeks and then paid salary rather than MP over the summer holidays).

Did you find another teaching job since?

Oh thanks for posting this. I didn't know. So maternity cover can always end early this way, even if the job is initially offered for a fixed term?

I think if you were an exceptional or had the potential to be an exceptional teacher this would not have happened. I mentored many an NQT and others, on the graduate teaching programme and that entailed weekly meetings agreed targets, observations etc. Are you being honest with yourself here about what happened. It sounds as if you were given support in various guises but didn’t make the grade. Sometimes that can be the fit is just not right, clash of personalities etc. Are you teaching now or did you decide it wasn’t right for you?

The cover can’t be offered in any other way than fixed term - offering it permanently would be unlawful.

Yes, it’s that easy, unless they completely fucked up the notice terms in the contract, of course.

https://www.nasuwt.org.uk/advice/conditions-of-service/fixed-term-contracts.html

Support plans should be clearly documented. If you didn’t see this document and weren’t aware of it then you weren’t on a support plan - you were being given informal support, which cannot be the precursor to capability proceedings. There has to be a formal, documented support plan with meaningful support, clear targets and review meetings.

As someone above has said, it’s a little odd that if they wanted to end your mat cover contract because the other teacher had returned early, they didn’t have a clause to do this. Good schools will try to honour the contract where possible as they recognise it can leave the cover teacher in a difficult position, but financially schools are struggling so this might not be possible. Capability is a minefield so I don’t really know why they would’ve gone down that route if a much more straightforward route was available to them - do you still have your contract and is there a termination clause that would’ve allowed them to just let you go anyway?

Were you in secondary or primary? NQTs (or, since 2021, ECTs) should be given classes in their subject specialism as far as possible and a mix of sets. This could’ve been a point in your favour if you were in secondary and seen to be struggling more in the non-specialist subject than across the board.

NQT still exists in Wales. It's only in England that ECT is used, so this might be recent. The trouble OP has is that the school are meant to help her pass the NQT year - there's paperwork etc that they need to complete for her. She will now have to do this elsewhere.

My advice would be to try and get a long term placement via a supply agency and get some distance between you and this school and try to get your paperwork completed asap.

You said yourself that you were “so stressed” so you should have took friend’s advice and gone off sick. Then got your union to work for you. Generally, this is case work not work based rep level. So contact union HQ and speak to advisor. Which union is it? Unfair or constructive dismissal is notoriously hard to claim but you might have a case. At the least you should have a payment of about 3 months salary and an agreed reference. I’m on a course at end of next month on capability for NEU which is probably a long wait but do feel free to contact me via here. Have you managed to get QTS and are you hoping to continue with career?

Usually they're advertised specifically as maternity rather than fixed term. I'm aware of this as a head I worked for once made a mistake and offered a year fixed term which was problematic when the maternity person returned earlier than initially expected.

I’m a teacher. I’ve seen both sides of this coin, and have been on a support plan myself. The support plan is supposed to have achievable targets with support provided in order to meet those targets by a specified time frame. It sounds like this didn’t happen with you. As an NQT ECT you should have had additional time out of class from the start - did you? You should also have had a mentor.
Did you speak to your Union as soon as the issues arose?
On the other side, I have seen some really incompetent ECTs in school who really struggled with the basics and heaven knows how they qualified! I have been a student mentor and been told by their uni mentor that basically they have to pass them come what may despite them clearly being unsuited to teaching.

Schools often take any short cut they can in order to get rid of someone asap. Sounds like this is what’s happened in your case. I’d advise you do a year on supply to strengthen your skills before applying for a permanent teaching job again.

With such short service you can be let go for any reason other than very specific circumstances (discrimination, whistle blowing, making a flexible working request etc). To put it bluntly there’s no point ruminating on it as what’s done is done, if you hadn’t resigned your contract would have been ended anyway .

Have you had teaching jobs since?

When I was an NQT, we had to pass that year and if we failed it, we were then banned from teaching. The advice on the PGCE course was that if you were in danger of failing, you should leave and try to start the NQT year again somewhere else.

Equally, if ‘competency’ is on your record you have to declare that in future job applications, and you probably won’t get another teaching job. So leaving before it comes to that is a sensible thing to do, and schools will help you do that by releasing you from your contractual obligations (as it saves them money and paperwork, too).

So it looks here as if you were going to fail NQT, the people mentoring you didn’t see you improving (quickly) enough to pass either NQT or competency, and by leaving, you still have the option to restart your NQT year and pass it?

Apologies if that’s not how things are any more. I haven’t worked as a teacher in mainstream for a long time now.

In all honesty were you taking on board feedback, were you implementing their suggestions? Teaching is, frankly, fucking hard work, and it’s not as easy as it looks. You also have the insane amounts of paperwork and record keeping to manage. I was on my knees by the end of my NQT, it nearly destroyed me. There’s a reason I don’t teach in mainstream any more! It may be worth seeing what options there are for work in the education sector, like support, EOTAS tutoring, writing exams or teaching materials, or policy? I don’t think you have a case for unfair dismissal if the school had put things in place to support you and can show that you were likely to fail, but IANAL or a union rep.

There were hidden reasons beyond what they told you.

This. Always.

They aren’t supppsed to put NQTs on capability because by definition you are already getting support through your mentor.

but yes, schools do do this and it’s not usually about the quality of your teaching.

i worked in schools for twenty years and it is unfortunately quite common.

i have lots of similar stories with colleagues. It’s unfortunately the standard way of forcing out people leadership have decided that they can’t afford/don’t fit the new vision.

it’s pretty fucking brutal to the MH of the people concerned.

It does sound as though you were treated really badly.

Sorry to sidetrack but I'm confused by the reference to bottom set English and maths. These subjects are usually taught in sets in secondary schools but teachers don't normally teach 2 very different subjects. Teachers do teach both English and maths (amongst many other subjects) in primary schools but would usually teach their own class.