Setting work when off sick

[Card1gan]

I was wondering if you'd be prepared to share how your school deals with staff absences and setting work in secondary schools. I am the only specialist teacher of my subject and am due to have surgery that will involve taking around 8 weeks off. I have a feeling that the school will expect me to leave work for this time which is frying my brain, especially for GCSE and A-Level classes. I am also concerned how I will make up for this lost teaching time in terms of getting the pupils through their exams as it's looking unlikely that the surgery will happen until September or October.

Please share your experiences so that I know what's reasonable and what's not before I have this conversation with my line manager and SMT. Thanks.

I would expect that 8 weeks of planned absence would be covered by a subject specialist supply teacher… but in reality it might be down to the cover sups. Without anyone else in your department, that would be really difficult to set. How bad are you expecting to be as you recover? Could you set the first week or two in advance and set the rest as you go, in close contact with whoever is covering for you?

We'd never be able to get a subject specialist supply so it would be expected to provide cover, at least for ks4 and 5. To be honest I'd rather set it and know what they had done than the alternative.

When staff were isolating they delivered lessons from home,would this be an option for you while recovering?

What subject?

This worries me about sickness now we have all had to work remotely -that working from home while not fit to work becomes the expectation

I've never worked in Secondary but surely it's in T&C that work during a sickness absence is not set by the person who is ill?

SLT, subject lead. Or a Supply who is hired and paid to do planning.

If you're not fit enough to work then you shouldn't be teaching/working from home at all. However there have been scenarios where staff are mentally fine to work but have broken an ankle/leg so can't physically be in school. In that scenario teaching from home would be ok. I'd actively want it for ks4 and 5 rather than setting cover.

Obviously this depends completely on the nature of the operation, the recovery and how you feel.

Technically if you're off sick I don't think you have to do anything. However it's more of a goodwill thing to set cover, especially if you know it's a planned absence.

In secondary, the expectation everywhere I have worked is that you set cover unless you're physically not able to. Eg in hospital = no cover, anything you can manage at home = send cover.

However I have previously set cover for colleagues if I know they aren't in. Saves them a shit job every day when they feel rubbish. A one person dept is a tricky thing here though. Presumably your line manager doesn't know your subject well enough to set cover.

Surgery + 8 weeks off indicates something pretty stressful + necessary recovery time. There's going to be a lot for you to organise before you go into hospital.

Realistically, it's hard to see how you're going to be able to do much advance planning before going in (not 8 weeks' worth!) or afterwards ...

Herc knows better than me, though.

Good luck with your surgery.

If you are thinking about it at this point, then it is either in September or later, or it will cut into Summer hols, in which case the eight weeks cover work will not apply. So it must be next academic year?
This gives you time to devise the best plan- You need to offer a solution to your management which means they don't need to fret about the work, and which means you don't need to put in extra hours just because you need to legitimately go off on sick leave.
How about you do a quick audit of how long it will take you to compile some work? You could compact the work into project based tasks, online tasks, peer marked tasks, plus some stuff you might find on the TES website. You might find that this would all take you, say, 5 hours altogether. Or whatever else you come up with as the specialist, Im just guessing.
Then present that to your managers-"I will need x amount of time if you'd like cover work, so I could suggest not attending x,y,z meeting, or some other directed task instead" If they say no, then ask them "when would you like me to compile cover work?"

You should not be prepping cover work at all during a planned absence, but you can always strike a deal for time to do it in advance. that would be profesisonal of you to offer, given that you are the only in-house expertise in the subject.
Good luck!

The departments I've worked in have ranged from expecting the absent teacher to set all their own work and mark everything on return, through to the department having fully resourced schemes of work that a long term supply teacher can use, with HoD and Lead Practitioners having appropriate material for short term absences.

The tricky part of your situation is the fact you're a one person department. Are there any online communities you could ask for medium term planning for some elements of the specification? Most people would help someone in need.

Thanks everyone, it's going to be tough. I teach Science, but am the only Chemist in the school (it's quite a small state comprehensive school). The surgery is likely to happen second or third week in September which is such bad timing as I can't teach year 7 pupils how to use Bunsen Burners remotely anymore than I can leave a work booklet for lower ability GCSE classes who just won't have a clue without an additional explanation.

My line manager is the Head Teacher so will not engage in setting cover lessons. I don't want to be a burden for the other Science teachers but can't get my head around leaving cover for 8 weeks, it's hard enough to think of things when you know you're off for a day.

Being the only chemist should only really be a problem for A Level classes, I would have thought. I’m most schools that is the only point in their education when students would only be taught by a specialist. If we had a long-term absence in my department, and non-specialist cover for the lessons, we would share the setting of work in order to support the absent colleague. So someone who also has a similar Year 7 group sets the Year 7 cover and so on. We would also swap in for occasional lessons, so setting cover for our own group in order to teach the absent teacher’s class, so they didn’t have 8 straight weeks of cover.

*In most schools (sorry)

With your context I'd agree that your specialist knowledge is surely only needed for triple science and ks5?

Depending on the structure of ks3 budding up with other teachers to set cover could work. We've also done split timetables where one teacher teaches a lesson to class A, sets cover for the following lesson and then teaches class B. Rinse and repeat until you're back. Means the impact of your absence is minimised.

It may be something that cannot be arranged fully until timetables come out in September.

For triple science it may be possible for a timetable shuffle to give them a Sci teacher even if it's the "wrong" science. You could then have them more when you're back. This may not work in reality depending on the timetable though.

With the rise of remote learning, some video offerings from places like Oak have been good. These could form part of the plan.

Thank you for the suggestions, I really appreciate you taking the time to help me see the wood from the trees. I'm sure it can be done, and once I've got my head around the fact that I need the surgery then I'll find a way to sort this out.

Using existing resources like Oak and TES resources won't really work because it's a Welsh medium school (yes, Chemistry taught through the medium of Welsh!) which adds to the difficulty of getting a science supply teacher. However, I'm feeling much more positive about the situation now which will make telling the Head about the surgery easier. Thank you again.

Oh blimey, that does complicate things! Is there a way you could suggest that English is used for those 8 weeks for ease of setting cover? I've no idea how strict it is.

Hope it's a productive chat with your head.

Good luck for your surgery too.

Good luck with your surgery! I'm a one person dept as well and I'd be expected to set full cover. It's one of the things dh thinks is absolutely barbaric about teaching, that we have to set work when we're off sick. I would think other science staff/oak academy could help out with ks3 and 4 and you would need to focus most on ks5.

It might be worth seeing if there are facebook groups for your subject and exam board. I know in my subject (History), some teachers have started doing workbooks at KS4. Publishers might do work booklets as well? Probably not in Welsh though! I think in my school, if someone was in your situation, they'd be expected to set the work. At KS3, do they do separate sciences or just 'Science'?

I’d say the expectation would be to leave at least the long term and medium term plans or the scheme or work, if this exists. Are there resources at lesson level from your previous years to signpost to? This absence is known and you have a fair amount of time to prepare now- it’s about the children as well as supporting your team. Secondary teachers have frees to be able to use? I wouldn’t expect you working whilst off, unless able to (depends on the surgery but you’d need to recover). Can you speak to headteacher to gather view on plans for cover? This will affect the level of planning required. A specialist would need less left behind than a cover supervisor.

Thanks for everyone's contributions. I am seeing the consultant this week so will have a better idea of the plan after then. I also plan to have a chat with my head who should be able to guide me. I genuinely can't get my head around setting work for such a long time, even if I do 4 weeks before I go off as I change my lessons so much based on the students understanding. Hey ho, it can't be helped and I will obviously do my best for them.