Difficult colleague

[Venu]

I am a teacher at an outstanding secondary school. I have been doing this job for 12 years or so and have had had various positions of responsibility etc. I have had lots of challenges, mostly with challenging colleagues not children! I have been at this new school for a year now.

I work with a woman who has about the same experience as me but is an absolute nightmare.We are Maths teachers. Various teaching assistants won’t work with her and she has recently been accused of bullying her latest TA and there was an investigation. The TA was moved on to another department. She was a lovely lady and was in tears most days due to this woman’s rudeness. She constantly moans about everyone and can be openly rude to people. She won’t listen to any ideas I have as she likes to be in total control of everything. She has made decisions that affect my class behind my back and I’ve had to tell her No. I have been very tolerant and patient. Members of my senior leadership team have spoken to me about the fact that others are weary of her and put up with her rudeness. She is a good teacher and can be nice. They have shifted her around to other subject areas apparently as she is incredibly difficult.

I kind of lost my temper in her classroom and spoke quite sharply to her and the kids and her TA were there. She had accused another colleague of something and they had come to me in tears. I just told her she can’t go around accusing people of things and to approach people diplomatically.

I am concerned I will really lose it with her. I know I need to distance myself from her as much as I can but I still need to work with her and be professional . No one has lasted more than a year with her!

Any clues to how to handle her?

What are management, particularly her line manager doing about it?

Good question! This is historical as far as I am aware! The investigation came to nothing. They like her and she gets excellent results to be fair. She has had struggles in her marriage and her mental health generally. They try and distance themselves to a certain extent as she is draining.

Document everything, get the TA's to do the same - then all of you launch a summary grievance on her.

That management know she is a bad person and refuse to do something about it also shows their incompetence.

Grievance her ass - she needs to be fired and shown the door. Who gives a flying fuck about her marital woes and fakenews mental issues - that latter one is a standard cop out for every bad egg these days who acts like a cunt, then expect sympathy.

Fuck her, you owe her nothing.

This last post made me smile! God I wish you worked with me! When she was under investigation, she was sent home because she was upset. She then took 4 weeks off for stress and of course she had something to say about how bad the supply was and apparently I had asked for too much help, bearing in mind I was new to the school. I’ve never worked with such a dishonest colleague. We had students that she didn’t want teaching her class and if her long suffering TA is away she can’t cope and will demand support. The last teacher to work with her dreaded coming to school each day. She’s desperate for my boss’s approval and I organised a really successful maths workshop for parents. She was involved and at the end took over to thank everyone for coming etc! She loves to order her TA around and they never meet her exacting standards. I work closely with her so it is hell on earth tp crest a toxic environment. I know I need to be more assertive and not listen to any more moaning. Ny own TA refuses to speak with her anymore.

She definitely sounds like a colossal cunt. And fucking useless one at that too.

If you're not in a union, join one - in case she complains about you.

Otherwise, it sounds like you have the support of staff and management which is good.