Pregnant teachers and reasonable adjustments

[ThisTeacherCan]

Hi, first-time mum and a secondary school teacher here. Currently 26 weeks and finding the first few weeks back harder than any other year! Just reaching out to see what others in my position have received as 'reasonable adjustments'. I don't want to be seen as taking the mick but I'd rather not do long days e.g. parents' evenings that go on til past 8pm and I can't go home before it starts; same with other such 'directed time' events. Can I reduce duties? Can I ask not to have break time meetings?

I could be wrong but I don't think you get to ask for reasonable adjustments. Your employer should do a risk assessment to identify any risks to your health. If risks are identified then the have to make reasonable adjustments to reduce/remove those risks. If no risks identified, no adjustments are required.

We generally remove break duty for pregnant teachers but other than that no adjustments unless they develop a specific pregnancy related medical condition which requires it. Unfortunately being tired is just part of being pregnant!

I had playground duty removed because of risk to health.
I also had 2 weeks off when there was slapped cheek in my class.
Other than that it was suck it up.
I went on maternity leave at 29 weeks teaching was not compatible with the end of pregnancy for me.
I knew I wasn’t going back though so didn’t have to save leave for afterwards.

The only adjustments we got were not doing duties near the football courts and not handling radioactive sources.

I'm 32 weeks. Since the beginning of term I've been taking PPAs at home - I'm really lucky with my timetable that this is actually 2-3 afternoons a week (fortnightly timetable). I'm doing duties and a club at the moment but in my risk assessment meeting HR mentioned letting them know if this got too much. They've also avoided using me for cover basically since first trimester (although that went out of the window this week). I'm also sitting down for most teaching, and discussed with HR that there may start to be times when I need to nip to the loo in the middle of lessons.

Edit: Just to add, if you're worried about seeming to take the piss you could say the adjustment has been recommended by your midwife? Gives you a shield if they respond with outrage at your temerity.

We took teachers off evening duties as too long a day, but they had to ring all parents if it was parents" evening.

Could you approach it from the point of view of " Because of my pregnancy and associated exhaustion, I'm not able to work 12/13 hour days finishing at 8pm. If you would like me to attend the parents evenings on x and y dates, one solution would be for me to start work at 1pm on those days. I'm flagging it up to you now so that appropriate arrangements can be made."
Don't ask permission, tell them you physically can't do it.

I should add that I'm in a really supportive school and really recognise that I've been lucky with all of this! But hopefully some possible suggestions.