Sickness absence

This is a speech made at annual conference on the issue of sickness absence:

" As a health and safety officer I as ecstatic to see this motion on the agenda, finally being discussed.

This is a true story..

' A teacher has found out she has a serious cardiac condition which her GP had said required her to be off work for 4 weeks...

The immediate and unsympathetic response was ... '4 weeks! 4 weeks! what are we going to do about yr 10 coursework if you're off for 4 weeks!'

(this made the conference gasp a little just so you know)

WE have a guilt culture in teaching and for the most part we perpetuate it.
We allow ourselves to feel guilty about being ill. WE shouldn't
And in turn this allows other people to make us feel guilty.

As a consequence, some headteachers can and will take advantage of this through sickness mgt/monitoring procedures.

Call them what you like they are 'supposedly' meant to be supportive, but are never used that way.

Reducing staff absence raises standards but making staff scared about taking time off nullifies this effort and doesnt address the real issue.

Teacher stress (the well known and documented cause for most illness's ) is an issue for all of us and for the employer to blame the sufferer of stress for suffering stress -through rigid and unsupportive monitoring procedures- is an admission of failure to fulfil their obligation of duty of care under the health and safety at work act.

WE need to support one another, and show that our health is just as important as continuity of teaching.

Teachers Health Matters