Reasonable adjustments don’t exist for teachers, do they?
I’m a secondary school teacher who has experienced a few health problems. I can still work a full timetable, but sometimes the full timetable without adjustments is unbearable. Especially coming in September, I have 3 PPAs per week and I’ve been given an additional subject to teach so I have to move between buildings constantly. For example, I am awaiting a diagnosis for endometriosis. One day a month, I get severe pains all over my body for a few hours and don’t have the energy to give a full lesson standing up. Would the trade union support me in that I can make my lessons slightly lighter during this day?
And meetings are sometimes during Friday at lunch. I need to pray during then (all lunches but especially Friday) as I am Muslim. I have mentioned this a few times it was accounted for, but often gets overlooked.
At my school, teachers rarely ever take time off work for being sick, unless they are hospitalised. I have found that I get sick less often at this school, as it’s a grammar school, so not as stressful as less behaviour management. It’s also run quite well by SLT. I just don’t know how to combat the issue of severe pains once a month.
I also experienced trauma nearly a year ago and I’m dealing with PTSD-like symptoms whilst working, along with depression and anxiety, but you wouldn’t be able to tell. I had to carry on like nothing happened and never got closure or justice. My manager tried to extend my probation (right after I experienced the trauma and took 2.5 days off work and didn’t take another sick day again the whole year!) as she said I don’t spend enough time with the department during my PPAs and break and lunch. I tried to do it more and we had meetings during my PPAs so I spend time with them. I took time out of each time to check in on everyone. She couldn’t give a valid reason to not pass me so I passed. I need break and lunch to collect myself, regain energy so I can teach again.
I feel like teaching is almost like being in prison. I feel watched. Every thing I do must be accounted for. If I share a personal struggle to explain why I might be quieter, it’s used against me. Even my break and lunch times, I have to justify how I’m spending them. if I create a lesson from scratch, spend a long time on it, I get told to “delete” it, rather than edit it and make tweaks. my HoD has shouted at me before genuinely because she did something wrong and blamed me for her getting caught, and I just cried. I feel I am not an assertive person but I also don’t feel like I have anyone to back me. my HoD has been at the school for two decades. I’ve been there for one year.
Is it normal to feel this way? Are all careers like this? does anyone have any tips? Because I’m dreading September. I enjoy teaching, but I find dealing with management as quite challenging.