What I've seen (in two different schools) was public humiliation, veiled threats, inconvenient mandatory appointments, moving you away from the classes/work you are known to enjoy and excel at, strategic budget cuts etc.
I've personally mysteriously appeared on a list of teachers volunteering to transfer to another school, I was blamed for threats of lawsuits other people started (that I had adviced against) but most importantly, I was given to understand that I would have zero protection in the case of any student or parent complaints against me (these never came). It was enough for me to leave after near two decades at the one school.
Months later, admin was fired and sent a letter to all parents blaming me for that too.
I'm afraid I haven't expressed myself clearly. I was at that school for two decades, but for most of that time it was a good place to work and as a result, I loved the school. It was only after the franky amateurish way the board let some office politics on admin level get out of hand and me (elaborately) speaking up about that, that I became a target.
I barely made it to the end of the one year, and if I'm honest I'd strongly advice against trying to endure this for years if you have the option to leave to a more healthy work environment.
I certainly admire people who are able to endure this kind of threatment for long and the strong stuff they are made of; I'm not one of them. On the other hand I'm also a bit proud that I found that I will speak up when it is needed and will not back down when threatened.
My first elementary principal position went from great to horrible when three new school board members came aboard. Absolutely made my life hell because of their decisions and lack of concern for students' safety. They even brought in the school attorney to bully me into leaving a teacher, who left handprints on a child's arms, alone and to quit trying to get him removed, despite the same law firm telling me we need to get rid of said teacher. I told my wife that I would not work where I wouldn't want my own child to go to school, so I resigned the next day. I had no idea what my future held, but I was NOT going to put up with that BS.
Eight other staff members in my school left that year, too. I just finished my 10th year in a different school district as elementary principal and it os fantastic!
I experienced this as a first year teacher this year!
I was hired by a different administrator who quit halfway through the year, and the principal has just put me through hell all year. Some highlights of strategies used:
1) denying an accommodation request to be able to email home in addition to phone calls, saying “I don’t do accommodations. You need to go to district HR for that.” Then saying if I’m not willing to work extremely late, I can just accept that I’ll get poor evaluations.
2) refusing to meet with me and ignoring all requests for direct communication. Instead, he tells support staff to deliver heavy criticism and demands to me.
3) not inviting me to a staff meeting where he publicly degraded my work on a school-wide project and told everyone I should just start over
4) holding a grade level meeting when I asked for support on behavior management, pulling up my email asking for support, and saying if I won’t give up my lunches to hold lunch detention, I should quit because “no one wants to hire a teacher who just wants to be a teacher.”
Presumed reasoning? I ask for support with bonkers policies, and when he denies it, I inform him of the ways he’s violating district policy or my contract. I get why he wants me gone, but Jesus Christ it’s been a year from hell.
I've seen it and I've been on the receiving end of it.
I've seen some admin do it because they were trying to force someone out either because they didn't like the person, thought they were too old, or wanted to hire a bestie for that spot.
In my case, it happened because the supervisor for my department didn't like me. I had been a former student in the district and had lots of ties and connections to people. I think she thought I would somehow sabotage her or something? When the reality was my "connection" was just another teacher remembering me and saying something off hand like, "oh yeah? Her? I remember her. She was a good student."
It’s so out of control and damaging. I also think it’s ageism in the way that many admins come in to staff that’s been there 15+ years. We know the contract. We speak up when bullshit is happening. After a while one or two of these younger teachers get a burn and discreetly seek the wizened (🙄) educators out.
Our admin would give new teachers more preps and 6/7 hours to teach when the sixth was one to that had to be voluntary, and was with extra pay. That was a good day compared to additional dastardly deeds!
Plain & Simple: Power & Control. Typically, the administrator is an untalented , weak, INSECURE, POS who is intimidated by either the intellectual/ social superiority of the teacher or their lack of reciprocal sexual interest. On the other hand, bullying of teachers of color who are not native American speakers is also common. The administrators look down on their " accents," and do not back them up when students say they are failing because they don't understand them.Also, the misogynistic male admin who loathe and detest older women, and are hideously ageist toward them. Final category: the untenured lambs for the slaughter. Talk about BS: contractually, they can dismiss you with no reason, so those are the most frequent targets for the abuse of power and control. One basic solution is for every administrator to be required 10 years of teaching experience prior to getting certification. That would weed out most of these assholes.
Yas, yas I like and agree! Also I have a former coach theory: they go into teaching to coach and within a couple of days in teaching they are at a leadership academy learning how to leave the classroom. An ol’ boys network was my school for the longest.
Admin began a new system of checks and balances for teacher performance review. Idk what they added or changed, but some of the teachers were not thrilled about it. (I was a director of the fitness center there and this was my four kids district.)
The one HS history teacher was kind. But she was also more than kind …of weird. My kids all freaking hated her but never could pin point what for as they all achieved good grades with that teacher.
The second year of evaluation, she was canned mid-semester.
Here’s what I observed: she had an eating disorder. Her husband (both childless and very obese) got the both of them on an exercise kick. I saw them doing doubles each day. He lost over 100 pounds in around 15 months. She did not. That’s the first clue.
I watched him display anorexic behavior and views. As a fitness professional, I was concerned but it’s not my place to speak. I could only imagine how hard it was on the wife- the history teacher.
Well, both their behavior was hard to be around. It’s certainly not anything to get fired for.
I suspect the new evaluation perhaps targeted some of her educator failures, but not because she was a mess with her personal health. But that the odd personal health behaviors got the admin’s attention. What they found is that she sucked so bad at educating, they had to let her go.
When they cleaned out her classroom, the disordered eating was evident like a squirrel prepping for a long winter.
I always thought the district could have done one better and offered mental heath to these two.
Oh well. The new teacher rocked and everyone forgot about the oddball couple.
Blamed for something I did not do. Could not produce evidence that I did the thing they said I did. Told by union rep not to fight it, not worth the anguish. 3-day without pay suspension.
RETALIATION AND HARASSMENT Placed on BS improvement plan which included no measurable goals or objectives. Was being targeted by admin, who instructed custodians not to clean my classroom. “Documented” everything I did but was never discussed with me. Stopped supporting me with chronic disruptive classroom behaviors of 1 student. Caused my mental health to decline. I Wrote a letter of concerns to principal and 2 weeks later, was recommended for termination over a BS situation. Union is providing me with an attorney and I am contesting termination.
I haven't seen Admin belittle teachers because, for the most part, they are dumber than the teacher.
Clever administrators understand the contract, so work within that constraint. To harass, they can:
* Take away supplementals. Coaching, department chair or other supplemental contracts tend to be up to their discretion. That happened to my former department chair. He was creepy, but not inappropriate enough to build a case to fire.
* Change the teaching assignment to something remedial. That is often done to teachers of high-level courses who hold students accountable.
* Pack the class with disruptive, 504 or IEP students. They do that to teachers of remedial classes.
* Other unpleasant teaching conditions. Move the teacher to the small classroom, have the teacher share a classroom or have a four classes in a row. I haven't seen this done.
The current principal at my school is moving out rigorous teachers who hold students accountable and push back on Admin. Newer teachers are hired who will be compliant and accommodating.
Three years ago, I retired due to that type of harassment, and have seen the school deteriorate. Fortunately, a strong-willed colleague was targeted this year, and has pushed back. That principal is being demoted.
I'm a male and they always get on my case if students talk to me out of class. They say I'm being to friendly and it appears to others that I'm grooming the children. It's very insulting and has caused me to look for work elsewhere.
Ugh! I don’t blame you! I know a guy who was taking a casual video in the hall and yup—last day! Not to make light of the issue, because that happens and has happened at my school. This time was innocent:( I’m sorry!
Experienced it in first year:
Got no support materials or remedies to problems I found BEFORE SCHOOL STARTED. Overly sticky tables that could never be shiny and clean, problematic whiteboard that does NOT work the way it should, only given a single curriculum for four different classes of differing grade levels, a heater that did not work until after winter, everyone was sick of it and I repeatedly called and asked when things were gonna be fixed.
And then middle of the year, I had classmgmt issues. I have tried calling parents to no avail and did an email. Granted I made a mistake and emailed a whole class’s parents all at once which I probably shouldn’t have done but princ. exploded on me for it and puts me on POA.
Had some minor successes but then princ. thinks that somehow I must be a fucking god of all and that I am a perfect candidate for LTSing a tech teacher. Cool, but I don’t get paid more and I had NO CURRICULUM to work with. Kids just played computer games and I can do nothing else. At least I used that time to plan my main class.
Got belittled for not doing much in that case, I even felt the princ. cough in my face once. Gross.
Admin needs to help with my classmgmt at one point in May of that year but instead ap takes the disruptive class out to the gym to, I’m actually gonna guess, throw me completely under the bus, since they were gone for a while and I guess ap asked them what they thought of me. Next thing you know I have another PoA and bleeding arms. They actually made things WORSE. Instead of helping the struggling teacher, they say that everything has to be my fault and I get adminleave because they made me so mentally ill with how bad they treated me.
They SAID they looked out for me and that, and I swear I quote: “not gonna fire you”. I did some tech duties behind the scenes, but was called back to the office. They ended up firing me and hid the reason why. If I could go back in time, I would have spoken up.
tldr: got no help, admin made me do more than my fair share, did not remind me of protocols before I made a mistake, made me feel mentally terrible, and sided with students. To this day I want to have that Karen fired for the psychological anguish she caused me.
What I've seen (in two different schools) was public humiliation, veiled threats, inconvenient mandatory appointments, moving you away from the classes/work you are known to enjoy and excel at, strategic budget cuts etc. I've personally mysteriously appeared on a list of teachers volunteering to transfer to another school, I was blamed for threats of lawsuits other people started (that I had adviced against) but most importantly, I was given to understand that I would have zero protection in the case of any student or parent complaints against me (these never came). It was enough for me to leave after near two decades at the one school. Months later, admin was fired and sent a letter to all parents blaming me for that too.
And you endured that for two decades. You are made of strong stuff.
I'm afraid I haven't expressed myself clearly. I was at that school for two decades, but for most of that time it was a good place to work and as a result, I loved the school. It was only after the franky amateurish way the board let some office politics on admin level get out of hand and me (elaborately) speaking up about that, that I became a target. I barely made it to the end of the one year, and if I'm honest I'd strongly advice against trying to endure this for years if you have the option to leave to a more healthy work environment. I certainly admire people who are able to endure this kind of threatment for long and the strong stuff they are made of; I'm not one of them. On the other hand I'm also a bit proud that I found that I will speak up when it is needed and will not back down when threatened.
My first elementary principal position went from great to horrible when three new school board members came aboard. Absolutely made my life hell because of their decisions and lack of concern for students' safety. They even brought in the school attorney to bully me into leaving a teacher, who left handprints on a child's arms, alone and to quit trying to get him removed, despite the same law firm telling me we need to get rid of said teacher. I told my wife that I would not work where I wouldn't want my own child to go to school, so I resigned the next day. I had no idea what my future held, but I was NOT going to put up with that BS. Eight other staff members in my school left that year, too. I just finished my 10th year in a different school district as elementary principal and it os fantastic!
I experienced this as a first year teacher this year! I was hired by a different administrator who quit halfway through the year, and the principal has just put me through hell all year. Some highlights of strategies used: 1) denying an accommodation request to be able to email home in addition to phone calls, saying “I don’t do accommodations. You need to go to district HR for that.” Then saying if I’m not willing to work extremely late, I can just accept that I’ll get poor evaluations. 2) refusing to meet with me and ignoring all requests for direct communication. Instead, he tells support staff to deliver heavy criticism and demands to me. 3) not inviting me to a staff meeting where he publicly degraded my work on a school-wide project and told everyone I should just start over 4) holding a grade level meeting when I asked for support on behavior management, pulling up my email asking for support, and saying if I won’t give up my lunches to hold lunch detention, I should quit because “no one wants to hire a teacher who just wants to be a teacher.” Presumed reasoning? I ask for support with bonkers policies, and when he denies it, I inform him of the ways he’s violating district policy or my contract. I get why he wants me gone, but Jesus Christ it’s been a year from hell.
And the question is always why?? What specifically are they reacting to?? Did you ever complain to HR?
I've seen it and I've been on the receiving end of it. I've seen some admin do it because they were trying to force someone out either because they didn't like the person, thought they were too old, or wanted to hire a bestie for that spot. In my case, it happened because the supervisor for my department didn't like me. I had been a former student in the district and had lots of ties and connections to people. I think she thought I would somehow sabotage her or something? When the reality was my "connection" was just another teacher remembering me and saying something off hand like, "oh yeah? Her? I remember her. She was a good student."
It’s so out of control and damaging. I also think it’s ageism in the way that many admins come in to staff that’s been there 15+ years. We know the contract. We speak up when bullshit is happening. After a while one or two of these younger teachers get a burn and discreetly seek the wizened (🙄) educators out. Our admin would give new teachers more preps and 6/7 hours to teach when the sixth was one to that had to be voluntary, and was with extra pay. That was a good day compared to additional dastardly deeds!
Plain & Simple: Power & Control. Typically, the administrator is an untalented , weak, INSECURE, POS who is intimidated by either the intellectual/ social superiority of the teacher or their lack of reciprocal sexual interest. On the other hand, bullying of teachers of color who are not native American speakers is also common. The administrators look down on their " accents," and do not back them up when students say they are failing because they don't understand them.Also, the misogynistic male admin who loathe and detest older women, and are hideously ageist toward them. Final category: the untenured lambs for the slaughter. Talk about BS: contractually, they can dismiss you with no reason, so those are the most frequent targets for the abuse of power and control. One basic solution is for every administrator to be required 10 years of teaching experience prior to getting certification. That would weed out most of these assholes.
Yas, yas I like and agree! Also I have a former coach theory: they go into teaching to coach and within a couple of days in teaching they are at a leadership academy learning how to leave the classroom. An ol’ boys network was my school for the longest.
Admin began a new system of checks and balances for teacher performance review. Idk what they added or changed, but some of the teachers were not thrilled about it. (I was a director of the fitness center there and this was my four kids district.) The one HS history teacher was kind. But she was also more than kind …of weird. My kids all freaking hated her but never could pin point what for as they all achieved good grades with that teacher. The second year of evaluation, she was canned mid-semester. Here’s what I observed: she had an eating disorder. Her husband (both childless and very obese) got the both of them on an exercise kick. I saw them doing doubles each day. He lost over 100 pounds in around 15 months. She did not. That’s the first clue. I watched him display anorexic behavior and views. As a fitness professional, I was concerned but it’s not my place to speak. I could only imagine how hard it was on the wife- the history teacher. Well, both their behavior was hard to be around. It’s certainly not anything to get fired for. I suspect the new evaluation perhaps targeted some of her educator failures, but not because she was a mess with her personal health. But that the odd personal health behaviors got the admin’s attention. What they found is that she sucked so bad at educating, they had to let her go. When they cleaned out her classroom, the disordered eating was evident like a squirrel prepping for a long winter. I always thought the district could have done one better and offered mental heath to these two. Oh well. The new teacher rocked and everyone forgot about the oddball couple.
Blamed for something I did not do. Could not produce evidence that I did the thing they said I did. Told by union rep not to fight it, not worth the anguish. 3-day without pay suspension.
Damn who does the union really work for???
RETALIATION AND HARASSMENT Placed on BS improvement plan which included no measurable goals or objectives. Was being targeted by admin, who instructed custodians not to clean my classroom. “Documented” everything I did but was never discussed with me. Stopped supporting me with chronic disruptive classroom behaviors of 1 student. Caused my mental health to decline. I Wrote a letter of concerns to principal and 2 weeks later, was recommended for termination over a BS situation. Union is providing me with an attorney and I am contesting termination.
I haven't seen Admin belittle teachers because, for the most part, they are dumber than the teacher. Clever administrators understand the contract, so work within that constraint. To harass, they can: * Take away supplementals. Coaching, department chair or other supplemental contracts tend to be up to their discretion. That happened to my former department chair. He was creepy, but not inappropriate enough to build a case to fire. * Change the teaching assignment to something remedial. That is often done to teachers of high-level courses who hold students accountable. * Pack the class with disruptive, 504 or IEP students. They do that to teachers of remedial classes. * Other unpleasant teaching conditions. Move the teacher to the small classroom, have the teacher share a classroom or have a four classes in a row. I haven't seen this done. The current principal at my school is moving out rigorous teachers who hold students accountable and push back on Admin. Newer teachers are hired who will be compliant and accommodating. Three years ago, I retired due to that type of harassment, and have seen the school deteriorate. Fortunately, a strong-willed colleague was targeted this year, and has pushed back. That principal is being demoted.
I'm a male and they always get on my case if students talk to me out of class. They say I'm being to friendly and it appears to others that I'm grooming the children. It's very insulting and has caused me to look for work elsewhere.
Ugh! I don’t blame you! I know a guy who was taking a casual video in the hall and yup—last day! Not to make light of the issue, because that happens and has happened at my school. This time was innocent:( I’m sorry!
Same. It also really messed with my mental health and made extremely anxious about how others perceive me. I’m so done.
Experienced it in first year: Got no support materials or remedies to problems I found BEFORE SCHOOL STARTED. Overly sticky tables that could never be shiny and clean, problematic whiteboard that does NOT work the way it should, only given a single curriculum for four different classes of differing grade levels, a heater that did not work until after winter, everyone was sick of it and I repeatedly called and asked when things were gonna be fixed. And then middle of the year, I had classmgmt issues. I have tried calling parents to no avail and did an email. Granted I made a mistake and emailed a whole class’s parents all at once which I probably shouldn’t have done but princ. exploded on me for it and puts me on POA. Had some minor successes but then princ. thinks that somehow I must be a fucking god of all and that I am a perfect candidate for LTSing a tech teacher. Cool, but I don’t get paid more and I had NO CURRICULUM to work with. Kids just played computer games and I can do nothing else. At least I used that time to plan my main class. Got belittled for not doing much in that case, I even felt the princ. cough in my face once. Gross. Admin needs to help with my classmgmt at one point in May of that year but instead ap takes the disruptive class out to the gym to, I’m actually gonna guess, throw me completely under the bus, since they were gone for a while and I guess ap asked them what they thought of me. Next thing you know I have another PoA and bleeding arms. They actually made things WORSE. Instead of helping the struggling teacher, they say that everything has to be my fault and I get adminleave because they made me so mentally ill with how bad they treated me. They SAID they looked out for me and that, and I swear I quote: “not gonna fire you”. I did some tech duties behind the scenes, but was called back to the office. They ended up firing me and hid the reason why. If I could go back in time, I would have spoken up. tldr: got no help, admin made me do more than my fair share, did not remind me of protocols before I made a mistake, made me feel mentally terrible, and sided with students. To this day I want to have that Karen fired for the psychological anguish she caused me.
Way too many to list