rantingteacher.co.uk

Annoying Colleague

Now let me get this straight from the start. I am not the only person at my school who has a grudge against one colleague in particular. Many of us at school feel this way. I’ve avoided letting it become an issue for as long as I can, both on here, in my little sanctuary of screams, and at school, where gossip is ever rife but somehow makes me feel a bit cheap. Does that make me sound “holier than thou”? Well here’s my confession: I’m not, but I do try to avoid the huddling in corners and whispered words about what Annoying Colleague has done NOW to upset somebody. However, recently my shoes are starting to wear thin after kicking the wall so many times after any one of a number of frustrating encounters with Annoying Colleague. And besides, the kids are starting to turn on me when I keep blaming them for the scuff marks on the wall.

If Annoying Colleague was one of the many incompetant teachers that still linger in corridors across this land, perhaps he would just blend into the background. The hallmarks of incompetance are all there: classes running wild, late arrival to nearly every lesson, room left in an absolute state after each hour, lost coursework, no work set when absent on courses (oh, and there are many courses!). I can’t go into specifics, but believe me when I state that this man deserves a series of obnoxious stickers slapped onto his back, all of which say “Kick me”. But what sets Annoying Colleague apart from the rest is that the Senior Management Team have recently welcomed him into their fold, bestowing upon him his own freshly painted office, key to the stock cupboard (which by-passes the rottweiler of a secretary), and freedom to bark all day long at pupils and staff alike.

Now what this says about our SMT, I really don’t know. Are they so out of touch that they thought designer silk ties were a surefire indicator of teaching success? Or did they really spot that he lacked certain essentials in the classroom, and whisked him away to a post that involves a lot of shouting, apparently, and of course a pay rise to shout about? Sadly, I know for sure that they really do hold Annoying Colleague in high esteem as a classroom practitioner par excellence.

So where does that leave us, the hoi polloi? We know how crap he can be, and now we’re working for a SMT who promote crap teachers to do jobs that they’re already screwing up. A SMT of which he is now a large part. Is this going to be self-propagating? Does the poison at the top of the fountain-head start to slowly drip down and infect us all? Maybe that’s why I’ve been breaking my own professional rules and bitching about a colleague behind their back. But did I mention that he happens to be a very Annoying Colleague?!

I know this kind of thing can have serious consequences. A friend of mine works in a school where now the SMT are in direct conflict with the rest of the staff over pretty much everything. SMT exact their revenge as only the people in charge of timetabling and contracts can. It is starting to get very messy over there, but my friend reports that the camaraderie amongst the classroom teachers has never been better, as they put aside their petty differences and start to fight for the greater good.

The sad thing is that when Annoying Colleague was promoted, I really wanted him to succeed. Less contact time with classes meant I had more chance of my sanity remaining intact, as our physical proximity meant that my lessons suffered when he allowed his class to mill in the corridor for ten minutes at the start of each hour while he was doing who knows what. He took over an area of management that desperately needed a good shaking down, and at first, he was as confident as a newly elected prime minister. He promised strategies and came up with ideas that made sense. I held out new hope. More fool me, I guess. If he couldn’t organise his own classes, how was he going to sort out the necessaries on a whole school scale? Well, I guess I won’t be so gullible in future. I can feel the cynicism swallowing me up. I’ll keep you posted!

Back to the Homepage

Go to the Contents

added 7/11/04