I always hear Texas is a right to fire state, but when I was bitching about this situation below he told me it would be hard to fire the *****. I have two assistants at school. Assistants are hourly workers in school districts. One of my assistants is a viscous *****. She is manipulative, lies, and is constantly creating problems in my program. Below I quoted an email I sent a couple months ago concerning her behavior. I figure this words it pretty well so I'm just copying... "Mrs. S job is to be my assistant. However, she blatantly disregards directives from me. She refuses to support decisions I make. She does not support the program we are trying to implement. She has poor relationships with the students. She regularly oversteps the boundaries of her role as a TA. Her animosity has caused a breakdown in the communication in our program. She was most likely an ideal assistant during the years when keeping ED kids self-contained was the modus operandi. However, she has not shown a willingness to accept the change that came to the program this year, or the need to change her mode of operation when working with the kids. She has been unwilling to respond to attempts from me to address this issue. The bottom line is that, rather than assisting me, she creates problems and drama. I would be more effective in my job and the program would be more successful with just Danny as a TA because of the problems listed above. I believe that it takes a specific personality to be able to work with ED kids and affect change. I believe full-heartedly in the district's philosophy that an SBS program should not attempt to control children, but rather to facilitate them in an internal locus of control through instruction, trust, as well as trial and error. I believe that Mrs. S's approach to education makes her feel she must be "in control" It is not possible to "control" the children who receive SBS services-- if it was, they wouldn't be here. In addition to the things mentioned above, Mimi told me earlier in the year that persons employed in the SBS units should be able to perform containment. Mrs. S is not able to do containment because of a back injury she says happened last year when she fell at school. This alone, without considering the things mentioned above, is a reason she should not be working in the SBS unit. " Anyway... I want this woman gone. Problem is, she's been employed w/ the district for 13 years. My dad says it's very difficult to fire someone after their first 6 months of employment. Anyone know anything? And thanks for letting me vent.
Don't most school districts just "reassign" people instead of firing them. Sort of like Milton in Office space, just keep moving them until they quit (or burn the place down). You can also throw out the old "Either she goes or I go" and hope for the best.
If she's "at will", she can be terminated any time, for any reason, or no reason, as long as it's not for an illegal reason. Like discrimination. Most employers like to have a good reason to terminate someone, so they can try to deny unemployment benefits.
School Districts many times will have a policy of only firing at will employees for cause. And that usually means they have to do something egregious because, in my experience, school districts do not give bad employees bad evaluations.
It has gotten to the point that most employers no longer give evaluations. They will confirm that the person worked there, and that is it.
the issue is that you are employed by a gevernment entity, thus the normal rules don't apply. Most governmental entities have an appeals process in place, thus unless there is extreme cause if she is fired she will appeal and get her job back.
In my school district they just wont offer you a contract for the next year if they dont want you back. Happened at my school this year.
I think The Donald just points his finger and says, "you're fired." Yea, the big point is that you work for the government, and the school district has it's own rules. I know that due to teacher's unions power, many school districts are very wary of firing teachers. Now, I have been involved in instances where people were fired. They were told you are fired, get your things and leave. It really can be that simple for private businesses in Texas. In fact, the less you say the better, because you can legally give no reason. If you give a reason, and you word it incorrectly then they could try to twist it back on you in a lawsuit.
All employers have their own rules, but if she's an at will employee, she can be fired for anything, anytime. Word of advice- BE SPECIFIC. You document EVERYTHING she does wrong. You have to go into specific detail. Who did What, When, How, and Why. What impact or harm did her action or lack of action have. You can't have too much detail.
I would recommend not adding anything other than the facts when emailing a recommendation or request to fire someone. Instead of only saying they don't listen to your directions, state exactly what happened and when. Most HR depts want that for the file so it can be referenced in the future, if necessary.
Unfortunately, you're probably more likely to get fired for posting personnel related emails publicly than Mrs. S is for being recalcitrant. I hope the names that weren't redacted are at least pseudonyms.
Technically, any email I send is a matter of public record. You could go to AISD and request a copy of every email I've ever sent, as you could to most any other gov't employee. I'm pretty sure Educational Aides are at will employees-- at least they were in my old district. AISD seems to complicate everything, so I don't know their policy. I think the biggest complicating factor here is that this TA has worked for my school for 13 years. From what I've been told, this person's been a pain in the butt for all that time. We've got other TA's on campus who are completely worthless, and for some reason they won't let them go. I just don't get it. I've got a meeting this afternoon w/ my principal and my department head. We'll see what comes of it. I'm hoping they will just re-assign her.
Observe-document-warn in writing with witnesses-get them to sign-probation-terminate. That's it in a nutshell and prevents the EEOC allegations from poping up. Watch out for labor union members working under a CBA or there might be both EEOC and NLRB charges!
Hmmm... You're a teacher in an ED unit on the secondary level... If you're willing to do that job and you're good, your principal should be doing whatever it takes to keep you happy. Simply explain that she's been an impediment to your doing the best possible job this year. I wouldn't offer that you'd be better off with just one... They have you staffed with two TAs... Tell them that you need 2 good ones. There are plenty of TA openings in the district to which she can be re-assigned, and there are plenty of 'shell games' that your principal can play to make sure she gets one of those and that you get someone else...
Well, basically I got given a guarentee that she would be reassigned, but they told me they can't promise that I'll get anyone better. At this point I'd be better off with someone who did nothing than with this woman and the crap she starts. I'm going to cross my fingers and hope for the best.
Good luck! It didn't sound like it could get much worse... In this economy, there are a lot of certified teachers taking aid positions, so hopefully you'll be better off with the new one. Are they letting you sit in on the interviews? They should, since you'll be the direct report. And if the new person is not an improvement, then just make the job miserable so they look for something else... Keep fishing until you get a good match.
In this at-will state, it's ridiculously easy. You call 'em up, say "Can you come to my office for a minute?" They show up, you close the door and after they have a seat, you say, "We're going to have to let you go. We''ll give you two weeks severence if you sign these documents." Bada-bing-bada-boom. That's it. You don't even need a reason. I've been layed off twice, but it works the same.
