Week 28 – Reflection on the influence on the law of ethics in practice

I have chosen to use Rolfe’s model of reflection to structure my ethical discussion.

Back ground:

In 2016 I was one of 4 members of staff that were part of a structured support program for a member of staff who was close to failing the schools appraisal process. The identified areas of concern from the 2016 professional registration criteria were:

·         Criteria 4: demonstrate commitment to on-going professional learning and development of personal professional practice.

·         Criteria 6: conceptualise, plan and implement an appropriate learning programme.

·         Criteria 11: analyse and appropriately use assessment information, which has been gathered formally and informally.

The support program was designed to be reviewed after 5 weeks and then appraisal could be signed off or support extended for a further 5 weeks.

What?

During this support program the member of staff started several Facebook posts in different groups discussing the BS of the confidential support program school had put in place. This member of staff had many current and past students as friends on her Facebook account along with many staff. As part of her account she also had listed where she worked. As the weeks progressed the comments got more and more toxic towards the support program that had been put in place. At the end of the 5 week review she still had not met the requirements for the criteria above. So this was extended for a further 5 weeks.

This led to a rather nasty comment re the school on a group on Facebook. The teacher had added it as a public comment and shared it on her profile. I was made aware of this by another member of staff contacting me via text asking for guidance as they did not know what to do. I checked and it had also popped up on my Facebook feed.

So What?

This meant that many current students and past students along with many staff had this appear on their Facebook feed. The content defamatory towards the school the department and not a true representation of what has been done for support of this teacher. The conversation continued to a point where the teacher’s friends and partner were stating they were going to march on the school and get media involved. In my professional opinion it was misuse of social media. Plus students were being exposed to the content who this teacher taught.

Now What?

This was not the first time and I raised this issue in 2015 with the HOF at the time. I found this a hard decision to make as I had got on with this teacher previously and I was not sure if she would react violently if I reported it. As stated in Hall 2001 I had to consider:

·         “Which stakeholder should be given priority? Why?

·         What restrictions are there to your actions?

·         Which courses of action are possible?

·         How should the course of action be implemented? “ (p.5)

This all occurred at the end of October just before seniors went on exam leave so these students had only a few days left. However the teacher’s junior classes still had 6 weeks. In addition I had to consider my friendship with the teacher on social media and my friendship with the teacher who had seen it and was asking me for guidance and support. The restrictions to my actions were that this was above my pay grade and level of expertise. But due to being a support person for this teacher I knew who I could go to for guidance and support. My course of action was to screen shot the social media comments and speak to the HOF who was also part of the support team for this member of staff. This led to being interviewed by senior management who had to seek guidance from the PPTA and legal support.

I still feel torn about this as the teacher no longer works here but is employed in another school and doing the same again there. So my parting reflective questions are:

What would you have done?

What measures can we put in place to prevent another school experiencing this?

References

Freshwater, D., & Rolfe, G. (2001). Critical reflexivity: a politically and ethically engaged research method for nursing. NT Research, 6(1), 526-537.

Zealand, E. C. N. (2015). Practising teacher criteria. Available online at: educationcouncil. org. nz/content/registered-teacher-criteria-1.

Zealand E. C. N. (2017). Our Code Our Standards. Retrieved from: https://educationcouncil.org.nz/sites/default/files/Our%20Code%20Our%20Standards%20web%20booklet%20FINAL.pdf