Schools have "fake" minimum days?

Question

A few months ago my school had a minimum day for the counselors and staff to congregate on issues in the school, etc.(At least they say) Anyway, on this minimum day I went to lunch with my dad at a Chili's near by. When we were there, however, I saw my principal, Vice principals, and all of the counselors at our school there. One of them even had a martini. They didn't recognize me, and I was able to see that our "hard working" school staff wasn't even working on school issues. I even saw them as we ate, and the hardly talked about anything school related.

Anyways, do you think our school's minimum days can just be excuses to give staff half the day off?

Answer 1

YES!! teachers have some crazy times!!

Answer 2

No. Even though I myself have gone out and had a long lunch break on a few of those days, I still worked. Not to mention that they could've just had a lunch meeting (something rare for school personnel to actually be able to do) and one of the folks wanted to unwind with a drink.

Nothing wrong with that. Be careful to not jump to conclusions.  

Answer 3

That's really an interesting question actually.  I am an assistant principal at an elementary school and I can tell you that many times we really cannot accomplish too much on minimum days.  On minimum days we dismiss at 12:29 and ten minutes after that the staff has their lunch.  We normally have a forty-five minute lunch, but are really only contractually entitled to thirty minutes.  However, we usually go with forty-five minutes as that is the amount of time the students get for lunch.  (The extra 15 minutes could be supervisory for teachers or planning time).  Anyway, on minimum days after everyone returns from lunch, at about 1:25, we really only have an hour and a half to get down to business, such as it is.  I hope that your administrators and counselors were not at lunch longer than 45 minutes or an hour; that would be inappropriate.  As far as the martini is concerned.....that's a different matter.  Not against educational code or anything, but still not good to come back from lunch smelling like a martini.

To answer your question, we don't usually have minimum days to have half the day off.  You can see from my explanation that after all is said and done we really don't have half a day.  At my school we normally have a series of workshops or professional development on these minimum days and trust me, they are more work than you would know.

It seems your administrative team has a more lax attitude on minimum days, but I hope they had a full agenda planned after they returned from lunch.  I also hope that at the very least you enjoyed having the afternoon off while your Principal, Vice Principal and Counselors had their lunch.

Answer 4

Definitely not.  We spend that half day and even more of that day after school in meetings, staff activities, group activities, meetings in other schools, support groups, lectures, presenting our own work and research, conducting research, discussion classroom issues, etc.  We use that time and we use it all wisely!!!  Some schools may give staff a specific meeting time too or depending on the activity, plan your own meeting and location and achieve your own goals on your own time frame.  That's why you may have seen them out..but regardless, they use that time to work.

Answer 5

maybe it is, maybe it isnt. Sometimes teachers really DO  talk school wise but its usually at like the teacher's lounge or somewhere to talk about stuff like that, or maybe sometimes they just say that to take a break. I mean they're teachers, I guess they need a break too everyonce and awhile

Answer 6

That is unfortunate that happened and I would bring it up to the PTSA so they can address the Principal and hold him accountable.  You can also notify the school district.