Content warning: death of a child
A reader writes:
The normally very quiet small town where we live (not in the U.S.) has been rocked by a heartbreaking disaster, and one of our colleagues was the one who was impacted, which is causing a lot of tension at work.
I teach at our local school, and a fellow teacher (“John”) and his ex-wife (“Jane”) have two children. The younger one (“River”) used to go here until John and Jane very tragically lost River in a fire at John’s house. There was a big investigation, which found that the fire was an accident that resulted from River, aged 10, leaving a flammable item on the stove while making themselves breakfast. There is a lot I could say about River and what a wonderful ray of sunshine they were and how crushed everyone was to lose them, but it’s not my place to delve into that here.
I am seeking advice because this tragedy has since caused a big rift in the community, with some people praying for John and viewing him as a tragic victim, while other people hold John partly at fault for River’s death and are actively alleging he neglects children. The fire occurred on a school day when John came to work early, leaving River to make breakfast and take the bus to school alone, as he often does. This is in contrast to Jane, who drives River to school on her weeks, but also is a housewife so she has the time to do so.
John says that was normal in the big city where he used to live, but it is very much not normal here. We all have kids and we all bring them with us to school in the morning even though they don’t have to be here until an hour later or more. They will hang out in the teacher’s lounge where at least one of us is always keeping an eye on them. Long before anything happened, it always stood out that John’s youngest was not part of that group. We would sometimes talk about how we were worried how something might happen because “you never know” and, now that it has, some folks are blaming him. However, it’s not likely that John will just move away, because his older child still lives here (although they attend a different school).
It feels selfish to bring up my own feelings after so much senseless loss, but the environment at work has become very tense and difficult. Some parents have stated that they don’t want their kids to be in John’s class, some parents and colleagues have ostracized him, and some older students have stopped following his instructions. Things are complicated by the fact that Jane and the older child (who has friends at our school) have been at the forefront of spreading a lot of the criticism, with Jane calling for his resignation and starting a court battle to renegotiate custody, which could go on for years. Despite being repeatedly advised to keep a low profile, John has instead doubled down and accused people of a “smear campaign” in social media posts. Meanwhile, all of us who work at the school are struggling to deal with distraught parents and students, not to mention extremely intrusive questions and periodic harassment from local media.
I have it on good authority that the school is in talks with lawyers because they are seriously considering letting John go in order to put an end to these conflicts constantly spilling onto school grounds. They claim that the kids who were close to River are being re-traumatized because of ongoing conflicts, and while that is definitely a real problem I think the truth is that they are sick of the negative attention and worried about the school’s reputation. The official reason is more of a technicality; he was put on paid leave but refuses it, saying he needs to work as a distraction, and has kept coming to the school.
When I first heard about this, I wanted to warn John and felt defensive of him. He is a victim here and to lose his job on top of everything feels crazy to me. He would be betrayed and blindsided by this. But then my own child showed me that John’s older child posted on social media about the siblings being left alone at home for long stretches of time at young ages, and other allegations that he has a temper (which I have never seen). At first it felt like a witch hunt, but now I feel like maybe there’s something to it.
All of this brings me to my question. Do I stay quiet? Do I give him a heads-up? And also, I really want someone who hasn’t been sucked into this whole tragedy to help me understand: Isn’t it deeply messed up for the school to let him go under these circumstances in the first place? Was it appropriate that they asked him to stop responding to people’s posts on social media? But also, I have no idea what I would do if I was in the administration. How do you give an employee grace when they are disregarding policies, because they are deeply grieving? And how long do you let it go on when an employee’s presence, through no fault of their own, keeps disturbing the sanctity of the learning environment for students, who have to be our top priority at the end of the day?
What a terrible situation for all involved, and obviously John and his family most of all.
You should stay out of it.
You don’t sound like you’re close to John, and this is very, very messy and not yours to engage with. You’re hearing things secondhand and guessing at what might be happening, and you don’t have all the information it would take to really know. You can be empathetic to John and his kids while still staying out of it.
Hopefully, hearing that should be a relief. There’s no imperative here for you to sort through conflicting stories and determine the ultimate truth. You, fortunately, aren’t one of the people who has to do that. You’re a bystander, and you can simply stay on the sidelines and let the people more closely involved sort through it. Be kind to all, and that’s it.
As for what the school should be doing: we don’t have all the information so it’s impossible to say. In general, you obviously want to avoid firing a grieving parent for actions that stem from that grief — but there are also limits to how much you can accommodate in a workplace, and particularly in a school. Empathy for John from the administration would mean talking with him kindly to explain he’s violating school policies and making it clear that while they are sympathetic to his situation, they need to require XYZ and there isn’t flexibility there. And if they’re truly on the verge of firing him because he’s not complying with those policies, it would mean telling him that very, very clearly so that he has a chance to pull himself back from that outcome, or at least not be blindsided if that’s what ends up happening.
The situation would actually be harder to grapple with if John didn’t seem to be exacerbating some of it himself, but in this case it sounds like he’s doing things that actively contribute to the tension in the situation. If he weren’t, I think the school would be in a tougher spot. Either way, though, at some point they might simply need to have a heart-to-heart with him about whether he’s still able to be effective in his role.
