Smokers - General - HR in Schools and Academies

1 Smokers

21 Jun, 2017 14:32

Hi all,

We have a number of smokers on our staff who currently leave the school site to take a cigarette break. Unfortunately, this means that they tend to congregate outside our community neighbours' properties and we have received complaints from a couple of local residents about this. We do encourage staff not to smoke and have support within school for staff (and students!) who wish to quit, but we cannot make them do this.

I'd like to ask what other schools and academies do about their staff smokers and where they are allowed to take their breaks please. We've already asked them not to stand directly outside of the academy site entrance as this doesn't give a good impression to students, parents or the local community. However, it appears that this has simply moved the problem along the road a bit!

Any advice would be gratefully received.

Thanks,

Sharon

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Robey | 0 Posts

21 Jun, 2017 15:28

I remember my wife once worked for a US company which made it misconduct to smoke on the same day as one was going to work.

You could take a similar, draconian approach and, for example, ban staff from smoking within a mile of the school. Difficult to enforce, of course, and perhaps not setting the sort of tone for the dialogue you would hope for.

I think my first step would be to arrange a consultation with smokers to explain the situation (their smoking is damaging the school's reputation and relationship with its neighbours, which is naturally vital to the school's success, plus setting a poor example for pupils) and see what they would be prepared to agree to.

Be clear about what problems you're looking to solve and be ready to consider some unexpected proposals from your smokers.
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