Legal Question in Employment Law in Virginia
I am an elementary public school teacher in Virginia. This year my principal has enforced mandatory lunch duty for all classroom teachers one day per week. This means that on my lunch duty day I will be with students from 8:10AM until 1:00 PM when my principal has generously allowed us to skip recess duty and eat lunch. Of course, on rainy or snowy days my students will still be in the trailer with me so, in essence, I will not be able to eat lunch alone and will be with children from 8:10 AM until 1:50 PM with no lunch or bathroom break. There are resource teachers in our building who often teach only three or four periods a day. We have spoken with our principal and shown her a spreadsheet of available teachers at midday but she is insistent that we have lunch duty. What other recourse do we have?
1 Answer from Attorneys
How about taking the issue up with your teacher's union representative?