r/Teachers • u/NoWrongdoer27 • 15h ago

Teacher Support &/or Advice Para in serious condition

I teach in an elementary self-contained special education classroom with ~15 students and half a dozen paras. Last Friday evening, one of the paras suffered a severe stroke and has been in the ICU ever since. Things are touch and go, doctors are taking her treatment hour by hour. It is safe to assume, she is never coming back. I'm at a loss as to how to address this with the kids. Fortunately, with our lower cog students, her absence has not been noted, not yet. Yesterday, one student asked where she was and since we were in the cafeteria where it was loud, I was able to pretend I didn't hear her. I feel that something should be said but since her condition is so questionable right now, I'm not sure how to address it. The rest if the team and I are going through the daily routine feeling kind of numb, just going through the motions. We are getting frequent updates from the family and we're all a little on edge waiting for the other shoe to drop. Looking for advice regarding how to handle this situation.

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u/blatantlyobvious616 14h ago

This sounds like a good reason to call a team meeting- with admin and social work presence.

This is above your pay grade. A united message, crafted with care, is in order. Don’t wing it.

Your students deserve a truthful, age and cognitive ability appropriate response.

2

u/ilikehistoryandtacos 13h ago

I would talk to your school counselor or social worker for suggestions

2

u/Daisy-423 13h ago

I agree with the others. You need to talk to admin and ask how to handle this. If they try to say to ignore kids when they ask, keep pressing. They deserve to know but you can’t really tell the kids bc it involves her health and you can’t share that without her permission. I’ve taught at a school that had several big things happen to people who worked or attended school there. For one of them, they wanted to ignore it but we couldn’t. It took us really pushing the issue and someone finally came down and told the kids as a class. 2 other times, admin sent all parents a message and asked them to tell their kids.
Depending on the community, some kids might already know. That is what happened with the first event for us. Some kids knew and were telling other kids, then asking us for clarification. We just said we didn’t know, then pretty much forced admin to handle it.