University Offer Refused Due to my Spoken Communication

Here is the feedback from the lecturer who interviewed me.

I’m very happy to share a summary of positive feedback. The areas where you scored well were:

1. Understanding of Safeguarding
2. Leadership potential and career aspirations – particularly your passion for supporting young people
3. Individual presentation

You also had sufficient scores in subject knowledge and resilience.

I have also included a copy of my interview record.

application –
strengths
Part time Business lecturer (teaching 16+)
Youth group leader (up to age 12ish)
Creative and Professional writing 2:1 predict Plymouth
GCSE B/C
Excellent written personal statement – high quality of written communication, with focus on supporting disadvantaged students, success
for all etc

Application –
areas to explore at interview
Knowledge of the full breadth of the English curriculum
No A level

Interview –
subject knowledge
Discussed grammar as a subject knowledge need
Discussed strengths and limitations of knowledge against the curriculum –
strong on literary historical and social context; keen on classical literature;
has researched literature on the curriculum e.g. Lord of the Flies, Christmas
Carol, Gatsby etc. Discussed how the degree included study of literature in
order to feed into understanding of writing, and writer craft. Also strong on
genres of writing and media studies (has studied podcasting, audio-video);
has also taught debate and pitching. Also studied Multicultural Lit.
SK target – grammar; Shakespeare.
Excited to teach use of language – example of microteaching loan words
and portmanteau. Also looking forward to teaching literary classics;
Dickens and the sociocultural context.

Interview-
understanding of the current educational
policy context, including any subject-
specific curriculum developments
Has been researching KS3/4 using e.g. BBC Bitesize. Aware of multicultural
literature as a priority/debate area at the moment.

Interview –
understanding of the role of trainee
teacher/teacher in the safeguarding of
children
Discussed the importance of boundaries and roles.
Has done safeguarding course and professional boundaries course for FE
teaching; aware of policies, key procedures.

Interview –
ability to reflect on prior experience
Discussed experience of teaching nonnative speakers and students from
disadvantaged backgrounds.
Asked re. difference between lecturing and teaching in school – discussed
wanting to work with young people before they are alienated. Asked re.
shared planning and shared teaching. Asked re. how many students
teachers will be expected to teach? Suggested students may be less
independent. More of a full picture of the student e.g. through
communication with parents at school.
Capacity for reflection though losing train / focus often; understanding of
schools and reflection on what it’s like to work in a school context is less
strong

Interview –
organisation including planning and
preparation for interview
Well organised

Interview –
organisation including planning and
preparation for interview
Well organised presentation. Other tasks were not completed e.g. prior
experience form.

Interview –
communication and interpersonal style
including empathy with young people
Good oral presentation; dominated in discussion task to the detriment of
other participants. Very nervous in interview and struggled to maintain
focus on questions asked.
Clear empathy with students - discussed how to help students engage with
classical literature, with example of Christmas Carol – focus on
understanding and relating to characters, looking at different contexts, look
at social issues e.g. around Christmas and presents; making themes as
relatable as possible.

Interview –
resilience and adaptability, including an
awareness of the demands of the PGCE
route/course
Expects to find organisation and administration challenging, will need
adaptations / strategies for managing workload and writing in the moment
– discussed the adaptations and strategies currently in place for this.

Interview –
leadership potential and career aspirations
Dream job would be working in special provision, able to use passion for a
subject (e.g. English / Drama / History), enabling children to be successful.

Interview –
aptitude for teaching
There is clear intellectual capacity and desire to support young people, as
well as clear capacity to teach post-16 in current role. The issues around
communication in the group discussion and interview as well as
organisational issues (not completing documents required) and lack of
confident understanding of what teaching in school is like gives rise to concerns about aptitude for teaching in a secondary school environment.

I was only invited to interview three working days before, so was not sent accessible prior experience forms which I contacted them about 48 hours before and was given in paper form on the morning of the interview, so should not have been marked down because of that.

From their feedback there are three areas they flagged up in total:

1 - Capacity for reflection though losing train / focus often; understanding of schools and reflection on what it’s like to work in a school context is less strong

2 - Expects to find organisation and administration challenging, will need adaptations / strategies for managing workload

3 - The issues around communication in the group discussion and interview as well as organisational issues (not completing documents required) and lack of confident understanding of what teaching in school is like gives rise to concerns about aptitude for teaching in a secondary school environment.

Each of these would work against you and point 2 probably raised red flags that you are likely to be hard work for them (not a fair assessment, but I suspect what they mean).

I can only assume that they had another candidate that met more criteria than you and they got the job over you.

Sometimes the breaks don't go your way, but keep applying and working on any areas you see have room for improvement and you will get the role you dream of.

I mean .1 is textbook ADHD. Both one and two are the kind of things that you would expect to see addressed through reasonable adjustments, additional time for administrative tasks, additional guidance on paperwork etc. neither of them would amount to a fitness to teach issue.

with point 3 it seems like they’ve assumed that because you have difficulty talking and communicating in a interview setting that you also would in a classroom setting. that’s not necessarily this case. making the assumption that difficulty in an interview setting would automatically translate to communication difficulty in a classroom setting could be seen as a form of discrimination. i’ve certainly heard of such assumptions described as discriminatory from time to time. They are after all two very different types of communication.

you’re not supposed to make assumptions about how peoples disabilities will affect them in their work settings; you are supposed to explicitly ask about it, to investigate. it may not of twiged with interviewer  3 that your communication difficulties in interview might have been autism driven. But assuming that someone Will have difficulty with an essential part of the job just because they had difficulty with something different at interview that was caused by their disability is a definite no no.

This is exactly what has happened yes. The deadline for them to respond to the complaint is tomorrow. Everyone keeps telling me to give up it's just an interview. But when you look at the university the students actually have a campaign going as they don't put reasonable adjustments in place for anyone it seems. www.disabilitynewsservice.com/.../

Iain said:

To my knowledge we, as autists, are not entitled to be put ahead of other more talented applicants in positions in courses / jobs etc.

If they had said there were better applicants then that would be another matter but they haven’t. in the specific situation they said the course was inappropriate for her because of her skills (or perceived lack of skills) and specifically referenced whether or not she would be able to pass a fitness to teach test.

on that basis if she’d been the only person who applied they’d have still said no. It sounds a lot more like they simply don’t want to make reasonable adjustments for her or that they just think that people like her shouldn’t be teachers.

I missed the original context a bit there. I read the following:

NAS88174 said:

I have asked them to reconsider and asked if as this was the only reason and they were again in their words aware that I had very many talents, could I complete a fitness to teach assessment

and thought it was a teaching position when her subsequent replies show it was a teacher training course. My bad.

Emma does point out that it was a prestigious university where I suspect there was a lot of competition for the places, so the same princiles of where she ranked in the application scales will be a part of the decsion making process.

I get the impression their selection process was quite rigerous and it may just be that she was outperforned by enough other applicants to not make the cut.

To my knowledge we, as autists, are not entitled to be put ahead of other more talented applicants in positions in courses / jobs etc. If this is the case and she was not as good as the other successful applicants then it may just have been bad luck. I don't think they would have discriminated just because she was autistic - or if they did, they seem to have successfully covered their bias with other justifications.

Except in this situation he was applying for university course not a job. And it’s being suggested the reason for rejecting him might be based on him being unfit to do the job. And I don’t see how that can be a valid basis for preventing someone doing a course if they would be fit to do the job with reasonable adjustments.

Peter said:

so not hiring someone because it might be more trouble or more cost to support  them to do their job safely is not on its own necessarily a justification for not hireing them

I guess in the absence of information on the other candidates we cannot work out how close the autistic applicant was - if there was a big difference in suitability in favour of another candidate and the company had met its quota for minority hires (I think this is the term they use for what you descrbe) then we cannot work out if it was just a "not as good as the other person" rejection or a "not sure we want someone who will be a bit of trouble for us" discriminatory rejection.

Looking at the level of feedback they maintained, I suspect they have more than covered themselves against a discrimination suit here.

Just my opinion based on the scant facts available to us.

Iain said:

Is this common sense from the employer or discrimination?

If I may say so your mistake is thinking the law has anything to do with common sense.

anti discrimination law is designed to force companies  to do things that hurt their economic interests for the sake of disabled people. Within reason.

so not hiring someone because it might be more trouble or more cost to support  them to do their job safely is not on its own necessarily a justification for not hireing them.

Peter said:

Both one and two are the kind of things that you would expect to see addressed through reasonable adjustments, additional time for administrative tasks, additional guidance on paperwork etc. neither of them would amount to a fitness to teach issue.

But from an interviewers perspective, if they had another candidate of comparable skills then the autistic candidate would be less desirable because of the extra efforts / costs required to make the accommodations and there would be additional risks of the autistic candidate being at risk of having their autistic traits triggered under certain circumstances.

Is this common sense from the employer or discrimination?

I think it can only be seen as discrimination if the neurotypical candidate was better or equal than the autistic candidate.

Given the attention to detail in the interview notes I think the interview panel were very thorough and noted many of the areas where the candidate was more than capable, so I can only assume that they lost out because someone else was a better fit.

The interview panel have more than covered their back with these notes and I'm sure any tribunal would compare the successful candidates interview notes and see that there was a solid reason for the decision to give the job to them.

Peter said:

Both one and two are the kind of things that you would expect to see addressed through reasonable adjustments, additional time for administrative tasks, additional guidance on paperwork etc. neither of them would amount to a fitness to teach issue.

But from an interviewers perspective, if they had another candidate of comparable skills then the autistic candidate would be less desirable because of the extra efforts / costs required to make the accommodations and there would be additional risks of the autistic candidate being at risk of having their autistic traits triggered under certain circumstances.

Is this common sense from the employer or discrimination?

I think it can only be seen as discrimination if the neurotypical candidate was better or equal than the autistic candidate.

Given the attention to detail in the interview notes I think the interview panel were very thorough and noted many of the areas where the candidate was more than capable, so I can only assume that they lost out because someone else was a better fit.

The interview panel have more than covered their back with these notes and I'm sure any tribunal would compare the successful candidates interview notes and see that there was a solid reason for the decision to give the job to them.

This is exactly what has happened yes. The deadline for them to respond to the complaint is tomorrow. Everyone keeps telling me to give up it's just an interview. But when you look at the university the students actually have a campaign going as they don't put reasonable adjustments in place for anyone it seems. www.disabilitynewsservice.com/.../

Iain said:

To my knowledge we, as autists, are not entitled to be put ahead of other more talented applicants in positions in courses / jobs etc.

If they had said there were better applicants then that would be another matter but they haven’t. in the specific situation they said the course was inappropriate for her because of her skills (or perceived lack of skills) and specifically referenced whether or not she would be able to pass a fitness to teach test.

on that basis if she’d been the only person who applied they’d have still said no. It sounds a lot more like they simply don’t want to make reasonable adjustments for her or that they just think that people like her shouldn’t be teachers.

I missed the original context a bit there. I read the following:

NAS88174 said:

I have asked them to reconsider and asked if as this was the only reason and they were again in their words aware that I had very many talents, could I complete a fitness to teach assessment

and thought it was a teaching position when her subsequent replies show it was a teacher training course. My bad.

Emma does point out that it was a prestigious university where I suspect there was a lot of competition for the places, so the same princiles of where she ranked in the application scales will be a part of the decsion making process.

I get the impression their selection process was quite rigerous and it may just be that she was outperforned by enough other applicants to not make the cut.

To my knowledge we, as autists, are not entitled to be put ahead of other more talented applicants in positions in courses / jobs etc. If this is the case and she was not as good as the other successful applicants then it may just have been bad luck. I don't think they would have discriminated just because she was autistic - or if they did, they seem to have successfully covered their bias with other justifications.

Except in this situation he was applying for university course not a job. And it’s being suggested the reason for rejecting him might be based on him being unfit to do the job. And I don’t see how that can be a valid basis for preventing someone doing a course if they would be fit to do the job with reasonable adjustments.

Peter said:

so not hiring someone because it might be more trouble or more cost to support  them to do their job safely is not on its own necessarily a justification for not hireing them

I guess in the absence of information on the other candidates we cannot work out how close the autistic applicant was - if there was a big difference in suitability in favour of another candidate and the company had met its quota for minority hires (I think this is the term they use for what you descrbe) then we cannot work out if it was just a "not as good as the other person" rejection or a "not sure we want someone who will be a bit of trouble for us" discriminatory rejection.

Looking at the level of feedback they maintained, I suspect they have more than covered themselves against a discrimination suit here.

Just my opinion based on the scant facts available to us.

Iain said:

Is this common sense from the employer or discrimination?

If I may say so your mistake is thinking the law has anything to do with common sense.

anti discrimination law is designed to force companies  to do things that hurt their economic interests for the sake of disabled people. Within reason.

so not hiring someone because it might be more trouble or more cost to support  them to do their job safely is not on its own necessarily a justification for not hireing them.