excuses to get out of drill weekend

Since BA schedules are published well in advance, Soldiers have plenty of warning and should plan accordingly. I resent our new hires for setting better work-life boundaries than our company normally has, hairy legs at work, my office sent me a random TV, and more, heres an example of a great cover letter with before and after versions, my employee cant handle even mildly negative feedback, my new coworker is putting fake mistakes in my work so she can tell our boss Im bad at my job, insensitive Diversity Day, how to fire someone who refuses to talk to us, and more, weekend open thread February 25-26, 2023, assistant became abusive when she wasnt invited to a meeting, my coworkers dont check on people who are out sick, and more. This boss is not ok, and you deserve better. 3. New comments cannot be posted and votes cannot be cast. And at least a third of us are on the introverted side. Would a forklift operator be able to opt out of forklift classes on the same grounds? This means that you are no longer allowed to serve in the reserves and will have to leave immediately. If people ask questions, you may just have to answer them. Yup. CLICK HERE to get your copy from Book Depository. Because they want to LARP like something out of a movie. For some unknown reason, my school decided to get all the terrible feelings trainings done at once, so wed be subjected to trainings on school shootings, teenage suicide, and abuse and neglect issues all in a row. He has to fly armed. Some people believe working on the weekends is bad for your productivity. I escaped HS 2 years before columbine was 8.5 mo preggo during SandyHook. So, maybe next time? Read More How to Write a Professional Email At Work (with Examples)Continue. When staff brought this and other safety concerns to upper management, these were brushed away, even though 1) they hired the trainer to come and say these things, and 2) we had violent threats and probably at least 1 or 2 lockdowns per year. It's almost perfect. Im likely close to the same age as the LW, and at the risk of making everyone feel ancient, I was born the year Columbine happened. This means that a significant proportion of the volunteer labor force comes from people who are already occupied with paid labor elsewhere. So,they understand that all you need to do is stay in bed (and watch a movie you just bought). And leaving them alone would be a big question mark to the whole face of humanity. Thanks for your practical, even-minded comment. I work for state government and am my agencys safety coordinator in addition to my regular, full-time role. -Get together with some friends and head to the range. I actually now feel I did not stress enough that this is an exceptionally dysfunctional and terrible approach, and should only be used if a) LWs knowledge of their boss says it will work and b) theyre out of other options. I remember there was someone (presumably several administrators) in the hallway repeatedly jiggling the locked door handle and it was suggested to us that they were doing so every time we were loud enough to be heard from the hallway. I was voluntold to participate in my companys active shooter drills and I said straight out NO. About 12 years ago I was medical director of an inpatient facility and we had a family member come in with a holstered gun visible. If you have a family or work obligations that conflict with your drill weekend, there are a few ways that you can get out of it. Not a drill, but my church employer, with school and preschool attached, had us all watch a video of a shooting simulation at a school. Its extra depressing and pointless when the core training package for a UK-based company with US offices includes active shooter modules. It is easier to dump them into the IRR and then some 79V has to put them back into another unit to make his numbers and repeat the process. I am happy to review written materials, but I will not be participating in a simulation., Other language you could have on-hand to use if necessary: This isnt about mild discomfort. Id either lean into something genuine and chronic (back pain? The light up shoes remind me of the fact that it regularly comes up in online forums for parents of kids with diabetes that you cant turn off some of the blood sugar monitor and insulin pump audible alarms, due to FDA regulations. So our poor security guard is stuck with trying to clear the error before the fire department responds. The number of are you feeling ok questions made me never skip it again. With 58th BfSB, it looks like i only have one drill in conflict with this semester. how do you handle soldiers and college? And leaving them alone would be a big question mark to the whole face of humanity. What could they possibly need seven hours to cover? That said, there is a little bit of the risk involved because either you will end up making them feel bad or you will actually have to leave your house if they say yes. Weve talked about where to run to and how to get the heck away from our building as fast as possible more than once. Id call in sick, but if I felt thered be any room or worry about grief Id schedule a doctors appointment for that day in advance to get some kind of note related to headaches, gastric distress, bad allergies or any other kind of generic ailment that could be having a flair-up. If your employment requires that you work on the weekend, organizing a spontaneous weekend away might not be possible. The lights were on a timer. There you go. I cried, honestly, because even though it was very low key and not big budget, it was very effective at showing what its like, to have a normal work and school day completely turn on its head. them how you need to fill up for one of your colleagues for an extra shi. My direct boss fought it and tried to get me excused, but her boss was firm that it was required. It waits till the last minute to give Soldier's orders which makes employers upset as well as Soldier. That sounds awful. I second Alisons phrasing of opting out as a prediction of the future, not as a request: I will not be participating, so how should we proceed? Just another site. Call in sick is what I would do. ] (which is, essentially, the adult version of the fire drill) and an active shooter drill (which, in my understanding, usually implies some level of re-enactment beyond what Ellis Bell (the teacher above) was describing as lockdown drills at school). What in the actual hell? It is also a less confrontational and frightening way to approach those issues, putting the onus to explain on him rather than on you. I have to do the Run, Hide, Fight video at work. (You say you dont have traditional HR, but in a large organization theres probably someone youd go to if you needed to request medical or religious accommodations, report harassment or discrimination, or turn in paperwork for FMLA. Im betting theyre planning it for some random time within those 7 hours. Have a good gaming night! This was not that, its just callous. The familyproblem makes upthe best excuses. Because lets be honest, who does not want to have a hot mug of coffee on the terrace while watching the rain pouring onto the glass of your windows, making a thud sound and yet so calming? Id never treat a younger person badly for refusing this. It was a practical tour of the various ways out of the building and a review locations of fire extinguishers, first aid kits, and defibrillators. Thankfully my boss was fantastic and made sure I didnt have to attend an actual training. Somebody is implementing this program, and is either intending it to be voluntary (and your boss is going rogue) or intending it to be mandatory and *really* not thinking it through, and either way I would think the CEO/Owner would want to know about it if you cant get anyone else to listen to you. I dont think I could do a drill again. It also can depend on what training is going on. I work in a large hospital. Depressing, yet so effective. The younger ones did. So, maybe next time? Also, your boss is a horses ass. Its just telling the kids that if a lockdown gets announced, then we lock this door, hide here, be quiet, the door handle will get tried by the headteacher, and this is the announcement that its over. Ive been participating in active shooter drills since high school, know about run-hide-fight, and know people who have died from gun violence. I doubt it. I have a perfect non-attendance record for the last 10 years of active shooter training at my firm. See if you can ask around about who started this training idea. Took a grand total of an hour and I was crying furiously by the end. It might possibly get him to realize the ridiculousness of what hes saying, but even if it doesnt it gives you a great and specific springboard for explaining to him why his assumptions are way off. It is not worth the cost to your mental health to try to justify your position any more to your insensitive boss or even, frankly, other people. As it is a work emergency,no one is going to know that you are bluffing. Add to the fact that you shouldn't be U'ed if the SM provided a valid excuse. Because somebody who had no business owning a gun was able to get one, I almost died. Also if this bunghole tries to make you feel weak for not being up for it, remember that standing up to him is a strong choice in itself. And dont give up. They are not going to find out; unless they know your father very well. single. Everyone knows how to call 911. Its not that I dont care or think its fine: I feel very grim when I read about the latest shooting(s), in a f this country way similar to how I react to new abortion bans or anti-LGBTQ+ bills, and I hate the online active shooter training module I have to do yearly for my job. She was fine, thank goodness. Whatever. It still felt stupid, though. Thats what you would be doing. I mean your boss sounds delightful so maybe he is concerned he may be a target, but the chances of you ever needing to use that mass-shooting situation at work is low. If youre a party person, in your teens or early twenties, a party at Davids is news that will stir a lot of excitement. This happened in effing Silicon Valley with the VTA shooting just 2 years ago. I think midterms and finals are possible reasons for an early dismissal the last day of drill if nothing important is going on. A few months later, my school staged this surprise mock car accident to discourage people from drinking and driving. Do you know what are the common types of spam email messages? Theres just not that much to cover. You are sick. A side hustle is any job that you do in addition to your normal or main source of income. Its the worst. Say you have cramps and start launching into period talk. I can not imagine what possible justification there is to spend an entire workday on this. The peak factor was approaching 4.5 or I couldnt find a single driver in my area will work. Teachers arent allowed to opt out. The two are not the same. Absolutely. Again, lockdown, except for the three classrooms that were directly underneath this workplace grudge-match turned fatal, we scurried like hell into the hallway to the next wings classrooms. The vultures swoop in when a shooting takes place, pretending to offer support as they build their trauma resumes and then move on to profit from death, offering lockdown training and recovery services. I HATED that we had to do these trainings it felt like being given a band-aid for a hemorrhage. Thanks for that i now have the Byker Grove theme tune stuck in my head, which made me think of 90s Ant and Dec and now ive also got Lets Get Ready to Rumble looping around in my stupid, sleep-deprived brain! There are some heinous examples of training going terribly because it is just some random person throwing a stupid plan together with no idea what theyre doing. Im worried that would get her fired. If not, I would call in sick the day before and after to solidfy the excuse. But the last one was letting us know that there were rumors of a violent event being planned for the next day. I would go with calling in sick the day of the drill. 1) Wont happen herewe are nowhere near the big city where these things happen. Im a survivor of gun violence and Ive lost a loved one in a mass shooting. Often the service of someone so discharged will be characterized as general under honorable conditions or under other than honorable conditions. he is not a nice guy. I was when I first went to this unit 5.5 years ago. And just like that, my butt is covered. Seven hours?! LWs boss is nuts. Yeah, our local transit agency shuts down a station occasionally (usually several hours on a Sunday morning) so all the emergency service people can run a training exercise. Not sure if you can find information about it in English, but here in Japan we have frequent fire and earthquake drills; there is also a very loud and scary alert that goes from the earthquake detection center to your cell phone. You already know so much more about what to do in this instance than any of us Olds who didnt do this in school. I think its 100% okay to stonewall/lie/be vague about your symptoms to protect your privacy if your boss pushes back. In the past 10 years, both employees and employers have recognized the importance of fostering a work-life balance. This kind of boss only considers puking in a trashcan as sick. And boy, was it poorly handled. Sometimes the messages are after the fact, to let us know that the school was on lockdown, but everything is ok now. We never needed to do it more often than that, and I am so thankful we never needed to do any other type of drill. Typically blanks are fired inside of the building (sometimes without specific warning) to simulate real scenarios. But in my opinion, your older colleagues have ZERO excuse for not empathizing with your concerns. Fast forward to this current moment in your life, (. If you have a medical condition that prevents you from participating in drill, you may be able to get a medical exemption. Some places would accept that and back off, others would, horribly, demand details. First, try to schedule any conflicts well in advance so that your unit has plenty of notice. You can easily use this one if the host lives far away. oh no, youre coming down with a bad cold the day before & have to leave early & advise youll wont be in the next day. You never know when that may be useful. Working too much will cause you to burn out, which will be detrimental to your productivity and mental health. The five most popular were: golf, basketball, baseball/softball, soccer, and running. It makes it less obvious that it was about the training. Unfortunately, many of our politicians (and the people who elect them) would rather our children live in danger than lose lobbying and stockholders money. But that was just about 30 minutes, not anything we had to actually do. I would not call it a mental health day and I would consider missing a couple of days so it does not outright look like I skipped the particular day. There is a debate you can maybe find evidence of online as to whether this is effective. Basically it was a whole thing staged as if some classmates had gotten in a car with a drunk driver and died, involving the local law enforcement, paramedics, etc., and framed as if it was actually happening and not a drill. When my former workplace held an active shooter training, they said it was mandatory and no one could opt out. Their representatives propose these changes. Which is even stupider than forcing everyone to do active shooter training in the first place. This is typically one weekend a month, plus two weeks during the summer. On top of that, everyone was ordered not to use their cell phones. As someone who has frequently been the only woman on the team, I certainly understand the concern of being additionally seen as different if you opt out. I learned in boarding school that a very light coat of green eyeshadow around the eyes works a treat to make that puked-all-night aura very believeable. My Dad was a St. John Ambulance volunteer when he was younger, and was a casualty in drills more than once. I hope it goes well, and click send. But youve already established your workplace isnt likely to be reasonable. 1. Combine that with the militarization of police, and these trainings are an abusive nightmare. What do you MEAN they didnt know what to do?? OP call in sick if your boss continues to be a jerk about this. they understand that all you need to do is stay in bed (and watch a movie you just bought). I cannot fathom how it has happened that even young children are expected to learn to react to someone with a gun. Want more Junkee in your life? excuses to get out of drill weekend. My employer has Active Shooter Training videos, but the intro states that if the viewer doesnt want to watch for any reason, you dont have to and heres a transcript. My sons had fire drills, but no active shooter drills. The OG excuse. Even seasoned writers need a helping hand at times, thats why we trust Grammarly Premium. Unless responding to active shooter scenarios is a commonly expected part of your job duties, theres no way this training is a reasonable requirement. Follow Alisons advice to talk to someone above her. It was a tough meeting. Im a big proponent of safety drills. Would you mind if I took you out for some drinks another time? Never the Right Word is a participant in the Awin Affiliates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to participating merchants. If you decide to go with one of the previous options, I wish you luck, strength and eloquence. I was the first person they tried to take as a hostage, it was something new. The statement Repeated [high-quality] training hones reflex actions is true. Thats about all you can do to prepare for such a horrifying, unpredictable event. No one ever said anything to me. Im Amy, and Im the person behind Never the Right Word. Heck, my dad worked in the Pentagon post 9/11, D.C. Sniper, and Virginia Tech and threat training was like an hour. Im mildly/moderately allergic to a common food that nobody else is allergic to. I do not feel safe. The problem is you have random, unqualified people thinking they can provide effective active shooter information when thats clearly not the case. When I commented to occupational health or whomever mandated the training with feedback about this needing an alternative, a trigger warning or both I was also brushed off). If you do not own a car, you might be thinking that you got to pass all the car excuses. Others believe that you should use your weekends to relax and recharge. Yeah, hes insensitive and unempathetic. I have two high schoolers, my spouse is a professor, and I work at a university too. cristina's restaurant salsa recipe. MP00 PEB Forum Regular Member PEB Forum Veteran May 21, 2012 #9 Thanks for the info You must log in or register to reply here. I didnt know any of this when I went to school that day and it was one of the worst days I can recall (my friends accident hadnt involved alcohol, but the response was almost identical). Jonathan Sandahl Former Private First Class at US Army National Guard (1996-2002) Author has 503 answers and 4.3M answer views 4 y Depending on the circumstances, yes. Now that I think about it, my workplace gives building-specific info for other types of emergency preparation i.e., I know where were supposed to evacuate and gather in the case of a fire, I know where in the building we should shelter in the case of a tornado/severe weather, but the active shooter training module was only a generic video with a generic office building showing fear and the run/hide/fight scenarios. Doesnt matter that the only reason that day is the only day available is because you told the office to schedule it only on that day. Not to deal with the threat to the campus. We watched a couple videos at my office, and had some PowerPoints. Training taken out of orientation, alert system stays. The LW said this drill was being run by law enforcement. (I am not being facetious or flip or glib here run means get away from the situation. With my tire being flat I've got no way of getting there unfortunately! You can easily use this one if the host lives far away. And a quality training, I cannot stress this enough, does not last seven hours. My all-women department once went to a shooting range for a super fun team building event at one of their self-defense courses. There are a million other much more reasonable ways to devise a safety plan. Read More 10 Effective Ways to Deal with Gossip at WorkContinue. If you also skip the second cup of coffee your ability to be perky and focused will fade through the day (confirming that the dreaded no makeup flu is getting worse!) As the first step in run-hide-fight, you totally should call in sick, say you are running. A year or so before COVID, our state decided to mandate active-shooter drills for schools. Most units require at least a month notice, but the sooner the better when it comes to requesting to be excused from drill. No job is worth having coworkers or your boss threatening to put you in harms way, joking or not. My elder kid went through a shooting at their workplace a few years ago. LW didnt really mention it as an option, though, so Im wondering if both her PTO and Sick leave is limited. Finally we learned they had just been required to offer an active shooter training by their insurance. It was a Jewish Organization, and the week prior was the shooting at the Temple in Pittsburgh. A.C is the editor-in-chief & career development expert who writes about real-world career advice on job search, interviews, career success, and hiring the right people for the team. We then had a staff meeting to discuss their concerns and a number of my staff expressed anxiety about mass shootings, workplace shootings, and what their kids went through with drills at school. A person who cant handle those wouldnt be able to work those jobs. The shooters there werent interested in us as long as we stayed on our side of the street. consider that he might be telling the truth. Yet this person always wants the group to come up with brilliant ideas to keep people from having normal human accidents, such as twisting their ankle or getting a door slammed on their hand by some other careless person. But in my opinion, your older colleagues have ZERO excuse for not empathizing with your concerns. And then if they pushed back, Id advise my staff to call out that day and I wouldnt question it. Also want to say: I hear that there are differences between younger folks experience and us middle aged people who grew up prior to mass school shootings being so frequent. We had one at my former workplace. 10 points are given just for being in the Reserves, which leaves 14 from AT + 26 MUTA (13 drill days). This sometimes makes it extremely hard to complete college assignments by their due date. We all live busy lives and we know that there will be times when we are called on to help out to babysit for a week, a weekend, or even half a day. there were no office doors to close and we had no escape roots beside the main hall, so we would be trapped. We need to do better. I empathize. Ive even had to go so far as to use a very light dusting of a slightly purple-y matte eye shadow to emphasize the dark circles under my eyes for one job (company was populated by a LOT of ex-military). Some years back, my company was adjacent to an active-shooter event it happened at another organization that rented space in the same building. If your employer doesnt want you to opt out of the subject matter entirely, they can provide alternatives to a shooter simulation like reading training materials or creating an individual safety plan. For additional context, I am the only woman in my very small department at a larger organization, which overwhelmingly skews much older. The point is, now, when you get the same news, and youre not as excited as you may have once been. There wont be chaotic running through the halls. Bring your creative projects to life with ready-to-use design assets from independent creators around the world. Agreed, why is this training seven hours long? Were in the same school district as the Tree of Life shooting, which happened on a Saturday, and the following week was Halloweensomeone called in a threat to my kids elementary school that day, and my oldest was in swimming at the time.