Teacher who failed to turn up at school for 20 years finally sacked

Cinzina Paolina De Lio

Cinzina Paolina De Lio has been sacked after avoiding going in to work at her teaching job for twenty years

LinkedIn
GB News Reporter

By GB News Reporter


Published: 27/06/2023

- 16:20

A history teacher in Italy has been sacked due to 'absolute and permanent ineptitude for teaching'

An Italian teacher has finally been given the sack after avoiding working for 20 of the 24 years she was employed to teach history and philosophy.

Cinzina Paolina De Lio has been dubbed the worst teacher in the country after she ignored her pupils and came to lessons without a plan, often forgetting her textbooks.


Outraged pupils went on strike after the neglectful teacher sent texts whilst conducting an oral exam and gave feedback with no correlation to the work handed in.

The supreme court has described her as "permanently and absolutely unsuitable" for the job.

An empty classroom with a few textbooks on the tables

Her dissatisfied students walked out of her classroom

​Wikimedia Commons 

De Lio had managed to swerve her job by using sick leave, holiday time and permits to attend conferences.

Italian media have reported that in the last 20 years, the teacher would have sent 67 certificates of sick leave along with two absences due to workplace accidents.

To add to this are three bans from work for health reasons, maternity and breastfeeding leave, and days off to look after her child.

This does not even include seven periods of paid parental leave, days to assist relatives with various disabilities, and five exemptions for participation in training courses.

The Ministry of Education, University and Research building in Rome

The Ministry of Education sent school inspectors who noticed her inadequate teaching

Wikimapia


She was sacked by her school, but this kicked off a lengthy legal battle.

De Lio went to court where the dismissal provision was declared illegitimate and she got her job back, despite the awareness of her "disorganisation and carelessness".

Her inadequate and unconventional teaching caught the attention of schools inspectors during one of her rare appearances at work.

They noted that her lessons were confused and clearly improvised, their report spoke about an "absence of logical thread".

The court's decision for her dismissal has been reversed, it is confirmed she has been sacked for "absolute and permanent ineptitude for teaching".

When Italian media reached out to De Lio for a comment she responded: "Sorry, now I'm at the beach."

She added: "I don't answer questions from journalists thrown around that wouldn't do justice to the affirmation of the truth regarding my story, unique in an absolute sense."

The case has been likened to when a Sicilian maths teacher was found to have taken 769 days off in three years due to ill health, only to be found spending the time working as a consultant.

You may like