Teacher who skipped work for 20 years has finally been sacked

A teacher in Italy has been sacked after successfully avoiding work for 20 years (Representational image)

A teacher in Italy was sacked after successfully avoiding work for two whole decades. Cinzia Paolina De Lio took her employer to court after she was dismissed in 2017 for showing up to work for only four out of 24 years in the job.

When she did show up to work, De Lio was distracted, made up lesson plans as she went, forgot her textbooks, texted in the middle of class and showed a remarkable lack of preparedness, local media has reported.

A philosophy and literature teacher at a school in Chioggia, near Venice, she used sick leave and holiday time to get out of teaching. She also went on conferences and used that as an excuse to skip school. In her time away from work, De Lio managed to get qualifications in pet therapy and criminology.

During a four-month period in 2015 when she did actually show up to work, according to BBC, De Lio caught the attention of a school inspector who noted that she looked confused and appeared to be making up her lessons as she went along.

Her students complained when she was caught messaging during oral exams and handed out grades that did not line up with how the students actually performed.

After her dismissal in 2017, she took her employer to court and was reinstated on appeal in 2018. However, in a counter-appeal, a judge reversed that decision after discovering that she had shown up to work for only four out of 24 years.

Italy’s highest court recently confirmed the dismissal after a long-drawn legal battle, according to BBC, but De Lio maintains her innocence. When reached for a comment, she told Italian newspaper Repubblica that she would “reconstruct the truth” and had documents to prove her story, but could not talk as she was at the beach.