I’ll bet the school has been tracking his tardiness for a long time. As someone who has managed employees, I can tell you that it takes insanely long, even with extensive documentation, to hold employees accountable for anything. I once had an employee who was late 96% of the time for a year who, even after regular warnings and reviews, still was not fired.
People who are late are losers. There’s a saying in the military: “If you’re early, you’re on time; if you’re on time, you’re late; if you’re late, God help you.”
I will say from an HR perspective, that “if” the school ignored his lateness the other 110 times, if they didn’t write him up and give him written warnings or documented verbal warnings for any of the previous lateness’s, then they might have been on shaky grounds to fire him for the 111th.
He also claims that he was never more than a few minutes late except for one time and claims there was an “unwritten grace period” for clocking in.
On Thursday, Anderson told CBS New York station WCBS-TV that nearly all the instances of tardiness happened during an unwritten grace period for teacher arrivals in the few minutes before classes begin.
"You clock in, there's a long line and stuff like that, so you have a three-minute window," Anderson said. "In the two years, I was late more than 10 minutes only once, and I mean, you know, my car broke down."
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-jersey-elementary-school-teacher-late-111-times-eating-breakfast/
But I will also say that when it comes to clocking in, most private companies that use time clocks, especially when a lot of employees are using the same time clock to punch in at the same start time; they do have policies that allow a grace period and some use a 7 minute rounding rule for clocking in, but that is on the side of clocking in early, not for clocking in after the start time. Where I work, at manufacturing company, for hourly production workers, clocking in even 1 minute late is considered being tardy and attendance points are assessed and that is a written policy, in the handbook that they have to sign an acknowledgement for. After an employee accumulates so many attendance points, they get a written warning, and then a progressively stronger written warning and then once they reach the max number of points, they are terminated.
The problem I have as a PR manager is getting all the managers to apply the policy consistently or note where it was a pre-approved/excused lateness or whether a point was assessed. I am constantly following up on late punches and asking managers to note if it was excused or unexcused lateness.
There’s a saying in the military: “If you’re early, you’re on time; if you’re on time, you’re late; if you’re late, God help you.”
I’ve never been in the military but I follow that rule when it comes to meetings. I am amazed how many people show up to meetings either at exactly the start time or wander in up to 5 minutes late.