Hey everyone,
I originally posted this in r/OntarioTeachers and was pushed to post it here as well by Reddit
I’m hoping someone here has some experience with this because I’m honestly pretty stressed about it.
I am in Ontario and accepted a teaching job in Manitoba on June 24, 2026. It wasn’t a formal contract or anything; just a verbal agreement that was confirmed over email and text. After that, something came up in my family/personal life and I realized I couldn’t go forward with the job. I was sent a contract to sign but never signed the document. I let them know on July 8, 2026 that I would regretfully need to withdraw my acceptance.
I didn’t go into detail about the reason. I’m a private person and it was something personal, so I left it at that.
They replied saying that I would be breaking my contract (one I never signed) by not accepting the position and that I would only be allowed to resign after December 30th. I then responded again confirming that I would regretfully not be going forward with the job.
It was about two weeks later, and still well before the school year, so I thought I handled it reasonably; especially since nothing had been formally signed.
After I sent that message, I didn’t hear anything back from them directly. The next thing I received was an email on the 15th where I was cc’d on a message they sent to the Ontario College of Teachers, stating that I was extremely unprofessional and had refused to fulfill a contractual obligation. There was no follow-up, no attempt to ask for context, nothing; just straight to a complaint.
I take teaching seriously, and seeing something like that sent to OCT without any prior conversation is pretty unsettling.
I’m trying to understand what this actually means, so if anyone has been through something similar:
does this kind of complaint usually go anywhere?
does a verbal acceptance over email/text really matter if nothing was signed?
how worried should I actually be?
what should I expect when I talk to OCT?
I feel like I acted in good faith and gave reasonable notice, so the whole situation feels pretty over the top.
Any insight would really mean a lot right now. Thanks.
Also, I have left a message with the complaint inquiry department at the OCT and waiting to hear back from them.
Thanks again,
FartFart5
EDIT - Recently got off the phone with OCT - they said that there’s two avenues; public complaint and employer complaint. Both of them first get discussed with OCT themselves to find if there is actually a complaint worth discussing and moving forward with. They couldn’t tell me if there was a complaint against me or not but told me they would first need to determine what category it falls under. If employer, and found substantial, they would then need to essentially fill out a bunch of paperwork to tell OCT that they do want to go ahead with an investigation. I would be notified and then investigated to determine if this complaint has legs. Public is similar but essentially fast-tracked. Either way, the rep seemed empathetic towards my experience and agreed with me saying “so no news is good news”.
Thanks for all the support everyone!