The English department is feeling a noticeable gap due to Simon’s absence, while Jenny has renewed energy to focus on work since splitting up with Alec. Penny is forced into full-time teaching to help cover Simon's classes, however she is not ready for the challenge and clashes head on with Liz, who is trying to make her teaching life difficult as payback for taking advantage of everyone when she first started. Kurt and Brian are trying to improve their communication skills so that they have the courage to refuse extra work from Clare, but they are annoyed at J.P. as he can already do this extremely well and always gets out of doing any extra work.