After almost 10 years in the business of education, I’ve witnessed a lot: a student using my classroom phone to schedule her abortion; a parent’s tirade during a conference that ended in her slapping her 16-year-old son upside the head and him crying; a lovely young man crashing through my classroom window as a result of a fight. Oh, some days have been fan-frickin-tastic.
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention all of the wonderful, uplifting, inspirational parts of the career. I’m gonna be remiss today.
The following is how I really want to respond when hit with an overload of stupid:
Student: I can’t believe you failed me! You’re ruining my life!
Me: Your bad attitude and inability to respectfully communicate failed you. As for your life, I’m gonna go out on a limb and say your parents ruined that.
Parent: My child needs extra help, but really doesn’t want to exert himself. Can you just give him good grades and not hold him accountable because I don’t want to spend the time helping him?
Me: You should have been sterilized.
Student: I don’t understand what the assignment is telling me to do.
Me: That’s because you haven’t read it. And you haven’t read it because you’re a lazy waste of space.
Colleague (almost always a history teacher): Would you like to collaborate on a project?
Me: That’s code for you want me to do all the work. Piss off.
Administrator: Can you mentor another teacher?
Me: Negatory. If the other teacher can’t do her job, fire her. Unless, of course, I’m getting her paycheck along with her workload. What’s that? Not happening? You, too, can piss off.
Student: I did NOT cheat!
Me: There are hyper-links in your essay.
Student: HOW DARE YOU!
Me: You literally left the “Best answer voted on by users” in your response.
Student: I WROTE EVERY WORD OF THAT MYSELF!
Me: Sure ya did. And I’m moonlighting as a math teacher.
Student: I can’t do my speech. I don’t do oral.
Me: Twitter pictures would beg to differ.
Tax payers: Teachers make too much money.
Me: We’ll gladly take a pay cut if you promise to start raising your kids so it’s no longer our responsibility to teach them manners, communication skills, time management tools, meal etiquette, AND reading, writing, and arithmetic.
I’m an unemployed teacher and I approve this message.
I want a T-shirt with that phrase on it, and then, after I retire, I will travel the country attending board meetings, throwing off my jacket and exposing my T-shirt like Superman showing off his “S.” So, those are my plans for the future…
You deserve a medal! Especially for having to deal with the parent who begged you to pass their child. Why do these parents perpetuate a sense of entitlement? There’s only 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place. Not a 14th place winner. Sorry!
Oh, now, Anka, if we don’t recognize everyone’s efforts, their egos will bruise and we don’t want hurt feelings do we? . Thanks for your recognition, though; if you can make that medal out of chocolate that would be super!
I’m on it! Getting my chocolate molds out as we speak!
As a retired NJ teacher after 26 years of teaching…now substituting and teaching in FL…I have to say that your post made me feel so good to hear another teacher “venting” so eloquently!!! Well done!
The names or locations may change, but the situations are similar…kids do not want to work at all!! Why is that okay? When a parent sends their kid to school to learn, do they think it’s going to get in their brains by osmosis?
I told my son, he had to work, do his homework, and get good grades…it was his JOB!! Now he’s in graduate school…I don’t have to do a thing now..I taught him to work hard in school the first day of Kindergarten!!
Wonderful post…try to keep your sanity! The school year is only half over! God Bless!!
God Bless YOU for raising your kid! It seems like babies are accessories these days; like the KIDS who are having KIDS don’t realize they’ll eventually grow out of diapers and have to contribute to society. Yoi!
Thanks! Loved raising my son!! Trying to teach “excellence” to my drama team, also!! Don’t want them to contribute “laziness” to our society!
Your title could have been “Many Teachers’ Wish List!” I always thought I’d write a book about teaching called “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up!”
One kid in the high school class I subbed in for 8 weeks last spring, told me he didn’t have his notebook ready to be graded because: 1. The teacher who hadn’t been there in 8 weeks, never required him to do it. I did!! 2. He didn’t know what the homework was, because he couldn’t see the board from his seat! 3. I didn’t give him a chance to voice a third excuse!
Goodness, I don’t envy your gig as a sub 🙂
Yes, I’ve recuperated! Thanks!! Have a great rest of the year!! I’ll be praying for you!
A+ A well-written piece with excellent examples
You must be a fellow English teacher 🙂 🙂
Hilarious! My favorite was your student saying they don’t do oral and you saying twitter begs to differ!
Ha! Thanks! I fear that one day I will actually have the balls to say these things. I will either be amazingly awesome or in jail. Only time will tell.
Thank you for being a teacher and helping so many kids! I actually didn’t realize you were a teacher. I am constantly telling my kid’s teachers that they are saints and that I have no idea how they do it after I spend the afternoons volunteering in the classrooms!
Lol why are we so afraid of being remiss? I’m gonna try being remiss some time next week.
I’m so glad I’m not a ‘mom’ to a classroom of teens, I mean ‘teacher’! LOL! Great one liners!
Ha! Hi, Lisa!! And thanks for your kind words 🙂
Sending this to my mom, stat. And she’s an elementary school teacher. Go figure.
Oh your poor mother 🙂
34 years old here and I was brought up right by my folks. I’m reminded of the line from Back to the Future where he says about young Marty “He’s an idiot. Comes from upbringing, parents must be idiots too.”
I can’t begin to realize what it is you wonderful people (teachers) put up with on a daily basis, but my job employs a lot of high school kids for part time at night, and I get stuck with them. The sense of entitlement is enough to choke you, the drama makes you want to wring their necks, and the lack of respect towards other people makes you want to slap their parents silly.
John, bless you for hiring those kinds of kids. It’s a shame because there are fabulous students out there who deserve the spotlight, but unfortunately, those aren’t the kids we discuss in the Faculty Lounge. I guess it’s just human nature to complain about life’s frustrations 🙁