Youdon’tsay, it’s even worse that you were overlooked because of racism, and that other students were treated differently. I’m white; it could have been sexism but it was a girls’ school. This GC was awful to everyone. And there were plenty of students headed for college, the school was selective, and the nuns (almost all the teachers were nuns) were committed to our academic development. I don’t know how that GC was ever hired.
Our experiences so far with “Guidance Counselors” have been so negative we’ve avoided them almost completely.
One thought DD16 should be an art student because on that particular day DD16 was wearing contact lenses that made her eyes look like snake eyes. And of course if you wear fun contacts, you can’t be a serious student. (holds up sarcasm card). DD16 had never taken an art course or displayed any interest in art-what orifice the gc pulled that out of, I’ll never know.
The second time we saw another one and she looked at DD16’s potential schedule and said “wow, you’re one of those smart kids, I never know what to do with y’all, you should be fine with whatever you want to take”. Really?
It seems the decent guidance counselors are the unicorns of the academic administrator world.
In my daughter’s NYC public school, the guidance counselors are doing things like helping pregnant or homeless students, so we didn’t get help there, but one of her teachers who was having a second career after being a research scientist stepped in and helped some of her students. That worked fantastically well.
My son is in a private school and has gold-plated counseling. Each counselor has about 10 kids and knows them well. She started with them in freshman year and has marched them through every step in the process. He starts senior year tomorrow, has his main essay, supplements and testing done AND has a completely solid list that was created with her significant input. His applications for EA must be in to her next week for submission by October 1. The best thing about all this is that I have never had to have a single word about this with him, so we had no arguments or disagreements. I love, love, love that.
I may adopt the gladiator parent label, since it probably fits me better than the helicopter concept. My goal is not to hover in order to protect my child from danger and harm, nor is it to ease her way by toppling all obstacles in her path with my adult strength. But when she self advocates with appropriate actions to address concerns and resolve issues, but the adults in charge do not give her the consideration and respect she deserves as a student, then I go into action. Today ended up being a fighting day, since she had been trying to deal with 4 different high school administrative snafus and was getting the run around for all four. Enough–she can’t be forever missing class so she can rush from office to office and teacher to teacher and then in the end still be told that nothing can be done. So I had to e-mail 3 different staff members, and I was pretty darn firm and demanding. In my experience I’ve found that when petty tyrants are being difficult, you can show no mercy or they’ll take you prisoner first. Miraculously, what was supposedly impossible to do when daughter asked, is now possible (or at least in 3 out of the 4 situations. I am sill waiting to hear on the 4th). Sometimes people are lazy and indifferent, and think they can just blow off a kid if they don’t want to be bothered. In my opinion, a special place in hell waits for those who mess with inexperienced, vulnerable kids, but it happens quite regularly.
A helicopter parent is annoying to the school, coach, etc…
A gladiator is just a little scary:)
But my guess is that whether the parent is a gladiator or a helicopter the student winds up in a better position than he or she would have been had there been no intervention at all. At least in the short run.
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A helicopter parent is annoying to the school, coach, etc…
A gladiator is just a little scary:)
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lol…so true
I remember one annoying (dumb) mom who made a HUGE deal over the fact that a teacher put ( - 0 ) on the top of her DD’s perfect paper. “Minus Zero!” she kept whining about…“How negative!”…and on and on…as if the teacher had done something really bad…lol… The rest of us parents were rolling our eyes.
And parents who have no idea what is even going on at the school as it relates to their children are even scarier.
There are some moms and dads who love to tout their lack of involvement as the epitome of virtue, both theirs and their child’s. They believe it indicates that their offspring is exceptionally mature and self-sufficient because he does not need any help from them to manage his life. Similarly, they brag about their noble ignorance of their child’s grades, homework, and details of school life, thinking it means they are completely innocent of living vicariously through their children. That’s great, but only if it’s true. What I have found is that in most cases it just means that the parents have no clue at all about some pretty important things they ought to be concerned about, or else that they suspect there are some legitimate concerns but turn a blind eye and ear because they are simply way too busy or maybe too lazy to do anything about it.
You all are lucky if your schools and their personnel are responsive, competent and empathetic such that there are no serious bureaucratic problems, or none that your wonderful kids cannot solve on their own. No doubt there are some fantastic private schools, and some small, affluent publics where that is the reality. However, in our public school, all three of my kids have had problems with things like getting grades and other transcript errors corrected–even with all the necessary documentation and proper forms filled out and signed by the relevant parties. In the end, as I did again today, I had to get involved to insure the problems were addressed after weeks of stalling and inaction on the part of the staff. Imagine the surprise of some smug parents–you know, the ones who roll their eyes and say they simply can’t understand why people like me always have issues–when they learned their own kids’ transcripts were also wrong, but they never noticed until after the grades were already sent off to colleges. And they only noticed then because they heard me tell my story and figured they had better check too. In one case, the grading program was wrongly programmed such that it treated one quarter of gym as if it were a full year course, meaning the grade was divided by 4, and the same idea for half year electives.
There was a discussion in the Prep School Parents forum about whether boarding school parents are “free range parents”, or do they just out-source the 'coptering.
One mom identified herself as a “Ninja Parent”. DS did something totally asinine at his boarding school, and this “ninja parent” drove 7 hours thru the night to surprise son in his dorm room to read him the riot act.
Lol…
I’m definitely gladiator but I didn’t know it. I fight for unfairness so that every kid like mine has a chance.
I’ve managed to get a high school teacher fired, a middle school teacher cried, a middle school counselor wondered what the word Amish mean. And best yet, the the whole gifted identification process in elementary changed so it’s became fairer. My kid didn’t benefit but I’m happier in the long run because there was nothing to complain.
@drgoogle I have you beat…lol…I got THREE high school teachers fired. lol…all for the betterment of all the kids. …those three teachers HAD TO GO.
One of them absolutely refused to do any teaching for two straight years (chem teacher) because her H had left her two years before. She’d come in, sit down at her desk, and tell the kids to form groups and read their books…no labs, nothing. She sat at her desk and just blank stared. She refused to get help/therapy. She had to go.
The second one, the Algebra II teacher was truly an idiot. Vandy EdD (somehow??), but truly an idiot.
The third one (a priest!)…lol…I swear he took the job because he wanted afternoons off to golf. He required a two page essay delivered on his desk every Monday at 8 am, no matter what class you were in. He’d return them with just some odd grade on the top, but no marking anywhere else to show WHERE/WHY points were being deducted. The students quickly realized that he wasn’t reading ANY of them, just throwing a grade on top…so the kids started printing out the same essay, week after week, just changing the dates…and he never noticed. The kids gave me their papers, I cut their names off, requested a meeting with him and the principal and showed them the papers. Some of the papers had random crap just copy/pasted in the middle for filler. Some just had their names written over and over. I think the principal took the day off after that…maybe the whole week. lol The priest, who was really a CPA by training, was put where his real skills could be of use.
One of my kids’ fave teachers thanked me and said, “now they are ‘blessing’ students elsewhere.”
Dance of the Lemons
When my youngest was in kindergarten he had a leave replacement teacher (newbie, no seniority). He had not yet been diagnosed w Aspergers and was a huge handful…she could not get the administration or the school psych to do anything. Finally she asked me to confront them bc I’m “a little bit scary” apparently. I’m not mean, but I am a no bullshh mom. I don’t care about the social “piece” or their zero tolerance crap. It came to a head when the principal suspended him at age 5. I called BS, and went right over all their heads.
Now luckily I have $ and insurance and could get my own diagnosis. And his dad is very experienced in school politics and we pushed it all through. I am not above telling a teacher or administrator when they are breaking the law just to keep order. And I am not above shaming them by showing them the cuddly 5 yo crying in my arms by saying: remember, this is the little criminal we are talking about here. He’s a baby…you are an adult!
And I flat out told the principal she will not turn the next John Irving into an accountant just to convert another step ford kid to keep the peace.
Ninja, Gladiator? Whatever is required and nothing more! (Momma bear…when you injure her cub…)
<<< principal suspended him at age 5.>>>
Wow…who suspends a 5 year old! for what?
Seriously, sing the praises of the your kids’ awesome teachers (and my kids had some AWESOME ones!), but pressure the schools to clean house and get rid of those who wouldn’t recognize Common Sense if its name showed up in their roll books.
@mom2collegekids Hitting the teacher (she says she knows she got in his safety zone)!
I wish I still had the suspension letter! I was going to use it at his wedding one day! Lol! Yeah, I’m the mom that laughs at stuff like that:)
Now his 1st grade teacher was the bulldozer. Kindergarten had no power, but she could choose is 1st grade teacher. She chose a 30 year veteran. She made things happen.
He now wants to be an earth science teacher bc of one of his middle school teachers. My oldest claims his 1 grade teacher changed his life to this day!!
yay for the great teachers!!! And administrators too, the special Ed admin sees him as their greatest success story. She really was personally invested!
mom2collegekids i have a whole new level of respect for you! i realized i was a gladiator when the principal said, “let’s meet in my office so we can record our conversation”