<p>Intparent – They weren’t sharing their poetry, but their analysis of a poem. :)</p>
<p>Three weeks ago, our district faced the loss of two teachers. It was ugly, and both lost a whole lot more than their jobs. The two circumstances were very different, but the district is on edge, and the message is that if you don’t like a teacher, you can ruin them. It’s sad.</p>
<p>Mainly, though, it breaks my heart to sit in a room with people who know me who can look me in the eye and say with conviction that I’m hurting their child. And my daughter is really hurting. These are her friends. Her friends parents.</p>
<p>I’m actually a big softie. Yes, I have standards, and yes, I hold form on some things. But I’m pretty open to reasonable feedback, and I’m pretty reflective about my teaching. I rout my heart into this, and I care about my students. FWIW, my students from last year (and their parents) are sending me “chin up” notes, so either In a whole lot worse this year, or something else is going on.</p>
<p>Sakacae, if your Principal gave you such a high rating, and observed the class in question, perhaps she could sit in with you for future parent meetings? </p>
<p>IMHO, These parents are trying to twist your arm into giving their children A’s, which they don’t qualify for. They have a chance to improve their grades but chose not to. </p>
<p>I am a cc professor for a class that is often likened to the “Anatomy &Physiology” of my discipline/teaching area (A&P is the weed-out class for our large cohort of pre-nursing students). Many students think it’s the hardest sequence of classes they take for their major. My student evaluations for the first class look like the class is filled with a completely random bunch because a group of them love me and a group of them hate me. You won’t hear from the ones who like you much during the semester because only the squeaky wheels need grease. After 25 years, the mean comments still hurt. I buy lottery tickets during the bad weeks and fantasize about early retirement . I am eligible for retirement, but I’m in a 403(b) plan and not a defined benefit pension situation. Not nearly enough socked away yet!.</p>
<p>I don’t know what you should do, but I have felt your pain and I respect you for trying to establish a standard and stick to it. Your policies don’t seem at all unreasonable to me and you are doing the students a favor by establishing some accountability. I wish my students had experienced more high school teachers who have high expectations.</p>
<p>ETA: While I teach cc students and not ambitious students who are aiming for high ranking schools, I did have my own two who attend a highly ranked school. They look back on the teachers who had expectations with appreciation.</p>
<p>Arrange a meeting with each parent and your principal who observed the lesson. You should be there too. Let the principal do the explaining.</p>
<p>Sheesh…it’s one assignment. Are these folks related to the parent who thought her child had a bad math teacher because the kid got an 87 on her first math quiz?</p>
<p>Re: three complaints not being usual…um…in my district, the parents talked. And there is no question it would have been easy to find a couple of other disgruntled parents because their kids got their first B.</p>
<p>It is like dominoes. One complains, and it opens the door for others to feel they should do likewise.</p>
<p>But, there are the obviously wacky parents and the legitimate complaints, and then there is another category altogether. </p>
<p>This isn’t complaining about my teaching (which is acknowledged to be good, even by the complainers) - it’s ME, as a human being. I just wonder how much of that I’m expected to take before doing the admittedly unethical thing - breaking my contract.</p>
<p>I’m trying to “man up” or “put on my big girl panties” but I can’t reconcile this. When I’ve spent countless hours tutoring your kids (for free), held practice tests for AP classes I don’t even teach at my house (and graded the tests, again, for free), met your kids on weekends at Starbucks to help with homework, etc., etc., etc. How did I suddenly become someone you can look in the eye and verbalize such hatred for? </p>
<p>I know they are under pressure. I get that. But when did teachers stop being people who deserve some dignity?</p>
<p>Thanks for the support and for the suggestions and for the ways to improve. I appreciate all the feedback.</p>
<p>I want to comment on “breaking your contract”. People leave teaching during the school year for various reasons. You will likely have to give 30 days notice, and your district can likely hold you in the position for those thirty days. </p>
<p>But you can resign if that is what you feel is the best thing to do.</p>
<p>ETA…one of my kids had a teacher who folks routinely criticized around town. In fact, when my kid was assigned to this teacher’s class, folks called me and said I needed to get her moved out. I have to say…she was not full of warm soft fuzzier, but she was one of the very best teachers either of my kids had in elementary school. She was very thorough, called a spade a spade, and didn’t let the criticisms interfere with her very fine teaching skills.</p>
<p>I think you need to give this some time…and space before making a decision. You clearly made a decision to enter teaching…and it sounds like as a second career. Don’t burn your bridges until you are absolutely sure you should.</p>
<p>I’ve seen this in spades. I’ve always refused to blame the teacher, but you also need to understand the stress that these driven kids are under. I’m sorry that you are being treated this way. Not all parents handle it well, and just because you are getting the whiners, doesn’t mean that you aren’t appreciated by the rest. However, it is not reasonable to expect students to turn in work over and over. They may be too overloaded. It is also not reasonable for parents to demand better grades. I don’t think you should back down. I can see how after your treatment it’s difficult to be introspective and ask if you are being too hard. I don’t know. I’ll tell you my kids story. </p>
<p>There was one teacher in my kid’s school who was just a brutal grader. The AP class involved a tremendous amount of work, beyond reasonable in my opinion, yet the students universally loved her because she was a great and passionate teacher and almost all get a 5 on the AP exam. She didn’t curve an iota. The class didn’t end at the AP exam though, there was still a lot of work do be done afterwards. The foot never eased up on the gas. </p>
<p>My older daughter who was an academic jock struggled mightily with her, and many a night I would ask her, what do you care more about, the grade or the education. D would always say the education, but her stress over the grade was undeniable. It was the only HS course that she didn’t get an A or better. She got an A-. I would say that this course was really useful to her, because it made her ask that question and it helped her get over the fear of not getting an A. I think it was healthy for her not to get one. I’m proud that she was able to handle getting B+'s and even a B in college without melting down. In fairness, in college she also got some As that she didn’t think she deserved. Grades are an approximation to reality. She would say that her 3.75ish college GPA was pretty close to how she perceives how well she did in college. </p>
<p>Fast forward some years later, my younger daughter had the same AP teacher and just loves the class. But she simply can’t handle the workload. She would be starting parts of assignments after midnight and lost a lot of sleep pushing herself. She eventually became so sleep deprived that she seriously injured herself in an athletic event. During rehab, she started missing assignments, and became more and more distraught. She felt horrible about herself but knew that she needed the sleep. She ended up getting a C and still got a 5 on the AP. She took a follow-on course at a college the following summer and smoked it. She too realized that it wasn’t her but that the AP class really was an unreasonable amount of work. Now she is in college and is pretty careful not to overload and she’s doing great. She chose a supportive college that filtered out the ivy league types. She still has some health issues (migraines and syncope) to this date that started during that period of severe sleep deprivation. </p>
<p>I wonder if the AP class really needed to be that much work. I wonder if the sleep deprivation did permanent damage. I wish I could go back and tell her not to do it. I never knew how late the kids stayed up. My kids regularly had 4-5 hours of homework a night in HS. That’s just absurd. </p>
<p>I stay on CC and advocate that kids to put sleep first. </p>
<p>Why am I not surprised. When things are balkanized, the last thing the school wants is someone who might not toe the party line. I suspect your friend wasn’t hired precisely because she was one of “those ________ parents”.</p>
<p>On the original topic, it would be nice if we could return to the days before grade inflation, but I’m afraid that horse is far out of the barn too. Given that, anyone who tries to spread the kids out very much is swimming against a strong current. There’s a big difference between a 3.88 and a 4.25.</p>
<p>I frankly have never liked the idea of multiple revision assignments and extra credit for this that and the other. I think its what leads to the neurosis that happens when someone who’s been getting straight A’s gets their SAT scores and they don’t match up. But I’m sure that isn’t unique to the OP. And if the AP scores improved for the class, I’d say that’s a good indication…assuming that the AP scores and the grades had a decent correlation.</p>
<p>Classic Rocker Dad - I think that your point is very valid. I have a daughter in this class, so I know exactly how much time the work takes her, and I know that it takes some students longer. I know that the work is hard, requires thought, and can take some time. </p>
<p>It isn’t impossible, though. It isn’t even close to impossible. It isn’t five hours a night - most nights it’s barely one hour. It isn’t even close to enough, IMHO. But, it stretches the boundaries of what they are accustomed to. </p>
<p>Philosophically, I think it has to. Getting your first B in college can be crushing, if you’ve never experienced having to fight through difficult subject matter.</p>
<p>These kids are applying to MIT, CalTech, Columbia, Harvard, Stanford. Their safeties are Duke, USC, UCLA and NYU. I’m not kidding. The parents I met with on Friday will not even allow their child to apply to any school but those listed above. Yet, she currently has a D in two classes, is in the 20th percentile of a class of 180 kids at a B rated school and cries every day. Whose fault are the tears? If I were her, I’d be having a breakdown, too.</p>
<p>Three nasty parents in one week does not a trend make.</p>
<p>The fact that their comments were so similar makes me wonder whether these are three parents who are friends? Or who are the type to whip up a bit of froth among themselves?</p>
<p>We have one (high school sports team) parent who disliked a particular coach’s style and record enough to send e-mails to the rest of the team parents asking the rest of us to approach the AD individually to complain, in an attempt to get the coach fired. The coach wasn’t great, but was not doing anything that was fire-worthy, either.</p>
<p>A single queen bee can cause a lot of pain.</p>
<p>I think it will be hard on my daughter. But I don’t think it will be as hard as listening to the comments that go on for hours during other classes after the students leave my class.</p>
<p>As far as revisions go, students can’t get scholarships to our state schools with a C in a core subject. The revisions are designed so that those students have some control over their grades, as the “regular” classes are not really designed to offer much academically.</p>
<p>In a prior post, I mentioned bringing in your Principal. having read your last post, now I’d suggest the GC. I assume this gal has taken the PSATs, and she probably isn’t in the top %. The parents need a reality check, or she will end up without a college admissions envelope.</p>
<p>Personally, I’d talk to some teachers I admire, who have handled parents and situations like this before. I’d get their advice, and then role play with your daughter good ways to handle her peers’ criticism.</p>
<p>When my son was in MS, the advanced English class was taught by his friend’s mom. Our families had been friends for 6 years by then. This woman is a no-nonsense teacher, with high expectations. Of course, some parents would complain to me, not knowing of the friendship. I suspect there were times it was hard for her son, being in her class. My sense of my friend is she would be straight-forward with the parents without belittling them. I know she is compassionate when a child was troubled, e.g. a divorce or death in the family. My point is that someone like her, at your school, could offer advice. </p>
<p>Just remember (as you probably know, since your D is in your high school) that if EVERY class gives an hour of homework every night AND these kids maybe have a sport with practice or a game, it is tough to get everything done and very stressful. If they have five academic classes, that is 5 hours of work. Plus if they are in music, they have to practice (my D1 used to get up early and try to practice before school, it was the only thing that worked…). And add a sport… well, my kid played on a team where at away games the coach would not let them do homework in the stands while the other team they weren’t on (JV or varsity) was playing, they had to be watching and rooting for the other team. This turned an away game into at least 3 hours of commitment (rooting for the other team, changing, warming up, playing) on a school night. Have to say I was very relieved when D2 decided to quit that sport after putting up with four years of that for D1. </p>
<p>Just saying that every teacher and every coach is convinced that THEIR activity is the most important. And our kids are squeezed in the middle… </p>
<p>You are a parent and a caring teacher. Trust your own judgement. Don’t give an inch against aggressive parents. There is nothing they can do to you. If your D is getting bullied, she should complain to her guidance counselors. </p>
<p>Perhaps you shouldn’t teach in your D’s school. It’s probably too late this year. But perhaps you can transfer to another school so that your D doesn’t face the backlash. </p>