Do room parents get preferential treatment?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers are professional. Professionals do not show favoritism. Teachers should not be casual, friends, with parents. Too much hanging-out at the school by the Room Mom is a problem.

It means they have problem kids

Not in my case. I literally put in the time all year because I wanted to be at all the class parties, I wanted to go on the feel trip, and I wanted a good enough relationship with the teacher that I could let her know my preference for the following year’s teacher. At our school, the current year teacher places her students for the following year. I always got my preferred teacher for the grade. This was of high value to me.

This is disturbing. Being given preferential treatment around volunteering is one thing, but also around class placement. Wow.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow- not normal, IME. I was room parent a few times and there was no preferential treatment. Usually the teacher sent out a signup genius and it was first come, first serve (for the first trip) and for any additional, parents who had NOT chaperoned yet got first dibs.

For parties, it was also signup genius for helpers- but any parent was always welcome to join and that was clearly stated.

This only seemed to be an issue in the very young grades. Usually by later elementary it was hard to find volunteers.

Our teacher uses sign up genius, but I’m still iced out as a new parent to the community. Despite a note on the sign up page that parent should sign up for one slot, there are a handful of known moms who sign up for all the slots. For example, story reader. There is a slot once a week and we have never had the chance to read in class. This weekend DC’s grandma is visiting and I looked months ago to sign up for her and of course the slot is already full with someone who has already volunteered in class multiple times and various roles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a room parent and we have a similar lottery for field trips. However, I am always give. First right of refusal since I spend a lot of time volunteering with the class, know all the kids, and the teachers know me. If a teacher is going to put a parent in charge of a group of elementary schoolers you bet they are going to lean on the ones they know.

That does not make sense at all. Such a system puts most volunteering opportunities in the hands of people who already have the opportunities. Any parent who goes through the volunteer training should have an equal chance. Handling a group of elementary schooler is not hard!

NP. And yet, some parents are very bad at it. They don't pay attention to instructions, they imagine that they are on a special outing with their kid and ignore everyone else, they argue (!) with the teacher about rules, etc.

I agree that it's unfair, but I would rather the chaperones take the job seriously.

OP, I avoided being room parent like the plague but if I got a chance to chat with the teacher at "back to school night" or during a conference I would always mention that I liked to volunteer for field trips and that I was very good at following the teacher's instructions. They would laugh, but also be like "yeah, good." I was never buddies with them but always tried to be helpful (like drop off extra t-shirts on tie dye day). I had pretty good luck going on field trips, though there may have also been less competition for it. Hard to know.

This is the truth. I went on DC's field trip this week. Teachers clearly said NO GIFT SHOP. One mom decided "rules for thee and not for me" and took her crew in for handfuls of candy. We were away from the school a total of 3.5 hours and every other kid managed to follow the rules. It was totally absurd.

Yikes. That mom should be on the no chaperones list from now on.

[Anonymous]

At my old school, I saw this first-hand. We also had a lot of teachers with kids in the school. The lottery for field trip volunteers was ALWAYS rigged and the teacher-moms always got to go. I really thought this was unfair.

We don’t do this at my current school. We just sent out the signup for our second field trip. We asked parents who went on the first one to wait a few days to sign up so that others would have a chance.

It shouldn’t be about “rewarding” parents who volunteer. We should be making sure that as many kids/parents as possible can share some ES experiences.

On a related note, my old school had a “Volunteer of the Year” award. One year, it went to a dad who was independently wealthy and didn’t have to work. He had more money than he knew what to do with and just hung out at the school all the time out of boredom. I felt like it should have gone to a working mom who had to take time off work to volunteer or a SAHM who had to arrange childcare for younger children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a room parent and we have a similar lottery for field trips. However, I am always give. First right of refusal since I spend a lot of time volunteering with the class, know all the kids, and the teachers know me. If a teacher is going to put a parent in charge of a group of elementary schoolers you bet they are going to lean on the ones they know.

This doesn't make sense. Since you're always around, they should allow other parents to chaperone before going to you. Lots of parents really do want to participate when they can. You should back out of all of the extra volunteer opportunities to give other parents a chance.

Huh? Your answer makes no sense. Why should room parent do the grunt work of doing the room parent duties for no rewards? Yes, I think of chaperoning as a "reward" for parents because they get to experience an outside school activity of their child and get to take cute pictures. "Volunteer opportunities" are doing the "room parent" work. No one is fighting to do those.

IMHO, teachers tend to lean towards reliable, friendly and sensible parents that they know. Especially in a situation where the safety of all the kids is very important.

[Anonymous]

None of the parents of kids with behavioral problems show up to chaperone.

I was told that there were no slots left when I wanted to chaperone my kid one time. I went to the principal and told her that I will pay for whatever it costs for entrance to the event. They told me that the bus does not have enough space. I told her, I will drive my own car and be ready to meet the group at the entrance of the event. This is what happened. And no, the truth is that there are never enough chaperones.

[Anonymous]

Being a room parent isn't the only way parents can volunteer in the school. There's no reason to put them on a pedestal when other people put in the effort just as much if not more, or contribute in other ways. I'm not a room parent but I put in many more hours in a volunteer capacity than the room parents do. I prefer the sign up genius route which gives everyone a fair shake. Let the rooms parents be the alternates if someone can't make it last minute if they have already had a turn chaperoning, like anyone else. But to act like they are the hardest working most selfless volunteers in the school who NEED this perk is ridiculous. I ask for nothing in return for the volunteer work I do. In the past 2 years I have chaperoned only 1 field trip and I have 3 elementary aged kids. I'm not often quick enough for the sign up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers are professional. Professionals do not show favoritism. Teachers should not be casual, friends, with parents. Too much hanging-out at the school by the Room Mom is a problem.

It means they have problem kids

As a former teacher, this. The teacher can really only take one “special friend” to sit next to her all day. I’d expect that at least some of those kids have behavior plans behind the scenes. Their parents presumably know how to handle them in a very disregulating environment, OR the teacher wants them to see how their kids’ behavior compares to the norm. Trust me, you don’t want to be the parent who “has” to go on every field trip.

[Anonymous]

This definitely goes on at our school. The room mom is super active in the PTA and constantly at school. Sucking up to the teacher is seemingly her full time job. It’s kind of wild.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Being a room parent isn't the only way parents can volunteer in the school. There's no reason to put them on a pedestal when other people put in the effort just as much if not more, or contribute in other ways. I'm not a room parent but I put in many more hours in a volunteer capacity than the room parents do. I prefer the sign up genius route which gives everyone a fair shake. Let the rooms parents be the alternates if someone can't make it last minute if they have already had a turn chaperoning, like anyone else. But to act like they are the hardest working most selfless volunteers in the school who NEED this perk is ridiculous. I ask for nothing in return for the volunteer work I do. In the past 2 years I have chaperoned only 1 field trip and I have 3 elementary aged kids. I'm not often quick enough for the sign up.

Yeah. I don’t like the sign up genius. It favors SAHM parents who have more time to check email and will see the sign ups first and therefore get the slots and fill them before anyone else even sees the sign up genius. The teacher should give one week to see who wants to go and then pull names from a bag in front of the students. That would be fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At my old school, I saw this first-hand. We also had a lot of teachers with kids in the school. The lottery for field trip volunteers was ALWAYS rigged and the teacher-moms always got to go. I really thought this was unfair.

We don’t do this at my current school. We just sent out the signup for our second field trip. We asked parents who went on the first one to wait a few days to sign up so that others would have a chance.

It shouldn’t be about “rewarding” parents who volunteer. We should be making sure that as many kids/parents as possible can share some ES experiences.

On a related note, my old school had a “Volunteer of the Year” award. One year, it went to a dad who was independently wealthy and didn’t have to work. He had more money than he knew what to do with and just hung out at the school all the time out of boredom. I felt like it should have gone to a working mom who had to take time off work to volunteer or a SAHM who had to arrange childcare for younger children.

Boy! Never mind the mouths of gift horses, you take the cake here, hun!

[Anonymous]

I was room parent most years and also was a classroom volunteer every year that teachers asked for them. I never once chaperoned a field trip. I felt like I’d put in enough time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a room parent and we have a similar lottery for field trips. However, I am always give. First right of refusal since I spend a lot of time volunteering with the class, know all the kids, and the teachers know me. If a teacher is going to put a parent in charge of a group of elementary schoolers you bet they are going to lean on the ones they know.

This doesn't make sense. Since you're always around, they should allow other parents to chaperone before going to you. Lots of parents really do want to participate when they can. You should back out of all of the extra volunteer opportunities to give other parents a chance.

Huh? Your answer makes no sense. Why should room parent do the grunt work of doing the room parent duties for no rewards? Yes, I think of chaperoning as a "reward" for parents because they get to experience an outside school activity of their child and get to take cute pictures. "Volunteer opportunities" are doing the "room parent" work. No one is fighting to do those.

IMHO, teachers tend to lean towards reliable, friendly and sensible parents that they know. Especially in a situation where the safety of all the kids is very important.

+1

[Anonymous]

Parents who aren’t around all year for the work of class parties, reading buddies, field day, etc. shouldn’t be the ones jumping in to show up once on a field trip. Of course parents the teacher knows and trusts will get preference for field trip spots.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers are professional. Professionals do not show favoritism. Teachers should not be casual, friends, with parents. Too much hanging-out at the school by the Room Mom is a problem.

It means they have problem kids

It also means their problem kids don’t get disciplinary records for bullying and physically hurt other kids. To answer your question, OP, yes, room parents and their close circle receive disturbing preferential treatment.

+1