Is it unethical for a school...

[Anonymous]

To place a child in her parents best friends class as a 1st grader? I think that this school did a terrible job balancing out the children and teachers. Why would the school allow this child to be place in her parents best friends room. The teacher babysits for them over long weekends the parents and teacher are always together. I think it's a terrible decision based on the school and against everything the school says they are.

[Anonymous]

As a teacher, I have HATED it when my friend's child was in my class because discipline/academic problem issues became super awkward. It is possible that the teacher feels the same way you do, PP, but it is also very awkward if the teacher's friends REQUEST that their child be placed in the teacher's class (the teacher could feel cornered into accepting the situation because it would make things more awkward if the parents find out that she vetoed the placement).

[Anonymous]

Did the school administrators know that the parents were best friends with this teacher?

[Anonymous]

I think it is unethical for parents to discuss kids that are not their own child.

[Anonymous]

Hm. Well, it will be that kid's family's problem. Why on earth do you care???

[Anonymous]

I was in the class of my parents' good friend in 1st grade. I remember I was told I had to had to call her Ms. X at school instead of firstname, which what I called her out of school.. It was fine. I quickly adjusted to her in her role as teacher and there were no issues. I had more trouble with my second grade teacher who had taught my dad when he was in elementary school; my dad had been super precocious and popular whereas I was a messy, unpopular disaster. I keenly felt that she was disappointed with me (and with my dad for becoming a poor, pot-smoking poet instead of governor).

[Anonymous]

I think this type of thing happens more often than you might think. I know of several parents who have a background in teaching or education and close friends with teachers at our school and their children have been placed in their friends' classes.
I agree with the PP that says this is not necessarily a good thing for the teacher or the kid. Besides it's 1st grade. It's not like high school where it might make a difference for grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To place a child in her parents best friends class as a 1st grader? I think that this school did a terrible job balancing out the children and teachers. Why would the school allow this child to be place in her parents best friends room. The teacher babysits for them over long weekends the parents and teacher are always together. I think it's a terrible decision based on the school and against everything the school says they are.

WTF cares, other than you, OP, it is 1st grade.

[Anonymous]

At DD's school, I am good friends with the language teacher, who happened to be assigned to my child's class (I was her friend before she got a job at this school). My child calls her Mrs. X and thinks it's really cool to know the teacher personally. There has been no favoritism that I can see.

At DS's school, some of the teachers live in the neighborhood and have children at the school; inevitably some students will be friends with their own children. The principal never puts a teacher's own child into his or her classroom, but then it becomes too difficult to separate kids who know the teacher personally from kids who don't, when considering all the other important balancing that has to happen in each class selection.

This is life, OP. You need to understand that these things happen, and you have to roll with it.

[Anonymous]

I don't think it's a big deal.

[Anonymous]

Is this a Catholic school?if so rampant favoritism happens 24/7. It's just how it is.'like it or flee.

[Anonymous]

Why would it be unethical to request a teacher you know and like? It would be crazy not to.

[Anonymous]

Op, it's a stretch. You're complaint is a stretch though a professional, like teachers are suppose to be, would have had the child assigned to a different teacher or at least stopped the heavy connection outside the classroom.

[Anonymous]

If OP is the "best friend" then she should ask that her child be moved. If not, she should mind her own business.

I was a teacher in a school where I ended up with a child whose father worked for my boyfriend (now my husband). He was not my BF at the beginning of the year. I did not enjoy this situation (the child was a problem, in any class), but it was workable. It was one of those things that was unavoidable.

[Anonymous]

My sister was my kindergarten teacher. ( Very small town -- one school) We survived.