Reply to NY times op ed on the teacher crisis

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Daycare workers ... truly the MOST underpaid profession. We really need to fix that, among other gross issues in the American economy. [/quote]

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But that does not excuse parents from treating teachers like crap. 
[/quote]

Please give examples of parents treating teachers like crap. This is not something I observe in my school. At all. I think sometimes parents can be ignorant of some of the pressures that teachers are under, but that's different. I mostly see parents who are respectful, supportive, and offering help. In fact I think when teachers at our school get frustrated with parents, it is often because they are offering the wrong help. But that's not "treating teachers like crap." It's a communication/expectation problem.

The two examples given on this thread are (1) sending emails about things that seem petty or pointless, and (2) refusing to address behavioral issues at home. The first, I think, is ridiculous. All jobs involve dumb emails, you learn to deal with them efficiently and you can't let it get to you. That's not a teacher-specific complaint. The second is more serious and is a genuine issue, but even there, I wouldn't frame it as parents "treating teachers like crap." I view it as parents struggling to parent, who likely had poor role models and/or are poorly resourced now. It is a real problem in education and probably a major source of teacher attrition, but I don't think it can be accurately summarized as "parents treating teachers like crap." More like "parents failing to adequately prepare and socialize their children for school."

The issue of the pandemic is a separate one but again, other than on these boards, I didn't see or even hear parents berating or criticizing teachers. I heard criticism of the teachers' unions, frustration with administrators and the mayor. Heck, I heard a lot of complaints about other parents, when people felt that their fellow parents weren't adequately advocating for what we needed. I didn't encounter much teacher bashing except for on DCUM, and even here much of the criticism was couched as "I fully respect teachers but am frustrated with the unions approach on this." That's not teacher bashing.

So I'd really like to know where it is that parents are apparently openly berating and criticizing teachers. It is not my experience at all, which perhaps is why I am confused by the argument that teachers are quitting because parents are terrible. [/quote]

In APS, parents were screaming at teachers and cursing at them during virtual school. APS parents also threw public tantrums on Facebook and Twitter hating on teachers. It was disgusting. 
[/quote]

Well I'm in DCPS and I'm not aware of any incidents like that. Certainly not at our school and as far as I know, nowhere else either. As for Facebook/Twitter, I feel like parents were falling all over themselves thanking teachers and supporting them, even when the closures when on longer than people were happy with and they started to grumble quietly amongst themselves. But even then, those conversations were not "teachers suck" but more like "this situation sucks and I'm frustrated with the mayor, the district, and the union for not being able to figure this out."

I wonder of the teachers who left APS left the profession altogether or just left APS. Because that doesn't sound like a common situation. I have family who are educators throughout the US and while the pandemic was incredibly hard on them (as it was on everyone) none of them have ever experienced anything like that. Their complaints are entirely about school administration and district policy. They might grumble a bit about parents but it's not a central complaint.[/quote]

Also want to note that I saw some stuff during virtual school that I was not happy with, and my response was to just let it all slide. Because I felt like the situation was terrible for everyone and no way was I going to express frustration over even stuff that I think is pretty problematic (relating to teaching approach and in particular how some kids were addressed by the teacher) in the middle of a pandemic when I knew everyone was at their wits' end. That's how most parents I know handled it too. Like "well it's not great but now is a time to be forgiving and cut people some slack."

So basically the opposite of teacher bashing.[/quote]

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