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I was recently asked to tutor a child after school. I told her mom i normally do not tutor after school, but I would make an exception. I just ask her to be at school at 4:00.
On the way to the front of school, the girl told me she was gonna ruin my day. Her mom had gone out of town, and her sister was gonna pick her up, but her sister was at her boyfriend's a half hour away.
Well I was ther till 4:45.
Unbelievably the mom called the next day, and asked when was I tutoring after school again. No apology, no nothing,
My response was "never." She got angry. I did, not care.
Good for you.
One bad thing is that the mom is probably telling administration and all of her friends and neighbors that youare cold, uncaring, unprofessional and really don't "do it for the love of the children".
Even worse is that the mom probably has no idea that she did anything wrong in this situation.
Appreciate your sentiment, but I hope she tells her whole world I am an azz. Nothing could make me happier. I am an old guy, and too good for the admin to mess with. Admittedly a new teacher could not be so blunt, but actually, an answer of never was pretty polite, for me!
Appreciate your sentiment, but I hope she tells her whole world I am an azz. Nothing could make me happier. I am an old guy, and too good for the admin to mess with. Admittedly a new teacher could not be so blunt, but actually, an answer of never was pretty polite, for me!
We need more teachers saying, "No", "Never", "Absolutely Not", "That is an unreasonable request", "That is beyond the scope of my job" and "Are you f*****g crazy?!?" (probably not the last comment) when parents make unreasonable demands. Maybe society will "get the hint" that it is wrong to treat teachers that way.
I always found it interesting when I taught orientation and mobility to blind children, parents wanted me to work before or after "school" because this is not a "real" class. Not important like math or English or whatever. And "Johnny" can't miss music, that is his favorite class....yada, yada...or computers.....blah, blah...
Okay. If, "Johnny" can't get to those classes on his OWN, do you think he will be able to go to college or get a job, or even take care of himself?
And of course, I want to work every day from 6 am to 6 pm. For free. I get paid for 7 hours and ten minutes. From 7 am to 2 pm. Those are the hours I work. You want your child to have mobility instruction, those are my contracted hours. Done.
Even administrators "thought" I should be more "flexible". Do they ask math teachers to work until 5 or 6 pm? Do other parents tell teachers what time they want their child to have math class? I could go on and on...and on...how about the parent who wanted "mobility lessons" to be, "He needs to go to the Social Security office, I will send him to school with the paperwork". Really? No.
Last edited by jasper12; 03-30-2013 at 09:20 AM..
Reason: edit
I always found it interesting when I taught orientation and mobility to blind children, parents wanted me to work before or after "school" because this is not a "real" class. Not important like math or English or whatever. And "Johnny" can't miss music, that is his favorite class....yada, yada...or computers.....blah, blah...
Okay. If, "Johnny" can't get to those classes on his OWN, do you think he will be able to go to college or get a job, or even take care of himself?
And of course, I want to work every day from 6 am to 6 pm. For free. I get paid for 7 hours and ten minutes. From 7 am to 2 pm. Those are the hours I work. You want your child to have mobility instruction, those are my contracted hours. Done.
Even administrators "thought" I should be more "flexible". Do they ask math teachers to work until 5 or 6 pm? Do other parents tell teachers what time they want their child to have math class? I could go on and on...and on...how about the parent who wanted "mobility lessons" to be, "He needs to go to the Social Security office, I will send him to school with the paperwork". Really? No.
And, I'm sure that administrators offered you extra money or comp time for staying late to work with the child and/or parent. Brahahaha!!! Of course they didn't!
Here is the worst experience that I ever had with a jerky administrator who wanted me to be more "flexible". The psychologist wanted to be accommodating to the parent of a new special education student so she arranged for the initial IEP to be scheduled after the mom got off of work, without asking anyone else first. The psychologist told me that the IEP was scheduled for 7:00 PM (instead of during our work day). I told her that it wasn't good for me because my son had an activity that I needed to attend that night. The administrator said "I don't care, cancel it and be at the IEP."
So, we held the IEP and it ended about 9PM. Where was the psychologist? She told the mom that she couldn't be there because she needed to be home with her children.
The bright spot was that the other administrators, who had to be there, got angry at the psychologist for scheduling it so late and I never had to attend another late, late IEP.
The psychologist told me that the IEP was scheduled for 7:00 PM (instead of during our work day). I told her that it wasn't good for me because my son had an activity that I needed to attend that night. The administrator said "I don't care, cancel it and be at the IEP."
So, we held the IEP and it ended about 9PM. Where was the psychologist? She told the mom that she couldn't be there because she needed to be home with her children.
The bright spot was that the other administrators, who had to be there, got angry at the psychologist for scheduling it so late and I never had to attend another late, late IEP.
Oh, dear gawd. I hear stories like this, but I can't imagine. My administrators would never direct me to stay late.
Administrators thought we were "Special",and union rules did not apply to us.
Wrong.
Unfortunately, even union rules did not always apply to special education teachers (at least in my school district). For many years (15+ years in my case) the elementary Cognitive Disabilities teachers did not have ANY preparation time during the school day, while by union contract, elementary regular education teachers and elementary specials teachers (art, music, & physical education teachers) had a contractual legal minimum of three and a half hours per week and most teachers actually had four and half hours per week.
BTW Middle School and High School teachers had even more contractual prep time per week. If they didn't get their two periods of preparation time per day they were paid substantial extra money for compensation.
Elementary CD teachers -zero prep time. Administration wouldn't help us so every year we would go to the union and every year we were told, "Sorry, but your situation is "special" we can't help you, either."
Guess when it changed? When a special education teacher became our union President, administration suddenly was able to make arrangements that every teacher (including all special education teachers) had the union contracted amount of preparation.
------Hmmmm, it is too bad that they couldn't offer back pay, 3.5 hours times 36 weeks times 15 plus years would have been a great addition to my retirement. Nineteen thousand hours of contractual paid prep time lost for me because "Elementary CD teachers were special" and the union couldn't help us. Teachers who had taught longer than 15 or so years had lost even more hours of prep time. No wonder special ed teachers sometimes act bitter.
Unfortunately, even union rules did not always apply to special education teachers (at least in my school district). For many years (15+ years in my case) the elementary Cognitive Disabilities teachers did not have ANY preparation time during the school day, while by union contract, elementary regular education teachers and elementary specials teachers (art, music, & physical education teachers) had a contractual legal minimum of three and a half hours per week and most teachers actually had four and half hours per week.
BTW Middle School and High School teachers had even more contractual prep time per week. If they didn't get their two periods of preparation time per day they were paid substantial extra money for compensation.
Secondary teachers here only get one prep period. Wow. Two. That would be nice.
[quote]Elementary CD teachers -zero prep time. Administration wouldn't help us so every year we would go to the union and every year we were told, "Sorry, but your situation is "special" we can't help you, either."
[quote]
What does "elementary CD" teacher mean?
Quote:
Guess when it changed? When a special education teacher became our union President, administration suddenly was able to make arrangements that every teacher (including all special education teachers) had the union contracted amount of preparation.
------Hmmmm, it is too bad that they couldn't offer back pay, 3.5 hours times 36 weeks times 15 plus years would have been a great addition to my retirement. Nineteen thousand hours of contractual paid prep time lost for me because "Elementary CD teachers were special" and the union couldn't help us. Teachers who had taught longer than 15 or so years had lost even more hours of prep time. No wonder special ed teachers sometimes act bitter.
Were you a classroom teacher? The sped teachers that co-teach and/or have classes to teach have preps. Facilitators and the like do not.
Do you mind sharing what state/district you are in? It sounds like they take a lot of liberties that would not go on here. Was this recent or did it happen a while back?
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