Parents
are biggest teacher complaint at Indiana’s affluent schools
By Dottie
Spainhour, THG News
An Indiana State Teachers
Association (ISTA) study has revealed that students’ parents are the most
mentioned complaint by teachers in the state’s wealthiest school districts.
Research conducted over
the 2003-2004 school year in the top ten most affluent school corporations
showed that while instances of the biggest problems that plague poor school
districts are low (gang violence, drugs, teen pregnancy), teachers who work in
wealthy areas still have low morale due to the constant pressure put on them by
parents.
Eighty-one percent of
teachers in rich districts declared meddling, overbearing parents as the worst
thing about their jobs.
“Rich parents are used to
throwing their weight around since they have money and power,” said Rick
Reinholt, director of the ISTA study. “They are constantly pressuring teachers
to change their teaching style or class rules to suit their child. This drives
many teachers out of the profession.”
“I love teaching and even
like our students, but the parents absolutely drive me insane,” said Wayne
Greathouse, a German teacher at Carmel
High School, “They think they can treat
us teachers like dirt because they make ten times our salaries.”
Reinholt said that through
his research he was able to identify and group the most troublesome parents into
five distinct classifications:
1. Enablers
These parents believe
everything their children tell them, even if their child has a history of lying
to them that goes back to preschool. If a teacher sends the child of an enabler
to the office for misbehaving, that teacher will receive a phone call that
evening from the parent who believed their child when he or she says they were
an innocent victim, sent to the office for no other reason than the fact that
the teacher just doesn’t like the student. Enablers also make a million excuses
for why their kids screw up: a friend made them do it, the family is going
through a rough time, their goldfish died, or they get dry skin in the winter
time.
2. Negotiators
When the child of a
negotiator doesn’t do as well in a class as the parents expect, negotiators
contact the teacher to try to talk them into giving 6,000 points of extra credit
or taking three-month old assignments late. Negotiators are usually tenacious
businesspeople used to making deals and can’t accept “no” as an answer. They
attempt to appeal to the emotions of the teacher—anything to get the teacher to
give in and raise that high “F” grade to a “D”.
3. The Clueless
These parents are in their
own world and never know their child’s grade until a teacher finally gets a hold
of them on the phone and tells them that the child in question is missing 54 out
of 55 assignments for the semester. Clueless parents usually don’t know when
report cards come out, so their children just throw them away. If they do
happen to ask their child about their grades, the child says they lost their
report card but rest assured—they made the “A” honor roll (when in reality they
had a 0.7 GPA). The children of The Clueless are smarter than their parents, so
they can get away with bringing home a fake report card written with crayon on
wide-ruled loose leaf.
4. Foghorns
These parents know they
are not very intelligent, so they feel the only way they can get their point
across is by talking at a decibel level that makes windows shake and eardrums
bleed. All it takes is one conference with a Foghorn to make a teacher bend
over backwards to keep a child happy so they will never, ever have to have a
conversation with their parents again.
5. Spammers
Spammers are very smart
and successful individuals that usually have unrealistic expectations for their
children. Their child might have the brain power of a tsetse fly and a complete
lack of motivation, but the parents think this kid will be the one who finds a
cure for cancer. Spammers check on their child’s progress at least a dozen
times a day, causing the teacher’s e-mail and voice mail to meltdown
periodically. Spammers never give up hope that someday their child will grow
out of the phase they are in and show their true promise.
Officials with the ISTA
are currently looking into ways to make working conditions better for its
members working in affluent schools. Until a solution is found, teachers are
encouraged to reduce stress by not returning any e-mails or phone messages left
by obnoxious parents.
