The Mind of Mr. M

It is so interesting what I hear from my daughters about their experiences in Junior High. I recently had the privilege to listen to my daughter and a few or her friends discuss one of her teachers at school.  Initially, I thought they were just bashing, as some kids do, but as I listened I noticed that their arguments weren’t the typical one you hear about notorious teachers.

They were discussing how frustrated they were that they felt like the teacher was not doing her job, because she was consistently handing them busy work and asked them to leave her alone because she was working on her Master’s Thesis.  Their complaint was based on the fact that this had happened for a few classes and that day in class the teacher got mad at them because “she was tired of hearing from all your parents” that they aren’t happy with her current methods.

So, the teacher decided to change her methods and told the kids that they could help expedite the dilemma, by help her look up information on her Thesis so she could finish it faster and then she could teach them more “fun” things.

Really? I know teachers are underpaid and many are working on getting better degrees and such but, you still have a job to do right? The last thing I think I as a tax payer should be doing is paying you to finish your degree…in most other professions you would get in a lot of trouble for something like this. How is it justified?

On another note, different teacher, different daughter…my daughter asks me, “Dad, can we go get some dry erase markers?” I asked her what for and she indicated that her teacher was offering extra-credit to any student who brought her dry-erase markers and other school supplies. This is Junior High School…my daughter then went on to say that she didn’t really need the extra credit but she felt like she need to do it to get the points because kids who never do their work could get better grades than her by bring the teacher stuff. Now, I also realize that teachers don’t have all the supplies they need and budgets are tight but I think this is a very dangerous proposition as it is one step away from forget the dry-erase markers just bring me cash for them…which is basically letting kids who can afford it buy their grades.

I know the economy is tough and I recognize that MOST teachers like to teach and like to help our children, but I still think that situations like the ones above need to be policed very carefully because in the end, a teachers influence can make or break all of our futures.