u/Emergency-Pepper3537

Because you KNOW some poor kindergarten teacher spent weeks preparing that graduation. Practicing songs. Making decorations with their own money. Keeping 5-year-olds alive long enough to learn when to walk across the stage.

Everything is beautiful for about 8 minutes.
Then from the back near the Capri Suns you hear:
“WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING TO?”

Every teacher in the room immediately hits DEFCON 1.
At that point I’m not breaking up a fight. Absolutely not. I teach comma rules and figurative language. I am not qualified to stop two grown women named Crystal and Nevaeh’s aunt from throwing punches beside a balloon arch.

I’d be evacuating children like a war reporter while admin does that useless fast-walk they always do when chaos starts.

Meanwhile the kindergarteners are probably having the time of their lives.

“THIS graduation is awesome.”

And you already KNOW the follow-up email would be:
“Reminder to continue fostering positive relationships with families 😊”

Ma’am. Someone’s grandmother just got shoved into the cupcake table.

Parent: “I just feel like I’m not getting enough communication about my child’s behavior.”

Say less.

Monday: “Your daughter did an excellent job following directions today.”

Tuesday: “Your daughter required 6 redirections for talking during instruction.”

Wednesday: “Your daughter tapped her pencil 47 times during silent work.”

Thursday: “Your daughter looked out the window for approximately 11 seconds before returning to the assignment.”

Friday: “Your daughter breathed heavily after PE and drank water with noticeable enthusiasm.”

You want communication? Baby, I can communicate. I can become a live sports commentator for your child’s academic journey.

Some of y’all don’t actually want communication. You want only positive communication while your kid acts like a raccoon trapped in a Waffle House every day. We have less than 2 weeks before school’s out. Don’t try me.

Every single year around field trip season it’s the same song and dance. Parents storming Facebook groups and emailing schools because little Timmy got barred from the zoo trip or Busch Gardens or whatever. And then you actually look at Timmy’s record and the kid has 14 referrals, throws pencils across the room, barks at teachers, wanders the halls like a Skyrim NPC, and once tried to vape in the bathroom sink.

“But why should he miss out 🥺”

Because field trips are privileges not Make-a-Wish events for kids who terrorize everyone around them.
You know what’s wild? Teachers are expected to supervise 30+ middle schoolers in public while also making sure your son doesn’t fight a seagull, steal from the gift shop, or disappear into a crowd because he thought it’d be funny.

And somehow when schools say “yeah maybe this student isn’t ready for that level of freedom,” parents act like it’s a violation of the Geneva Convention.

If some of y’all care SO deeply, then YOU chaperone your little menace. Take PTO. Follow him around the aquarium while he Naruto-runs into displays and screams racial slurs at stingrays. Be my guest.

The rest of us are trying to survive the trip without ending up on the evening news.

Context: I’m not physically stopping anybody from going to the bathroom. I’m enforcing the same rules my county expects us to enforce: one kid out at a time, and no leaving right before or after the bell unless it’s an actual emergency. Medical situations are exempt. Always have been. I had a student with diabetes who could go whenever she needed because she had documentation. Nobody had an issue with that because that’s what accommodations are for.

But some parents have gotten way too comfortable telling their kids, “If you need to go, just leave anyway.”

Cool. Then your child can also deal with the consequence anyway.

Because here’s the part people outside education don’t understand: middle schoolers abuse the HELL out of bathroom passes. It’s not “sweet innocent child quietly using the restroom.” It’s hallway wandering, vape meetups, TikTok scrolling, avoiding work, visiting friends, or disappearing for 20 minutes because they’re bored.

If I let every student leave whenever they claimed they “really had to go,” I’d be teaching an empty classroom.

And the internet always jumps straight to “SO YOU WANT KIDS TO PISS THEMSELVES???” No. In years of teaching, that has literally never happened in my room. Not once. Turns out most kids survive being told to wait a few minutes.

What’s actually frustrating is the growing number of parents teaching their kids that rules are optional if they personally disagree with them. Then those same parents are shocked when the kid struggles with accountability everywhere else too.

If I tell a student they need to wait, and they decide to walk out anyway, that becomes a discipline issue. Not because I’m power tripping; schools cannot function if every single expectation turns into “well my mom said I don’t have to listen.”

Now, if you still believe I need to GEt oUt of EDucation, please send me some job applications :)

“My momma said I can just walk out if I need to use the bathroom”.

Then your behind is getting a write- up for skipping. Not a hard concept to understand, but some of these parents are the result of No Child Left Behind.

Can you tell I’m over this shit?

“Hot take: part of the problem with education is that schools stopped being just schools. They’re expected to be food banks, clothing drives, therapists, doctors offices, daycare centers, parenting replacements, and behavior rehab programs all at the same time.

And then people wonder why academics are struggling.

Teachers are somehow supposed to fix hunger, trauma, mental health, behavior, poverty, and home life issues while also getting test scores up. At some point it becomes impossible.

Helping kids is important. Nobody’s saying kids shouldn’t get support, but society keeps dumping every problem onto schools because every other system either failed or checked out. And the more schools get stretched into doing everything, the less actual education becomes the focus

What am I doing wrong?

“No” is a complete sentence. Stop trying to negotiate.

I guess some you truly don’t wanna parent.

I said what I said.

So not only do we have to be counselors and nurses, but also straight up potty- trainers too. Why do some of yall even become parents…?

When can we expect to teach your child how to walk? I mean because we’re basically required to do eveything now

Nope, can’t do this Thursday after school. Nope, the social studies teacher can’t do that Wednesday. Nuh-uh, the Math teacher has a doctor’s appointment before school.

Modern problems require modern solutions. Or whatever.

I am DONE with these dumbass parents and their baseless insinuations. I’m trying to enjoy my lunch and I get this crazy- ass mother and her shit.

Fuck off, lady.

I’d argue there never been a point in history where we have so many parents absolutely clueless about how to control their own kids… I am a bit biased because I don’t have kids. But I still have a hat in this race because my mom was a single mom with two boys, and damn if she couldn’t control us. She never made excuses. It took just ONE phone call from a teacher to get us straight. Shed be on our asses from the minute we got home to the next morning.

I swear I make this post every year but it doesn’t get easier.

YOU NEED TO TALK TO YOUR KIDS MORE THAN ONCE PEOPLE. I guarantee that child still has their phone/ other privileges, because the parent doesn’t want to be “annoyed”.

When I say my previous school was the worst, it truly was the worst. It was bottom of the barrel in EVERY way, most of all leadership. We had 4 APs and they were all shit.

I had this issue with this one student. Sweet one day, but off the chain the next. It all came to a head when she and her mother accused me of “getting in her face”.

I reached out to the principal and I said how this situation made me uncountable and I don’t appreciate how my AP was handling it. Cue the “I’m sorry you feel that way” and “we are servants of the community” spiel. I truly almost quit with no back up plan.

Fuck. That. School. I know my case isn’t limited to just me and I’m sure there closeup is other teachers with stories similar to mine.