My niece is a school teacher. She forwarded this letter to family members. Powerful stuff.

Below is the first paragraph, to give you an idea about the letter. The provided link will take you to the remainder of the letter; it’s relatively long so I didn’t copy and paste the entire thing.

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Do you want to know why there’s a teacher shortage? Why, this year, in Nebraska alone, there are approximately a thousand open positions in education, why the number of post-secondary education majors is plummeting? I think any teacher, para, bus driver, administrator, lunch lady, or secretary would give you the same answer: a lack of parenting. We have so many students in our school systems who come from broken homes, from absentee parents, from hostile environments, from neglect, and on the opposite side of that coin, from coddling, from “yes” parents, from ipad houses, from parents who want to be their child’s “best friend” or live vicariously through them. And when parents don’t parent, they raise children who are an entirely new breed of difficult, who are entitled, who don’t understand the concept of respect, who have never been held to rules or standards before and rebel against them in classrooms, kids who have never been told “no,” kids who have been constantly handed a screen to keep them quiet. This generation of parents is failing, and it only takes a step into our school systems to see the evidence.

The Illusion of Adulting

This message has been edited. Last edited by: TMats,

As somebody heavily involved in attempting to deal with school related issues, I agree with everything she says in that article.

However, in the absence of these skills coming from parents it is imperative that they come from the school. You can not allow the children to come to school, act however they wish, then simply blame the parents.

I've said it for a very long time, and she states it in her article. Kids crave structure. Schools need to provide that.

That structure is not permitted in schools in my perception. I know people who got out of education and anything related to kids because of the points enumerated in the letter.

I would say the majority of the burden is at home. The school can reinforce. Or teach on a limited exception basis. But the focus is on academics not social norms. I'm not even sure i would agree with what the teacher may consider social norms.

The longer post notes an important issue not covered in your brief clip.
That is: parents are enabling disrespect by complaining to school administrators (often threatening to sue) when little Jill or Johnny or River doesn't like what a teacher or coach said or did.
I know we at SF tend to be a crowd disrespectful of government, but if you're sending your kids to government schools, you need to support the adults at the school--unless it's some woke shit of course.

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But the focus is on academics not social norms.

With less than 50% of most students being proficient, I can assure you the focus is not on academics.

Teacher - it used to be a profession that garnered respect and praise.

We all knew about the low salary, the long nights, the incredible stress associated with developing young minds.

And I agree, parents hold a large bag of the blame. And we all know if the parents respect the teacher, so will the kids.

So, if I may ask, what do you think it is that made the parents stop respecting teachers?

And I'm not asking about the kids from single mother households. I'm not asking about the kids from the rough side of town. I'm asking about the middle-income basic American nuclear family. What is their level of respect for teachers, and why?

Your union supports with millions the very people destroying this country.

Your union cheered when prayer was removed from school.

Your union claps when the pledge is ripped from the activities list.

Your union gleefully applauds when another "brave" young person is maimed or neutered by transitioning.

Your union welcomes common core math and CRT with open arms, spitting in the face of American parents.

And you wonder why our kids don't respect you?
You wonder why they won't sit down and shut up?
You wonder why your career has become a laughing stock?

Blame parents all you want, and for every shitty mom or dad out there doing a half-assed job, I can show you a teacher doing the same.

You want to keep pointing fingers, or do you want to listen to reason?

Until the parents respect you, the kids never will. Look at your own hands. What have you done to earn the respect of parents lately?

"An open letter to..." blah, blah, blah, my job sucks and here's why it's hard. Anyone can do this shit all day long, and you know what it nets? Zero.

Blame game, money, admin, parents, test results, whatever you want...as long as we don't ask ourselves any real questions. Wouldn't want to stumble and fall into an actual logical answer.

I'm not saying there's not a ton of shitty parents, my kids went to public school K-12...I've seen it. I'm just saying maybe get beyond the finger pointing and blame laying, just far enough to look a little deeper. But I understand that doesn't fit neatly into a Facebook post.

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Originally posted by TMats:
My niece is a school teacher. She forwarded this letter to family members.

Well, then she should know the difference between Allusion and Illusion...

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Originally posted by RogueJSK:

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Originally posted by TMats:
My niece is a school teacher. She forwarded this letter to family members.

Well, then she should know the difference between Allusion and Illusion...

Touché. That was me. It wasn’t a typo, it was carelessness.

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Originally posted by RogueJSK:

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Originally posted by TMats:
My niece is a school teacher. She forwarded this letter to family members.

Well, then she should know the difference between Allusion and Illusion...

click the link and you'll see the teacher does know the difference even if OP doesn't.

sorry TMats just messing with ya.

Good article but students are only in school 7 to 8 hours a day. The rest of the time they are at home or out on the streets. But all the problems with them and society today seem to be blamed on the teachers and the education system. (Just my little rant from a retired educator with almost 30 years experience.)

My sister bought out her last 2 years of retirement from Cobb County GA as she was fed up with the student behavior & the woke administration equally.

It’s not just the parents, it is society at large. I largely raised myself and had nobody at home to teach me much of anything. I still went to school, made straight A’s, and only ever had a real issue with a teacher in 11th grade. She was going through a divorce and the man must have chunked her for a younger model because she took that shit out on the entire class and I was having none of it. She was very abusive and all I did was stand up to her one single day, having had enough of it. I got a 97 in her chemistry class, but she gave me a F in citizenship costing me national honor roll status. I never made a B or below in public school. Then one of her close friends was my work program teacher in 12th grade and she failed me for absolute bullshit. It was a pass/fail course only. The class was pointless but required for me to split early and go to work. Poor kids and rich kids in that class. Poor kids that had to work and rich kids who got mommy or daddy to sign them up for that class so that they could leave early. Many of them didn’t work but on paper they worked for Daddy’s company. I spoke with the VP and he didn’t agree with any of it and encouraged me to take it to the school board. He was on about the National Honor Roll and what it could for me on college admissions. I told him I didn’t care and that I would still graduate on time. Senior year I only had 3 courses as I had completed high school, more or less, a year early. So when the work program bitch pulled her stunt, I only had to go to 2 classes. It might as well been a reward to me. Got to sleep in another hour. Never had an issue in my entire public school life until that bitch in 11th grade. She pulled that and I got myself moved into the other Chemistry teacher’s class and never had another issue until her bitch ass friend got me senior year. My goodness the vindictive nature of some people has no bottom or end.

I say this because I could have easily been a heckler in school. A problem child, getting into constant trouble, what have you. And I was the opposite of that, and it had nothing to do with parenting as that was nonexistent. When the media, and especially social media, tells you that you are very important, and that you can do whatever you want allstar, and pushes narcissistic values, there are going to be massive problems in society. Parents are certainly a factor, and a massive issue, no doubt, but it’s a bigger problem than that. Our whole society is fucked. Every single drive I make now I see massive shit on the roads. Narcissistic behavior, constant rule breaking. Speeding is one thing, swerving all over the road with my precious in their hands is another. People u-turn right in front of you where it’s not allowed. They are in the fast lane on the highway and they last minute Larry a highway exit, cutting across 4-5 lanes of traffic and do not give a fuck, even when they could have caused massive wrecks and sent people to the ER or morgue. There is no accountability at all anymore. Customer service is almost nonexistent whether it is food service, a store, doesn’t matter. Behavior at large in society is the worst it has ever been. Everyone is a fucking Karen or Chad now. Entitled and narcissistic as fuck.

Society, at large, is a free for all. Kids get told by their parents, media, social media, that they can do whatever they want. Accountability is gone. And keep in mind that half the world has an IQ of 100 or lower. The phone and social media are as big of problems as the parents. When grown adults are driving around 5000 lb vehicles with their face smashed into a 6 inch piece of glass, well it doesn’t take rocket science to figure out how fucked they are, and their children are. People do not think for themselves any longer. They do whatever that bitch ass phone tells them to do. Common sense, gone. It’s so bad that at this point I just enter society for necessities and that’s it.

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Originally posted by TMats:
kids who have been constantly handed a screen to keep them quiet.

There are people in my family "raising" their children this way and it saddens me and worries me for so many different reasons.

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Originally posted by fiasconva:
Good article but students are only in school 7 to 8 hours a day. The rest of the time they are at home or out on the streets. But all the problems with them and society today seem to be blamed on the teachers and the education system. (Just my little rant from a retired educator with almost 30 years experience.)

I see school busses here picking kids up at 8 AN, and those same busses dropping kids off at 2:30 and 3PM.

Morning and afternoon break, a one hour lunch, a free period at random - they're not even getting close to an 8 hour day of learning

Schools are nothing more than thinly guised publicly funded daycare and I'm willing to bet that given the large numbers of woke or socialist 'teachers' we're getting far more indoctrination rather than education.

How are 50% of 6th graders not proficient at basic mathematics?

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Originally posted by a1abdj:
As somebody heavily involved in attempting to deal with school related issues, I agree with everything she says in that article.

However, in the absence of these skills coming from parents it is imperative that they come from the school. You can not allow the children to come to school, act however they wish, then simply blame the parents.

I've said it for a very long time, and she states it in her article. Kids crave structure. Schools need to provide that.

Well. That structure maybe covers 8 hours a day. Then what? That is even if the school lets the teachers try to do something resembling respect or structure. More than likely little Johnny will go home bitching about how the school makes him do this or that. Parent/s bitch to school about the horrible mistreatment of little Johnny and how they will sue. Teacher gets bitched at by supervising personnel or school board. Teacher says “fuck it” and doesn’t give a shit anymore or quits.

I’m seriously looking at pulling my kid from public schools because in grade school (and there’s only K-5 grades) EVERY class he’s had there’s been a child who has disrupted the room to the point where no one is learning. I mean the entire class with the exclusion of the troublemaker has had to be moved physically to a different room. Not the brat that won’t listen. The rest of the kids have to be taken elsewhere.
And when I ask why my child might not be learning whatever subject in a timely fashion, no one wants to say it’s because Tommy won’t stop flipping the lights on and off, or throwing shit, or shaking tables. They are all supposed to just ignore it. You name it, and these little disrupters are doing it.
One little fucker streaked naked in the halls after flipping off the lights to the entire school (4th grade). And he still attends. Another called the principal a “fucker” (this is grade school, folks) and got suspended for 1 day.
It’s frickin wild, but it’s not just parents. It’s the administration, and the disruptive children that other kids are watching misbehave with no repercussions. It’s not only screens, it’s watching others they know personally get away with it right in front of their very eyes in their day to day real life.

And when we as parents have gathered and registered a complaint, we’ve been told by the admin to try and understand/have sympathy/empathy for that troubled child’s situation. Because no one knows what to do with that kid or parent. Can’t expel them, apparently..
one kid who was permanently removed from my son’s class (after hitting/threatening other kids and screaming at the teacher) was put in another same age class and for a few days after she was moved, she walked through the lunchroom (I was a parent monitor) and she’d smack all the kids from my son’s class on the head as she walked on by- subtly. I watched her do it two days in a row before I called her on her bullshit. She was bold as brass about it when confronted. This was AFTER she was removed from their class. No teachers or employees were even noticing, and if I hadn’t said anything, I don’t doubt it’d still be happening.
While I’m not saying tech doesn’t have a role, it’s not just tech. And not just the parents.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: irreverent,

I love the school one of my kids is going to so much I substitute teach there. I had a student trying to turn in shody work, so I kept handing back to him, telling him to redo it right. I finally told him if he didn’t do it right, his mom was going ti find out. The next day, I asked him how it was going and he said I got him grounded. I told him he got himself grounded and he was warned. Go mom!

Just last week, I had a teacher tell me my son disrespected him, he was going to give my son a detention, but he wanted to talk to me first. I said if my son earned a detention, then he gets a detention. My son did not have an enjoyable ride home, lost privileges for a week, wrote an apology, and served the detention.

The families that don’t follow the examples above, don’t stay long. I couldn’t sub in a public school.

As a bus driver, I say she is right on. With one little overlooked point.

The school administration doesn't want to do their job at disciplining the children.

I can write a kid up over the same things over and over again and nothing happens. I'm not talking about silly shit, I'm talking about real, serious safety issues.

I had a kid causing all kinds of problems, I won't go into all of them, but the least of them was the total disrespect to me.

I had wrote him up half a dozen times in less then 2 weeks.

I finally went in and demanded to speak with the principal or vice principal. The vice principal meet with me and I told her she needed to do something about ( let's call him Johnny ) she replied you mean JJ.

That's what he wanted to be called.

I said, no Johnny, she goes he wants to be called JJ, at that point I told her I'm going to be dictated by a child what to call him, while he is disrespecting me, and showing disrespect to me and other students.

I asked her what SHE would do if he was disrespecting her? I told her that she wouldn't stand for it, and I'm not going to either. I told her that if she can't get it fixed, that I would go to the superintendent if I had to, and he would be off the bus!

So, after talking to her, and him. I told them what was going to happen. I would assign him a seat ( he already had one, but wouldn't stay in to ), he WOULD set there and behave, and if not she would remove him from the bus, and if she didn't do that, I would go to the superintendent about that.

Well, I held them both accountable, and after 3 weeks, this boy has made a true turn around. After dealing with him all school year.

I could write a Series of books on this.

Oh, I'm a sub driver, and I'm on this route because the lady that had this route had no support by school administration so she quit.

Bus driver shortage in our district is really bad, and the number one reason is no support from school administration.


ARman

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I held them both accountable, and after 3 weeks, this boy has made a true turn around.

Funny how that works. That's all most of these kids need, is somebody who will set them between the guardrails.

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Well. That structure maybe covers 8 hours a day. Then what? That is even if the school lets the teachers try to do something resembling respect or structure. More than likely little Johnny will go home bitching about how the school makes him do this or that. Parent/s bitch to school about the horrible mistreatment of little Johnny and how they will sue. Teacher gets bitched at by supervising personnel or school board. Teacher says “fuck it” and doesn’t give a shit anymore or quits.

Because doing nothing, out of whatever fear not only doesn't address the problem, but makes it worse.

Sometimes we should be doing the right thing because it's the right thing to do. Why would the school care about getting sued? They have all sorts of tax payer dollars to defend themselves.

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Originally posted by a1abdj:

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I held them both accountable, and after 3 weeks, this boy has made a true turn around.

Funny how that works. That's all most of these kids need, is somebody who will set them between the guardrails.

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Well. That structure maybe covers 8 hours a day. Then what? That is even if the school lets the teachers try to do something resembling respect or structure. More than likely little Johnny will go home bitching about how the school makes him do this or that. Parent/s bitch to school about the horrible mistreatment of little Johnny and how they will sue. Teacher gets bitched at by supervising personnel or school board. Teacher says “fuck it” and doesn’t give a shit anymore or quits.

Because doing nothing, out of whatever fear not only doesn't address the problem, but makes it worse.

Sometimes we should be doing the right thing because it's the right thing to do. Why would the school care about getting sued? They have all sorts of tax payer dollars to defend themselves.

You aren’t going to get an argument from me, but reality sets in and the schools lawyers say knock it off or settle out of court for an undisclosed amount feeding the problem.