Just sitting here in the cafeteria with my colleagues watching the clock slowly tick towards 1pm. Most of the parents I've met with are making sure their children are doing well, those I'd like to talk to about what we can do to improve achievement won't be coming in. 1pm to 8pm yesterday and then this morning drag by...

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An unjust law is no law at all--St. Augustine of Hippo

Cause tried and true
I see the light in you
Oh, can you dig in my soul?
Could you smell my whole...
life?--Gener and Deaner

That's what moms are for.

Went to these last night for my kids.

As I told my wife, Parent Teacher Conferences should be open bar.

_________________

That would loosen up all the woke/gender fluidity/problematic whiteness discussions...

_________________
An unjust law is no law at all--St. Augustine of Hippo

Cause tried and true
I see the light in you
Oh, can you dig in my soul?
Could you smell my whole...
life?--Gener and Deaner

The truth will flow

_________________
Be well

GO BEARS!!!

Eh, I have what I want to do next week all queued up. I suppose it is time to revisit Jeff Beck's Live At Ronnie Scott's...Vinnie Colaiuta and a young Tal Wilkenfeld kill this performance.

_________________
An unjust law is no law at all--St. Augustine of Hippo

Cause tried and true
I see the light in you
Oh, can you dig in my soul?
Could you smell my whole...
life?--Gener and Deaner

damn man, 2 days of that? We have one day from 1pm to 6pm. And that is too much.

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"He is a loathsome, offensive brute
--yet I can't look away."

Our first experience with parent teacher conferences.

Conference: Your kid is doing great.
Reality: I'm yelling at your kid every day in school and making his life miserable.

It took us until this year to realize that too when suddenly a new teacher had no problems at all with anything.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Are specific days for conferences even necessary anymore? Can see my kids grades on-line at any time, and receive emails from their teachers about what's going on in class. If my kids miss a day (and we forgot to call the school), or if they are marked tardy/missing a class, I get an email about that too. I don't know what I would actually talk to the teachers about, other than 5 minutes of small talk and "your kid is doing great".

I mean even the best student's have something that might be improved (or something to consider when transitioning towards high school). It drives me nuts when I hear these stories about teachers saying their kid is "doing great" and that's about it.

_________________
An unjust law is no law at all--St. Augustine of Hippo

Cause tried and true
I see the light in you
Oh, can you dig in my soul?
Could you smell my whole...
life?--Gener and Deaner

That's why you go into those conferences and grill the teachers in as nice a way as possible.

_________________
Be well

GO BEARS!!!

Ignatius parent-teacher is set up like speed dating. Every teacher in the whole school are set up at long tables in one room. You get a time beforehand. They ring a bell and you get 5 minutes until they ring another bell.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

It doesn't surprise you that Rick did not get the information out of the teacher that he needed?

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Elections have consequences.

Very evasive teachers!

_________________
Be well

GO BEARS!!!

Grade school parent teacher conference for parents of boys: your son is overly active in class and disrupting other students so I reduce his grade.

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

That was the frustrating part. We would get reports of bad behavior but at the conferences they acted like it was no big deal. We didn't know any better to question why in the moment things were so bad but overall they weren't.

We did start to question it towards the end of the year but our thoughts weren't validated until this year when suddenly all the issues went away.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Not in the conference. We talked plenty outside of the conference. That's what made the conference so frustrating.

I'm not going to say "Are you sure you aren't the problem and not my kid?" though.

_________________
You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I witnessed a language teacher lighting up his 3rd or 4th grade class years ago. I didn't have a child in his classroom at the time. I was standing outside waiting to talk to another teacher about something. When he saw me, he almost shit himself. He apologized a million times. My kids never got less than a 100% from him, on anything, for the rest of the time they were there. He would greet me in the hallways as if his job depended on it. My kids couldn't understand why he acted that way around me. Truthfully, I couldn't understand it either. Besides yelling at the top of his lungs, I didn't hear him say anything extreme. I've always wondered if he crossed a line prior to my arrival.

_________________
Be well

GO BEARS!!!

My oldest is very well behaved and can be quiet in large groups. She started the year with a long term sub after her actual teacher went through a forced birth this summer under Illinois’ draconian forced birthing laws.

Anyway, the long term sub gave us some very specific anecdotes about behaviors in the class that while positive, sounded nothing like my child. We asked her about it when we got home and sure enough, she had no involvement with these things.

It left me 90% sure the teacher had no idea who my daughter was despite having taught her daily for a couple months.

_________________

I'm sure I may have told this story before, but it's weird and funny enough to repeat.

I have a good friend who works at an elite prep school. She had a girl in her class who was the daughter of a North Korean party bigwig, like the Minister of Defense or something. The girl was a complete fuck-up. She was surly and she refused to even try to learn. Of course my friend failed her. The dad came to the Parent-Teacher conference and he looked at my friend very seriously and said, "She must not fail." My friend said, "I know. I have offered to work with her after class. I have suggested she get a tutor. She just isn't making any effort." Again the guy said, "She must not fail." My friend started wondering if the guy's English wasn't good or if that was a threat. She said the guy had a big briefcase and she started thinking there may be a nuke inside of it.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

My youngest son and I still laugh about a pair of conferences I had with two of the few men teachers he had in HS. I was extremely frank telling one teacher what my son thought of him. It brought about quite a few laughs by the teachers present. My son couldn't believe it, but as it turned out, those two male teachers became his favorites, he began going to them at the first sign he needed help in a number of classes and his grades shot up.

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

We had our second day of parent teacher conferences yesterday. This one was by online appointment. I had 3 people in 6 hours.

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One year I had a kid translate for his mom what I was saying. He wasn't doing very well and had a lot of missing assignments. At one point his little sister taps the mom on the shoulder and tells her in Spanish what I am really saying. Mom immediately gets up, says thank you and drags him away.

_________________

When I was chairman of the LSC at my kids' grammar school I amusingly often got the same reactions.

_________________
There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

Chairing one of my kid's high school LSCs for 3 years reminded me that MANY adults behave just like kids. The emails, phone calls, and text messages I got from teachers and staff was insane. Everyone wanted me to fight the principal for them and support every idea that popped in their heads because of a few changes we were able to make. I had my child's science teacher crying on a Zoom call with me because she wanted me to fire the principal. Lady, I don't have that power, and I have zero interest in creating chaos just because.

_________________
Be well

GO BEARS!!!

I get it. Was a good chuckle however.

_________________
Elections have consequences.

I only argue incessantly about things that don't matter. Real life is too important to be as hated as I am by people on here like Spaulding and badrogue and you.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I had a couple of teachers come to me complaining about the principal, one actually calling her evil. I had to remind them how she and I had been successfully fighting for their positions through the years where the Board kept cutting our budget over a couple of years. I was really skeptical about a few of the teachers after that.

_________________
There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

For my 4th grader they had three fucking days of them. The 7th 8-11, 3-5, 7:20-8:20, 17th 4:20-7:20, and 21st 1-7.

yeah. teachers are the worst.

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'Your AT&T Universal Card has arrived'? Oh God, Kick-fucking-ass, I got a Master Card! I don't believe it, man. Life is kinda cool sometimes.