HRS SYNDROME: HIDE, RANT, SEND
Stop HIDING behind your computer, RANTING entitlement paragraphs and hitting SEND!
Let’s go with this premise: teachers create all other professions. If this assertion is true, why does the American public and more specifically American parents make the lives of teachers challenging at the least and abhorrent at the most? Of course in today’s culture, there are circumstances where parents must get involved. Sexualizing children and stereotyping them according to race is not acceptable to most parents. With that aside, why is it parents feel entitled to rant at a teacher via email?
So let me rant…vitriol emails have no place in a civilized society. As I shared in my book Rescue the Teacher, Save the Child!, I lost my last position as a teacher due to five parents complaining using the accusatory email route. Those caustic emails, sent to my anemic administrator, ultimately ended my 46 year career as a teacher. I now label these thoughtless parents (and some administrators) with HRS SYNDROME: HIDE behind your computer, RANT paragraphs on your entitlement to privilege and hit SEND.
When I worked in education, the public schools forced me to absorb those scathing emails. Seldom did an administrator support me. Those HRS SYNDROME parents loved to rail at me around 7 am. Percolating on an accusation without merit, I taught my classes for six hours, wondering why a student would misrepresent me to their parent. Did it affect my teaching? Of course it did. I found myself previewing my remarks before they made it through my airways so students would clearly understand my every instruction and intension. This created a stumbling, mumbling, inarticulate instructor, with loss of confidence and some days near tears. How could any parent assume the teacher of their child is a moronic, vindictive imbecile? Whereas those words are hyperbolic, the translation is clear: my child is perfect, I am entitled to scold you and you better do what I demand. Here’s the good news: I AM NO LONGER EMPLOYED AS A TEACHER IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS!
As the director of a successful voice studio, on rare occasion I have received less than complimentary emails. When that transpired, I tried to appease the parent, apologizing for any “misunderstanding”. A couple of years ago, that was simply not enough for one angry parent. What did I state in my final email to this parent? Don’t contact me again. Ever. It felt so good to have the right to disconnect from this acerbic parent. As a public school teacher, I never held that right. Today’s teachers are certainly no different. The HRS SYNDROME parent (and sometimes administrator) prevails while teachers have no recourse to stop the madness. Solution: administrators need to step up and prohibit this kind of email behavior. I mean really set down the rules of communication to both teachers and parents with consequences for bad email behavior. I once had a principal who defended me by telling the hostile party to simply “shut up!” It worked and in my tenure at that school, I was never attacked again.
For the love of humanity, step away from your machine-gun keyboards! The bullets of your hurried rage have the capability of not only squelching the passion to teach but more importantly is one of the single reasons teachers are leaving the profession in numbers greater than ever before. If there is no respect from the parents, students sense their parents’ contempt and amplify it in the classroom. Enter stage left the State of California, a euphemism for the State of Chaos.
California students can no longer be suspended for ‘willful defiance’. Could nationwide change be next?
At least 25 states and the District of Columbia allow schools to suspend students for “willful defiance”, according to the LawAtlas Project’s Policy Surveillance Portal. This week, California became the first state in the US to ban such suspensions for all students, expanding a pre-existing ban on the disciplinary practice for students in grades kindergarten through eighth grade. The new law, signed by the governor, Gavin Newsom, last Sunday, could represent a model for how other states approach reforming disciplinary practices. In my opinion, the irate parent, not having a thread of respect for the teacher, can assert his bias on his child. That child now can go into any classroom, become defiant with the stamp of approval from his parent and not receive any consequences from the administration. And it all begins with an email. Parents in pajamas emailing scorched earth accusations are now even more empowered in Califoria. Coming soon to a school near you. I wrote a blog several weeks ago entitled “What a Stupid Time to Be Alive.” I rest my case.
I believe the internet is the worst thing ever to be invented and many others are beginning to agree. According to Reuters, over half of Americans surveyed in the last year reported facing online harassment and hate. Using emails to attack teachers demonstrates the inability of administrations and parents to communicate physically in the same room! Emails circumvent the required face to face conversations which must take place between student, parent, teacher and administrator. Teachers who join the profession to make a difference cannot continue walking along side students and their parents who openly demonstrate their disdain for those very teachers. Our educational system manifests hypocrisy, hysteria and a hapless pathway towards complete dysfunction. And you guessed it. Emails are the first phase of that manifestation.
Education was important when I was growing up. So many things have changed in this country including the emphasis on a quality education and overall respect. So the next time you sit down in front of that potentially career-ending keyboard, STOP. Would you want to receive a blindsided email at 7 am? Instead, use that email as a positive communication. Do HIDE your unfavorable comments and slap on that filter! Do RANT about what is good for our children. Do SEND an email to your child’s teacher once a week with praise-worthy intensions.