Dealing with nosy teachers

[gravel_road]

I have 2 kids in Catholic schools for the last few years. The oldest is 10 and the youngest is 8 and is in the autism spectrum, but is very high functioning and is a year behind in normal class room making A’s and B’s.

The 8 year old’s teacher is overly nosy this year. We meat with the teacher the week before school started and everything was fine. Last week the teacher sent home a letter asking a lot of questions about her home life. Dose she have her own room, her own bathroom, she wanted my Facebook and twitter names, what we do for a living and wanted more information than just self employed, ext. We set up a quick meeting with the principal that week and told us he would take care of it.

She has told us a few times that the teacher pulled her aside and started asking her questions about how big our house is, how many cars we have, what we cook for her, ext.

Monday the teacher went to our oldest kid and started asking her about our household and what we did for a living. When we were told we had a second meeting with the principal. We asked about switching her class for a different teacher, but we were told it was not possible at this time.

Today the teacher was back at it again. She ended up having a breakdown episode and i had to stop what i was doing to go pick her up from school and bring her home. The principle was in the office when i picked her up, but i did not want to talk at the time i just wanted to get her out of there and get her back to normal. The principal has tried calling me a few times and is trying to set up a meeting with us Monday morning.

I truly under stand that from the outside looking in that we are self employed and looks like we live way outside of our means.

I have a meeting with the community school that both of our kids went to a few years ago before we moved across town tonight.

How would you feel if you were in our shoes?
How would you handle it?
What are your thoughts?
Do you think i need to get ready for the CPS at my door next week?

 

[1ke]

he principal has tried calling me a few times and is trying to set up a meeting with us Monday morning.

So I don’t understand why you are apparently avoiding the principal. Ask for a meeting with both the principal AND the teacher.

I truly under stand that from the outside looking in that we are self employed and looks like we live way outside of our means.

I don’t even know what that means or what it has to do with anything. The self employed often make really good incomes.

.How would you feel if you were in our shoes?

Well I would probably address the teacher directly. I am not sure why you started with the principal, why you have up to now not met with the teacher at all.

Meeting with another school seems rather drastic when you have not even talked with the teacher once.

How would you handle it?

I’d talk to the teacher.

If I wasn’t satisfied, I would talk to the principal then I would go to the diocese and talk to the superintendent of Catholic schools.

What are your thoughts?

We don’t have a lot to go on.

Do you think i need to get ready for the CPS at my door next week?

Since you have no idea what the teacher was asking about and why she was asking, I think this is a bit of a leap. I don’t have enough information to personally draw any conclusions, and neither do you really.

Why don’t you just ask the teacher?

There may be another explanation that hasn’t occurred to you.

I also find it odd that the teacher wouldn’t reach out to you. Seems like both you and the teacher avoid talking to the other.

.

 

[Hoosier_Daddy]

So I don’t understand why you are apparently avoiding the principal. Ask for a meeting with both the principal AND the teacher.

I don’t even know what that means or what it has to do with anything. The self employed often make really good incomes.

Well I would probably address the teacher directly. I am not sure why you started with the principal, why you have up to now not met with the teacher at all.

Meeting with another school seems rather drastic when you have not even talked with the teacher once.

I’d talk to the teacher.

If I wasn’t satisfied, I would talk to the principal then I would go to the diocese and talk to the superintendent of Catholic schools.

We don’t have a lot to go on.

Since you have no idea what the teacher was asking about and why she was asking, I think this is a bit of a leap. I don’t have enough information to personally draw any conclusions, and neither do you really.

Why don’t you just ask the teacher?

There may be another explanation that hasn’t occurred to you.

I also find it odd that the teacher wouldn’t reach out to you. Seems like both you and the teacher avoid talking to the other.

.

I think this post is right on except yes, I do, think you should be ready for a visit from cps. The teacher has been notified of your concerns but is still pushing. Honestly, it’s her job. She obviously has see some risk factors and may be overreacting. Honestly I don’t understand why your first step would not be to talk to the child’s teacher directly. This seems odd and puts you at risk of seeming at odds with the teacher.

I assume you pay for this school. That is an interesting dynamic…

 

[EasterJoy]

Why don’t you just ask the teacher?

Every school our children has been in has had a policy that all parental issues with teachers go directly to the teacher first unless there is a compelling reason to start with the principal (such as an allegation of conduct by the teacher that might warrant immediate dismissal).

I don’t see why the parents won’t go straight to the teacher, ask what is up with the invasive questions, and tell her that the questions are upsetting to the student, intrusive, and need to stop immediately.

In the absence of an answer that lets me know this is all some big misunderstanding, this is getting to the point that I’d tell the principal that I’m ready to find his or her boss, if that is what it takes to stop this nonsense. Either tell us what the concern is or quit playing Nancy Drew with our child, because she is feeling singled out and harassed by these questions!!

Having more money and a larger house than a grade school teacher thinks you ought to have is not a matter for CPS. They don’t investigate people for “excessive unearned wealth.” If you have an 8 year old daughter and a 10 year old son who still share a bedroom, that could be a cause for concern, but I’m very sure that CPS doesn’t have time to investigate homes where the children are fortunate enough to have rooms of their own.

 

[gravel_road]

We meet with the teacher before the school year started. We have tried to contact the teacher, but did not have any luck. I was told at the last meeting with the principle the teacher would be there.

I have left 15 messages at the school for the teacher to call us. I do not have her phone number or i would of called her my self. We limit our phone usage when we are with clients and for the 2 hours of dinner / family time we screen our calls and limit what we take to 2 minutes if possible.

I truly think you would not want to talk to the principle if you had to drop everything you were doing with a client to go pick up you kid that from school because the teacher was going outside of her job to make your kid feel uncomfortable for no reason.

So i’m at the point now that i might of lost this client, i have not been paid for 60+ hours of work, and if not i have lost the client i have to rebuild the relationship that i have with the client.

As a teacher she is asking questions that do not need to be asked for her to do her job or to teach my kids. If a kid dose not want to talk about there home life then she needs to talk to the guidance counsel and her supervisors if she feels that there could be an issue that needs to be taken care of.

The teacher should know the limitations of my child as she was part of her IEP meeting for her autism.

Yes Hoosier Daddy i had to prepay $35,854.76. That’s for 1 normal kid and 1 kid in special education (yes she is in normal classes 1 grade behind). I will still have to shell out $400 to $600 for raffle tickets, anywhere up to $4,000 for field trips, and there will be a few fund raisers that will cost me up to $2,500.

 

[mommy_k]

At the beginning of every school year, the teachers have sent home a questionnaire regarding our children…likes, dislikes, di we have pets and things like this. Sometimes they use it for projects, or an “all about me” kind of thing
Some ask for email accounts and some even twitter.

Since I am a pencil and paper type of person, I let them know my preference is notes home…I deal with the teacher…if the request for something like Twitter keeps coming, I ignore it, as I already told the teacher this. This is also catholic school btw

If i didnt agree with any request, and would never think they were spying. Why would you think that?

 

[PassingSoul]

So I don’t understand why you are apparently avoiding the principal. Ask for a meeting with both the principal AND the teacher.

I don’t even know what that means or what it has to do with anything. The self employed often make really good incomes.

Well I would probably address the teacher directly. I am not sure why you started with the principal, why you have up to now not met with the teacher at all.

Meeting with another school seems rather drastic when you have not even talked with the teacher once.

I’d talk to the teacher.

If I wasn’t satisfied, I would talk to the principal then I would go to the diocese and talk to the superintendent of Catholic schools.

We don’t have a lot to go on.

Since you have no idea what the teacher was asking about and why she was asking, I think this is a bit of a leap. I don’t have enough information to personally draw any conclusions, and neither do you really.

Why don’t you just ask the teacher?

There may be another explanation that hasn’t occurred to you.

I also find it odd that the teacher wouldn’t reach out to you. Seems like both you and the teacher avoid talking to the other.

.

Sounds like talking to the Teacher first is the best idea. Ask her why she’s asking these questions but avoid a nasty confrontation. See why she’s asking these questions then go to the Principal if you are troubled by her answers.

 

[acadiANNA]

I must be the only one, but I would change schools even if I have to drive further and pay out of parish fees. This doesn’t seem like a good fit for the children. You will probably have one issue after another throughout the year. Of course, it is your decision. The emotional, psychological development of the children is just as important as the academics no matter what level the child. I think the school made a mistake hiring this teacher. Will pray for all involved and for God to guide you, through Jesus Christ.

 

[bitterhope]

I must be the only one, but I would change schools even if I have to drive further and pay out of parish fees. This doesn’t seem like a good fit for the children. You will probably have one issue after another throughout the year. Of course, it is your decision. The emotional, psychological development of the children is just as important as the academics no matter what level the child. I think the school made a mistake hiring this teacher. Will pray for all involved and for God to guide you, through Jesus Christ.

I am right there with you. I wouldn’t put up with that.

Praying for your family. I’m sorry things are so rough.

 

[Rau]

… Last week the teacher sent home a letter asking a lot of questions about her home life. Dose she have her own room, her own bathroom, she wanted my Facebook and twitter names, what we do for a living and wanted more information than just self employed, ext. We set up a quick meeting with the principal that week and told us he would take care of it.

She has told us a few times that the teacher pulled her aside and started asking her questions about how big our house is, how many cars we have, what we cook for her, ext.

Monday the teacher went to our oldest kid and started asking her about our household and what we did for a living. When we were told we had a second meeting with the principal. We asked about switching her class for a different teacher, but we were told it was not possible at this time. …

Certainly I would not respond to those kinds of information requests without hearing a credible reason first. In my case, I’m pretty sure there could be no possible credible reason, and consequently persistence by the school (in fact, by a “mere classroom teacher”) would be met with a pretty clear response.

Now, I can’t comment on the motivation for the actions of this teacher - but even then, the actions taken strike me as absurd. If the teacher (or school) have some serious concerns they feel compelled to investigate, sending you a questionnaire - absent an expressed reason - seems just absurd. And that such a questionnaire comes from the classroom teacher is even more absurd. And that you have met with the principal - twice - and seem to be none the wiser as to the motivation of the teacher- just stretches credulity beyond belief.

 

[1ke]

We meet with the teacher before the school year started. We have tried to contact the teacher, but did not have any luck. I was told at the last meeting with the principle the teacher would be there.

I have left 15 messages at the school for the teacher to call us. I do not have her phone number or i would of called her my self.

Well, that is information we did not have before in your original post. It does seem odd that the teacher would be avoiding you.

We limit our phone usage when we are with clients and for the 2 hours of dinner / family time we screen our calls and limit what we take to 2 minutes if possible.

I truly think you would not want to talk to the principle if you had to drop everything you were doing with a client to go pick up you kid that from school because the teacher was going outside of her job to make your kid feel uncomfortable for no reason.

So i’m at the point now that i might of lost this client, i have not been paid for 60+ hours of work, and if not i have lost the client i have to rebuild the relationship that i have with the client.

Also information we did not have before. Although I would assume that you would have some sort of contract in place for a client you’d already worked 60 hours for, and having to pick up a (sick) child at school is so common place that I can’t imagine actually losing a client over it. If your client is that high maintenance, maybe you are better off without them.

But that’s your business and I don’t really know what your business is, nor do I need to.

The teacher should know the limitations of my child as she was part of her IEP meeting for her autism.

It is time to continue up the ladder from principal to superintendent of Catholic schools until you get some answers.

 

[Allegra]

This is a really strange story. If your kids were in a public school, I would bet money that your kid’s school suspects that you live out-of-bounds and are attending illegally. Since you’re not in a public school, I can’t imagine why that would matter, unless you were receiving a scholarship that was tied to living in the parish boundaries.

I hope you won’t be offended, but I notice there are some errors in your writing and I wonder if English isn’t your first language. If your family is from another country, is it possible that this teacher is some sort of self-proclaimed immigration law nut and suspects you of being in the country illegally? I can’t think of any reason why a school would care if you were living within your means or not. As long as the tuition check clears, why would they care?

Personally, I would want to know the reason behind the snooping, but I guess it really isn’t important in the long run. What’s important is that you asked her to stop and she hasn’t. I would be very uncomfortable dealing with that teacher as well. Whether I would actually change schools over it would depend on my experience with the rest of the school. None of the questions you’ve mentioned seem to be about an issue that CPS would be interested in. It isn’t illegal for parents to be self-employed or even unemployed.

 

[Eliza10]

Wow, these kinds of questions do sound very rude. It is better to talk to the teacher first, yet, I can see how you would be put off from doing so, from this. Wow, she even asked your BOTH kids. I can see how you just wanted to get your 8 year old out of there under that circumstance, but hopefully you will talk to the principal and explain the situation as its developed. Something is very wrong there, IMO. And you should repeat the request for a teacher change. Why is it “not possible”? Because the other teachers have 27 kids and this one has 23 or something? (Because parents in the know didn’t want her for a teacher for their kids?)? There is not need to explain what your concern is about people knowing about how you make a living (like they might suppose you live above your means). That topic should just be completely unnecessary (other than, I work for the hospital, or we have a home business in bike gear parts - just general info). There is no excuse for prying a child for private information - that’s just unprofessional and completely inappropriate. Normally its better/more right to go directly to the person you have a problem with, but I can understand the mistrust this caused, and why you might just skip that. This level of impropriety seems to merit that.

 

[E_7]

I must be the only one, but I would change schools even if I have to drive further and pay out of parish fees. This doesn’t seem like a good fit for the children. You will probably have one issue after another throughout the year. Of course, it is your decision. The emotional, psychological development of the children is just as important as the academics no matter what level the child. I think the school made a mistake hiring this teacher. Will pray for all involved and for God to guide you, through Jesus Christ.

This.

 

[Patavium]

This is extremely odd, and I don’t know what to think here. OP is time for action.

 

[Hoosier_Daddy]

We meet with the teacher before the school year started. We have tried to contact the teacher, but did not have any luck. I was told at the last meeting with the principle the teacher would be there.

I have left 15 messages at the school for the teacher to call us. I do not have her phone number or i would of called her my self. We limit our phone usage when we are with clients and for the 2 hours of dinner / family time we screen our calls and limit what we take to 2 minutes if possible.

I truly think you would not want to talk to the principle if you had to drop everything you were doing with a client to go pick up you kid that from school because the teacher was going outside of her job to make your kid feel uncomfortable for no reason.

So i’m at the point now that i might of lost this client, i have not been paid for 60+ hours of work, and if not i have lost the client i have to rebuild the relationship that i have with the client.

As a teacher she is asking questions that do not need to be asked for her to do her job or to teach my kids. If a kid dose not want to talk about there home life then she needs to talk to the guidance counsel and her supervisors if she feels that there could be an issue that needs to be taken care of.

The teacher should know the limitations of my child as she was part of her IEP meeting for her autism.

Yes Hoosier Daddy i had to prepay $35,854.76. That’s for 1 normal kid and 1 kid in special education (yes she is in normal classes 1 grade behind). I will still have to shell out $400 to $600 for raffle tickets, anywhere up to $4,000 for field trips, and there will be a few fund raisers that will cost me up to $2,500.

2 kids 40 grand a year for 12 ish years… That’s close to half a million for pre collegiate education. For two kids.

This is perhaps something you should reconsider as a wise use of your money.

Unless this school cranks out martyrs, Saints, priests and nuns at a rapid rate I couldn’t justify this type of spending and then having a teacher be so personally intrusive on where you make your money and if your kid has enough to eat.

Something is off on this situation. Either by the OP or by the school.

It just isn’t making sense.

 

[gravel_road]

acadiANNA. After talking to her old school it’s looks like it would be cheaper to switch schools. It is about 15 more miles a day, but something that would be worth it long term.

1Ke. Yes there are contracts in place for the type of work i do, but you also have to look how every contract has 2 sides. I was not able to produce what they wanted at the meeting that was set up. It’s not like i can just drop off a flash drive and run i have to show whats been done, how to use it, how it fits there needs, and work with them to make it work for them.

Allegra. Yes your right that i have issues writing in English. I had a lot of hearing issues all my life and i ended up 2 years behind in school because of a non-verbal communication learning disorder. I do not think i was every tested for autism spectrum, but have been told that most likely i would fall under the spectrum when i was getting my child tested. For some reason my brain has no issues with computer coding.

Hoosier Daddy. It would be much cheaper, but they charge about twice as much for a child that’s under an IEP. I never did the math looking at spending almost half a million before collage, but looking at the public schools where we live still makes me think it’s worth it.

 

[Rau]

acadiANNA. After talking to her old school it’s looks like it would be cheaper to switch schools. It is about 15 more miles a day, but something that would be worth it long term.

1Ke. Yes there are contracts in place for the type of work i do, but you also have to look how every contract has 2 sides. I was not able to produce what they wanted at the meeting that was set up. It’s not like i can just drop off a flash drive and run i have to show whats been done, how to use it, how it fits there needs, and work with them to make it work for them.

Allegra. Yes your right that i have issues writing in English. I had a lot of hearing issues all my life and i ended up 2 years behind in school because of a non-verbal communication learning disorder. I do not think i was every tested for autism spectrum, but have been told that most likely i would fall under the spectrum when i was getting my child tested. For some reason my brain has no issues with computer coding.

Hoosier Daddy. It would be much cheaper, but they charge about twice as much for a child that’s under an IEP. I never did the math looking at spending almost half a million before collage, but looking at the public schools where we live still makes me think it’s worth it.

None of which resolves any of the absurdities or gaps in the story so far.

 

[Gordon_Sims]

I wouldn’t be so quick to discount OP’s concerns about CPS being called. We had problems with one of our son’s teachers that nearly escalated to that. She had numerous unfounded disagreements with us over how we were raising and caring for him, most of which were things never brought to our attention prior to a series of contentious meetings with her, the principal, counselor and a couple other teachers. She hounded us through several years of his education, causing problems even when she wasn’t his teacher. The problems spanned the tenures of 3-4 principals and two priests and only ended when I [redacted to avoid going into too much detail] and threatened a lawsuit (the fact that she was also retiring at the end of that year I’m sure played a part in it). I believe there’s few things worse than someone who thinks they know your business better than you do, and has just enough knowledge or authority to make your life a living hell if you don’t kowtow to them.

 

[Eliza10]

I wouldn’t be so quick to discount OP’s concerns about CPS being called. We had problems with one of our son’s teachers that nearly escalated to that. She had numerous unfounded disagreements with us over how we were raising and caring for him, most of which were things never brought to our attention prior to a series of contentious meetings with her, the principal, counselor and a couple other teachers. She hounded us through several years of his education, causing problems even when she wasn’t his teacher. The problems spanned the tenures of 3-4 principals and two priests and only ended when I [redacted to avoid going into too much detail] and threatened a lawsuit (the fact that she was also retiring at the end of that year I’m sure played a part in it). I believe there’s few things worse than someone who thinks they know your business better than you do, and has just enough knowledge or authority to make your life a living hell if you don’t kowtow to them.

Wow. My son also had a totally crazy and bad teacher once, for 5th grade. The principal clearly discounted ALL of my very grave concerns. She truly wanted to see the bright side over reality. She wanted to trust her own judgment, and she already judged it, and was not open to more (name removed by moderator)ut, and my judgment did not match hers, and she* did not want* to consider it. It was a small private school and they took a great liking to submission to authority and they were the authority. I took my son out of that (private Catholic) school in November when I saw my words meant nothing to her or the other staff and probably never would.

What a stressful time that was, and the change did not go easy. But I heard that that poor class suffered a whole school year of total craziness, due to this principal’s closed eyes, before reality beat them over the head and they finally fired her at an “orderly” time - at the conclusion of the school year. She immediately went to another school - but they did not have closed eyes, and immediately they saw what they got. and fired her in first month… My son still shudders when he hears her name, and he is now in college. Also I recently was organizing old paperwork from those single-mom days, and I read my notes from the meetings I had with the principal, and my stomach got sick being reminded of it all. (I threw them out this time! Better not to remember.)

In 9 years of school there was the just the one totally crazy teacher, and the one high school statistics teacher who taught notably extremely poorly. But there was also one truly exceptional “perfect” teacher for 9th grade English, and another very good history teacher in high school who loved her subject and inspired her students interests. Oh, and a great chem teacher. As to all the rest, it ranged from not that great to acceptably competent (more of those, really).

Gordon, you give a very good case for fleeing from an unusually nosy, prying teacher. The teacher the OP described sounds totally crazy and I agree with fleeing. Especially since the principal said it was “impossible” to move the child to another teacher.