I have just had the most astonishing encounter with a mother! For three days we have had the most awful heatwave in our city with temperatures of 40 degrees Celsius (104 F). Some of our classrooms have been renovated as part of the school's donor programme; mine has not. So while some of the classrooms have airconditioners, mine does not. With no wind during the heatwave, the classroom has been unbearably hot. Two ceilings fans and one standing fan have hardly had an effect unless you stand right beneath them. The children removed socks and shoes inside, and we tapered the work down to bite-size portions.This morning I met an angry mother who is furious that we, the teachers, have to work in such unbearable heat and she pelted me with questions.
"Why don't you have airconditioning?"
"Why haven't you done anything about it?"
"Why don't you go on strike until you get an airconditioner?"
I reassured her that the school is concerned and parents will hopefully help to raise money for our classroom, but that we cannot go on strike in order to get airconditioners.
"That is not good enough!" she exclaimed. "I'm tired of everyone always being concerned about the children. What about the teachers?"
How refreshing - someone who cares about the teachers!
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3 comments:
Hi Linday,
It is refreshing and yet if you hang in there long enough, you'll start to see that most parents do care about the teachers. In fact, as a district administrator, I know that we all do (here in my district), yet we are not perceived as doing so. We are forced to make some tough decisions and there is a chain of command when it comes to communication (all departments are not necessarily permitted to email directly with the teachers, we may have to issue a bulletin which then must be distributed by the principals), so the communication does breakdown sometimes when(if) it gets to the teachers, unfortunately.
Most importantly though is that teachers understand how to properly advocate for themselves and their students and not suffer in silence. It sounds like you handled the situation perfectly.
Keep up the great teaching and keep blogging. You've got a great start to a great blog here.
It is nice to hear that someone cares about teachers. We don't always get the credit we deserve. I knew you had to be a long way from Kansas. We won't need an air conditioner for a couple of months.
I live in Virginia, where it gets hot but not usually above 100 F as it did for you. Although most of our schools are air conditioned, they don't always work! So we have had two or three fans going and even sat on floors to be cooler.
Parent involvement is crucial here in the U.S. because parents can often put pressure on the school boards to make changes for teachers. Do you have organizations there such as PTA or PTO (Parent-Teacher Association or Parent-Teacher Organization)? These groups are organized in most schools here and claim a good amount of local clout. The PTAs also raise money sometimes for teachers' needs and bring yummy baked goods to our workrooms once in a while to let us know they're thinking about us!
I'm glad to see that you have an ongoing dialogue with parents in your school. This will make a difference to them and to you and, ultimately, to the students.
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