Teacher tales: ... off the cuff and candid stories from classroom teachers from around the country.

Watching over student teachers
By Fred Munch

Posted August 21, 2008. 6:55 p.m.

I had an “incident” at work yesterday. While walking out of the cafeteria with our food we stopped at a table where the principal and a few teachers were eating. Sitting next to the principal was a social studies teacher who is personal friends with the principal, who also hired him. The teacher (my age) said to a student teacher (ST) that he wanted to observe her in the classroom.

I said, “Hey, she has only been in front of a class three times, give her a break.” I then turned away from the guy and said something to another teacher. Then we left to go eat.

When we got out of the cafeteria, I told the ST to stay away from the guy because he was an old lech. She then told me that the guy told her, “I really meant that I want to observe you in the shower.”

I was and still am SO pissed.

An administrator for another school, a friend of mine, says I need to tell the ST what to say and how to handle that (sexual harassment) in the future. And that the ST needs to tell the guy that if he ever says that kind of thing again she will file a lawsuit. She also thinks I need to make the principal aware of it. Jenna said the principal was looking right at her when the teacher said it and she thinks he heard it. It should prove to be an interesting day today hey?

First thing this morning, I told the ST that she needed to go and tell the perverted teacher that if he ever said anything else inappropriate to her that she would take action and file a sexual harassment suit. I was proud of her for saying that she would do that.

However, it wasn’t necessary because the guy came to my room this morning and called her into the hall to apologize. He did so because I told the principal what happened right after school started this morning.

The principal's response was, “Danny is a damned idiot. I’ll talk to him.” So the damned idiot says to her when apologizing, “I’m sorry for what I said yesterday. I don’t know you well enough to have said that.”

WHAT AN IDIOT!!!! The ST swears the principal heard it when the guy said it. We can’t prove that. So it is over. Fini. Done.

Update: August 22, 2008. 5:35 p.m.

The ST is not even considering any further action. She is a very attractive young lady that has lots of self-confidence. She just laughs it off. She wasn’t pissed. Her husband wasn’t pissed (which I don’t understand). But I bet her dad would be if he knew.

The really scary thing is that the principal didn’t seem that upset that his buddy did that. Just calling him a “damn idiot” and making him apologize was not enough. He should have put a letter in the teacher's personnel file since he has a history, but they are good buddies who golf together and go back a long way. The guy (white) has a history of this shit and the white assistant-principal (a buddy of the principal
who was hired by him) also does, and we have a couple of very attractive
younger teachers that they “joke” with inappropriately all the time. Like I said, that is the reason the female assistant principal from last year got fired. Shethreatened filing a grievance against one of them and ended up getting fired for it. Where is the justice?

The ST is not likely to get hired at our school so she really doesn’t care what they think. She only cares what I think and her professor thinks. The professor doesn’t know. I met him today. The ST is getting a real education about black culture, having grown up in the county and going to a 95% white school. She is going to be okay as far as teaching. She loves history and wants to share that with the kids.

What is really throwing her is the low level of the kids here. I have a few groups that could be taught on a 7th grade level. It’s sad.

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Note:

Eduspeak: 'The use of acronyms and abbreviations to further the cause of American education.'