Parent Teacher Confrences

I am always nervous for parent teacher conferences because you never know what to do until you hear what the parent has to say. Sometimes you have to tell the parent that their child is an avatar of Satan, other times you have to defend the student for no other reason that you feel sorry for them.

And other times, well, they look at you and thank you for what you have done and you think about that driving home and are glad that you are a teacher, feeling like the master of Chicago and the future.

This conference promised to be interesting. It started when I saw two teachers run out of the gym. When you see this you get a feeling that something just happened that we will be talking about at the bar later.

What happened was one of my girl students, D, was at the first conference with her gym teacher. D's mother works for the post office (and although my mother is a mail carrier I have to say...) and is quite postal. Turns out D is failing gym because she refuses to dress. So the mom started slapping the shit out of her in front of the other teachers. D naturally was crying, Mother kept screaming about how she just paid $200 to get D's hair done and this is how she acts.

So when D was sitting at the table, I did soften what I was going to say. The mother's breathing slowed.

A's Mother came next, with A looking down so all we could see were the rows of his greasy hair and the gold chains on the back of his neck.

These mothers are intimidating and remarkable. The young males all think they are tough, fighters and gang bangers, but they have only seen a part of this life, and these mothers have seen much more.

It shows how tough they are, but also how much more complex the neighborhood is, how social problems are denying us the ability to see functional, caring communities who are tougher, more self less and united then most American communities. And how confusing and tragic this make the social conflict, and how much more important.

When I drove home I thought about the mothers thanking me, saying I was doing a good job, asking if they could, telling how important it was for them to get an education...
Makes me want to be a teacher, to be a better teacher.