The Other Conference

Ten minutes after the conference with the crazy EA, I had a wonderful conference with the father of a boy in my class. Dad has had custody for less than 2 years and no contact with the kids before that. When my student, a real sweetie, lived with mom he missed 90 days of his 2nd grade year and nearly all of his first grade year. He's not unintelligent but he is behind. He had 4 C's and 2 F's on the progress report I printed for the conference. I showed these grades to dad and waited, tensed and hunched, for a verbal assault directed at me begin.

I was so wrong. Dad turned to son and congratulated him for his effort. He said that he sees son is still having some trouble areas, but that those 4 C's showed his effort. He thanked his son for trying so hard to do his best. It was all that I could do not to sob (but I did wipe a tear from my eye.) Dad spoke to me about his own growing up--his father died when he was 8; his mother was useless and he's been on his own since he was 14. He said he had made some bad choices in his life but that he was going to be there for his son and younger daughter because no one had ever been there for him.

His son is one of the hardest workers in my class. His home life isn't perfect--his dad works nights and his dad's aunt takes care of him. Evidently there's a lot of people at this home but none are able to provide educational support because none can read much at all. So my sweetie tries to get all of his work completed at school where he can get help if he needs it.

It strikes me how different this is from Rotney's situation. Rotney has more people helping him than he can probably count, all determined to educate him. But he doesn't participate much in the process--just rushes through his work because he'll have to redo it at home anyway. Rotney's not trying to please anyone because it's not his fault when he doesn't succeed. According to his family, it's mine for not caring (code for not greasing the skids enough for him to slide onto the AB honor roll.) By contrast, Sweetie Son tries to achieve because he knows how much it pleases his dad. He also feels a great deal of personal satisfaction when he does well on an assignment--Looky, Ms. Matters, I made an A!

I would give my paycheck back to have a classroom full of parents who care as much as Sweetie Son's dad. And I definitely don't get enough to deal with the ones like Rotney's EA.