"We don't get along, and she kind of likes to do her own thing, and she's a pretty stuborn kid, so I just stay out of her way."

Explaining why she passed her daughter on to the next grade, even though she literally did no work last year.

"As far as I'm concerned, he was defending himself. I'd have punched the little shit, too."

This parent refers to his son punching someone half his size in the face repeatedly, drawing blood, in the hallway because the kid stumbled and bumped against him. He also swung at a staff member who was breaking the fight up.

"A lot of the stuff you guys send home is too hard. I couldn't do some of that stuff, so I tell him he doesn't have to. Why should he have to do things that even I can't do? I won't let him do it."

Your kid is in the 7th grade, man...

"I can't help you. He's out of control at home, too. He screams and breaks my things and stays up all night. Last weekend I think he drank all of his father's beer. I can't control him for you. You'll have to do it."

The conversation was about the student skipping detentions and storming out of class.

"Mostly, I just do her homework for her. Between dance, softball, and friends, she's always too busy."

Truth is, the success of failure of any school is 90% about parenting and 10% about the teachers. So I salute those of you who are parents, and aren't retarded.

something's up here...

holy crap, that's really saddening.

On a potentially related note, I've maintained a nice low 3 beer a night average for the last week. Fingers crossed on keeping it that low.

damn that's rediculous

It's really not shocking stuff, it's just weird to see. At least, I hope it doesn't shock anybody. I've worked at small town schools (small enough that I worked at the ONLY school in town), big inner-city rough spots, and upper-crust suburb locations, and it's always the same. Probably half of the parents, in any of those spots, were exactly like this. Today was just tiring because I was exposed to so many of them at one time.

You can imagine how receptive the children of these idiots are to the structure and expectations of a school environment. But don't worry, they never bother or distract the other kids from learning...