Less Than 50 Angry Emails from Parents? It Must Be Teacher Appreciation Week!
Or Her Email Isn't Working Right
An English teacher at Mission San Jose High School in Fremont, California was surprised to find that by Wednesday her inbox only had about 35 angry emails from parents.
She had recently just posted grades from an essay about The Crucible and was expecting the normal flood of emails questioning the assignment in general, the grading criteria, and why she “has it out” for her students.
Then there’s always just the regular resentful emails attacking the teacher personally or the ones criticizing her overall decision-making as a professional.
After a rushed and haphazard email from school administration wishing the teaching staff a “Happy Teacher’s Appreciation Week,” she realized the lack of emails was her thank-you.
“I couldn’t believe it,” said Mrs. Hoang, an 11th grade teacher. “By Wednesday evening I’m usually inundated by hate mail, mainly just from irate parents who think I’m stupid or that their children’s grades should be higher.”
When she brought her computer to the IT department, they did a thorough check of her Outlook email to make sure she could receive emails properly. Maybe there was something wrong with her account?
But no, everything was working properly.
Hmmm….
It was Thursday morning by the time she put two and two together. After a rushed and haphazard email from school administration wishing the teaching staff a “Happy Teacher’s Appreciation Week,” she realized the lack of emails was her thank-you.
No cards from students, no coffee mugs. no gift certificates?
“Actually, I’ll take it,” she said, more than ecstatic. “Now I can free up my Thursday evening a little.”
In between classes, Mrs. Hoang will see if she can try to reply to most of them. She’ll get to her “high-flyers” first, then the ones who show genuine concern for their fuck-up kid second. The ones who wrote the essay for their child and are now questioning her grading she’ll get to last.
Any that use derogatory language towards her or racial slurs (which are more common than you think) she’ll forward to her principal. She smirked as she sent them on. “Let him deal with all of these,” she giggled.
By the end of the day on Thursday, she might only have 10 or 12 parents she’ll still have to respond to, but she can get to those in between picking up her kids and making dinner.
On Friday, she’s sure that there will be 10-12 more, but hopefully she can respond to them during her lunch and prep.
She’s brimming with excitement, but she doesn’t want to get her hopes up.
“I might actually have an entire weekend without having to respond to parents,” she beamed, fingers crossed.
She looked around her classroom, feeling appreciated for the first time all year. She was getting choked up and needed to take a moment. There were tears in her eyes.
“This has honestly been the best Teacher Appreciation Week ever!”