Upper Darby Senior High School
Homeroom w/Mrs. Aston.
Grades 10, 11 and 12.
Every day – “Good morning, Scotty.”
I had that pretty well blocked, thank you very much!
Man, you guys’ teachers had some issues. I never got embarassed (never have to this day) in school. I on the other hand was a teachers nightmare. The closest thing i have to relate is that in my Junior year of High School, i pissed off my German teacher (cummulated over the previous 3 years no doubt) to the point that she threw me out into the hall for 2/3 of an entire school year. Every day at 8th period I had to have my desk slid into the hall by the time the bell rings. She would come out and tell me the assignment, I had to figure it out on my own while she taught the rest of the class. The thing that pissed her off about it was, that all my friends would get out of their classes and come visit with me in the hall so I was thrilled to be there, and I still got an A in her class. She single handedly kept me out of the National Honor Society, considering I won the National Merit Scholarship I think she blackballed me.
Thanks All
Greg,
I bet she also leaned over and hissed “you’ll never amount to anything.” I’ve have more that my share of interaction with elementary school teachers, and most all feel that they KNOW if you’re worthless or not. As a child, I was told that again and again. Guess what, I am not worthless, I did amount to something. My experience taught me that respect must be earned (or at least conferred with the proper introduction). It also taught me that I was, in fact, smarter then most teachers I would ever encounter. Small minds do petty things, and I was above that.
About a week after the Challenger explosion, my fourth-grade teacher told the class (completely out of the blue – I have no idea why she thought this was something we needed to know) that the salvage team hadn’t been able to find the body of one of the astronauts at first, but they had finally found them all. One of the kids raised his hand and asked the question that had come into all our heads, the question any normal nine-year-old WOULD ask at this point: whose body was it that they couldn’t find? Mrs. Bryant proceeded to lecture us for half an hour about what HORRIBLE, sick, unfeeling children we were for wanting to know such a thing. I remember squirming with shame and feeling that I must be a terrible person – even though I hadn’t been the one who asked the question! Ugh. It amazes me that someone who had been teaching for twenty years could be so clueless about children …
I got sent out of class once because I farted. It was kindergarden! A few kids laughed, and the bitch sent me out! As if farting in the middle of class wasn’t embarassing enough.
This stuff reminds me of how much I hated being a kid, because I was so powerless. I remember raging for knowing this. Maybe that’s one of the reasons I will not have kids.
“With enough courage, you can do without a reputation.” - Rhett Butler
I’ve never told anyone this, but when I went to kindergarten, I wouldn’t talk, no matter what they tried to get me to do so. Finally, my teacher figured out a master plan: she would deny me the privilege of having a coloring book that she passed out to the other kids. So for a couple of weeks, I sat there watching everyone else color in their wonderful little coloring books with their wonderful crayons, feeling very alone and left out, and crying softly into my arms with my head down. I still wouldn’t talk, so she eventually gave me a coloring book, but I swear she scarred me for life, seriously. I’ve had an inferiority complex ever since, never felt I was a part of any group, but always separate (and lesser) from them. (I did eventually start talking to people at school in second grade.)
And we wonder why kids and their parents now sue? Cripes! These teachers were psycho!! I had a few, but by far one of the worst things I ever saw was this:
A good friend of mine (extremely shy- wouldn’t say shit if he had a mouthfull) had to go to the boys room during a test. I mean, squirming in his seat. Teacher embarrasses him- “Can’t you wait?” “What’s the big rush?”. We were all embarrased for him…then he peed his pants. In fifth grade. The best part is, NO ONE laughed at him. Not one person, ever. He was so damned mortified…I mean, it was on the floor. Anyway, he went to the nurse, blah, blah, blah and everyone HATED that teacher from that moment on.
The good thing is, I ran into that teacher in the mall a few years ago. He recognized me and tried to say “hi” and chat. I said “hi- before you say anything else, I want you to know that I think you are the biggest coward in the world because you get off embarrasing kids. and Greg M probobly thinks so to. So how 'ya been?” And this guy turned absolutely crimson and just walked away. I even gave him a good loud “screw you!” My husband was a little baffled until I explained. It felt great!!!
An optimist sees an opportunity in every calamity; A pessimist sees a calamity in every opportunity.
Zette has monster cajones. I am soimpressed!
One time I was about 14 and the wood shop teacher, who knew I couldn’t hear well, told me to sit in back of the class, which I did.
He then did roll call and when I didn’t respond, he said something to me and everyone in the class was laughing at me. I asked my friend in the class what the teacher said and he told me the teacher asked me if ‘I couldn’t hear well.’ ack.
First grade, six years old. We had to color in a picture of a snowman and I colored outside the lines. The teacher told me I had “ruined” it and had to do it again, but she was out of copies and sent me across the hall to the other first grade class with instructions to tell the other teacher I had “ruined” the picture and needed a new one. I remember standing outside the door to the other classroom, too ashamed to go in and admit the apparently horrible thing I’d done, until my teacher came out into the hall and asked me “What are you waiting for? Christmas?” and pushed me into the room. All the kids in that class stopped talking and watched me walk up to their teacher and tell her. I was fairly shy even before that and that incident didn’t do much to alleviate it.
Damn straight! Ahhh, hind sight…actually, i was talking about this with my mom and i was saying that if I had thought of it, i should have got up, told my professor to come with me outside and then tell her how professional and embarassing that is (in the middle of class mind you, so everyone there could see that). Then tell her that she had better not embarass me in front of the class like that again or i would go to her supervisor and let her supervisor know how unprofessional she was being. 
In my junior high school, one of the music teachers was a real bitch of a woman. She had some sort of complex about gum-chewing. Any student caught with gum in his/her mouth was told to spit it out and hand it to the teacher, who would then smear it into the student’s hair.
The one year I had this woman, a few parents filed complaints about her, after having their kids come home with gum all over their heads. The principal ordered her never to put gum in a child’s hair again. So from that point on, she would order students to stand in front of the class and put the gum in their own hair, so she could deny ever having touched it!
What’s worst about it is that most kids actually did what they were told, even though it was completely insane. We hadn’t yet discovered the freedom of simply saying “no” to an authority figure; we still followed orders out of fear of punishment, even when the orders themselves were the greater evil. (I say “we” because, even though I never had a run-in with this teacher, I recognize that I wasn’t any better than my fellow students in this.)
Of course I don’t fit in; I’m part of a better puzzle.
Oh, this brings back memories …
In junior high I was a complete dork and social outcast, but I took drama because my older sister (quite shy at the time) had taken it and enjoyed it.
Well, the teacher was casting one of those stupid little one-acts that junior high kids do, and there was a narrator’s part; a very long part, but I always had a gift for memorizing so when he said girls could try out for it, I thought I would. It was just me and several boys, and I, the social outcast, was the best by far; even my many enemies were impressed. The next day the teacher came over and showed me in his book how long the part was, and asked if I thought I could do it. I was sure I could, and said so. So a little while later he gave out the parts, and gave the narrator part to a good-looking boy, and made me a “townswoman” with no lines. He had been trying to scare me out of taking the part when he showed it to me, and when he gave it to the boy he said “Sorry!” to me with a smile, thus making it worse (then I knew that he knew he was wrong.) The boy who got the part even apologized to me; that’s how clear it was.
When he said girls could try out, it seems he didn’t mean a plain little fat girl.
Catrandom
For everyone scarred by these awful people, let me tell you that actually getting to say something to them, as an adult- is a beautiful thing. I was able to do this twice! Once as mentioned above, and once more. I had a track coach who ordered the skimpiest, most sheer outfits for the girls in track- we had to wear shirts under our shirts because you would just fall right out of it. He leered, he touched, he was a total devient. Once I pulled a muscle in my leg (INNER thigh) and he took me to his office to get some Icy Hot, and HE wanted to rub it on me HIMSELF…was mad when I told him no friggin’ way. Anyhoo, it was well known that he was a gross pervert. Fast forward 5 years…he gets in trouble (finally) for being a pervert, gets booted from the school, can’t teach, etc. I’m working at a big grocery store in the store pharmacy…and he is a shelf stocker! I run into him in the lunchroom, and asked him if he remembers me. He says Oh, yeah! Like we’re old good friends. I asked him if he enjoyed rubbing Icy Hot on his track runners and if it was worth it to him. I also asked what his daughter thought of the whole thing. He just babbled about how there wasn’t even any proof, etc. I just laughed and walked away. From then on, he left the lunchroom when I came in. Gee, I wonder why?
It may be petty, but it was remarkably satisfying.
I didn’t feel bad about confronting either one of these idiots, and I would do it again. It is wonderfully empowering to realize that these people, who used to be so powerful, are NOTHING to you now. If you get the chance, try it. I hummed a happy tune for days after (but I’m a little sadistic)
An optimist sees an opportunity in every calamity; A pessimist sees a calamity in every opportunity.
These stories are absolutely heartbreaking! How such bitter, warped people get to be teachers, I’ll never know.
I once had a horrid monster of a 5th grade teacher who stood me up in front of the class and proceeded to shriek at me for 5 minutes straight about how my bangs were too long, and how I couldn’t possibly see through them and why didn’t I go and get a haircut. Absolutely mortifying.
Oh, You can’t believe the people who are teaching…my neice goes to CATHOLIC school (not all of it is taught by nuns, evidentially) and one day she says to me “You know, my teacher is only a year younger then you!” (my neice is 10). I asked her how she knew how old her teacher is (apparently she’s 27) and she says “Because she’s always telling us how she’s getting so old, and she can’t find a good man, and she’s worried she won’t get married and have babies”. My jaw absolutely dropped. I asked her how she knew all this and she says “She tells us all about it, all the time”. I asked my sister about it and she says that indeed, this teacher comes to class moaning about her age and lack of a man all the time to these 10 year olds. How bizarre is that???
An optimist sees an opportunity in every calamity; A pessimist sees a calamity in every opportunity.
In an interesting twist, I once embarrassed my high school physics teacher by telling her she had an equation done incorrectly on the board, and after she stood there for two minutes staring at, walking up, taking the chalk from her and correcting it.
Geez, Dougie, what is it about French teachers. The only episode I can remember being embarrassed by a teacher is in my Junior year French class. I’d been taking French for 3 years (at this point). On one boring day, I yawned, mouth open, and made that ‘uuummmmm’ sound people sometimes make. Mr. Garnett acted like I had dropped something stinky on his lunch. Started ranting about how rude it was, and how was I raised, and didn’t my parents teach me how to yawn in public etc etc. Of course everyone in class is looking at me and I’m 3 shades of red. Completely humiliated me in front of class cause I yawned. Was the way I did it rude? Wasn’t meant to be. Always had a good relationship with the teacher before that but that kind of sunk it from that point on.
Hey, ChiefScott, my Mom went to Upper Darby! I’ll have to ask her for horror stories.
I had a junior high school science teacher who, I swear, WAS Mr. Garrison from South Park. Looked like him, talked like him, everything. When he kept us after school for detention, we had to SIT ON HIS LAP. We all thought this was pretty funny at the time, I might add, I don’t think any of us were traumatized.