I imagine our teacher Dopers had a lot on their minds when they went to school Tuesday. I’m sure my middle brother did – he’s been a teacher’s aide for the last six weeks or so. He deals with just one student, a fifth- or sixth-grader. In the short time my brother has been working with him, he’s been suspended three different times - once for hitting another student, and twice (for a total of four days) for threatening to kill someone, or in the second case, everyone.
This kid has a long record of this and a lot of problems that I couldn’t name, and the staff is afraid of him because his father is a police officer - so, at least in theory, he has access to a gun. He was suspended again Monday, and I guess that means he’ll be back in school Thursday.
I’m not really worried my brother will get shot by this student, but he was a little shaken to have this happen (again) and then come home to hear about what happened at Virginia Tech. He’s not happy about what he’s dealing with, but as far as I know, he still wants to teach and he’ll keep dealing with this.
I’m sure most of you have never had reason to fear for your lives at work. But some of you have, and here’s to those who stuck it out. I’m not surprised that one of the heroes during the Virginia Tech horror was a teacher. It’s brave to teach at all, much less when something like this happens. Thank you for doing it.