It is not the children in one’s classroom that lead a teacher to drink (or seek some other, “healthier” stress reliever); it’s the Parent Teacher Association, a.k.a. “Parent Club”.

In an attempt to put together a celebratory Thank You dinner for the most active members of my school’s Parent Club, I’ve had 3 calendar dates rejected after setting them, 3 venues rejected after booking them and 2 finalized dinners cancelled altogether. We’re talking about a “Thank You” dinner paid for by the school – not a fundraiser!
Interestingly, the rejections came from parents who had complained one way or the other to a teacher about their kids’ problems.

Parents can be far more concerned about the daily foibles of their kids than kids are. Although some of their concerns are valid, others need to be confronted by and worked out by the kid himself.
But parents who bombard teachers with “His feelings were hurt,” “He can’t lose his recess even if he didn’t turn in homework for the week,” or “I know you are watching 20-plus kids at a time, but mine didn’t drink enough water and it’s hot outside” are factually doing a disservice to their child.
Coach the kids, don’t resolve the problem yourself, and don’t expect your child’s school teacher to resolve it, either.

Most of the time the real problem is not the one you think it is, anyway!

The child is the one ultimately responsible for his education and environment. By the time he / she is 6 and older, they need far less hand-holding and far more “It’s your life, how do you want to live it?”

YouthMUSE would say the top three goals any parent should have and be responsible for are:
1. Insisting their child become actively self-reliant.
2. Ensuring their child is moral, both through education and parental example.
3. Helping their child get the best general education possible in his / her environment.

These three things alone will give us ethical, productive and intelligent future generations.

There are no parents around to guide our everyday decisions in adulthood. Perhaps the roots of teen delinquency fall back to parents failing to do #1 through 3 above.

Dana Houston Jackson www.youthmuse.com