Learning Curve: Hover or hang back?

By Maureen Downey

My mother still smarts over her conference with Mrs. Hayward 35 years ago. My brother brought home a fifth-grade history test marked with a zero. Danny answered every question correctly, but Mrs. Hayward failed him on his penmanship.

So, for the first time with any of her four children, my mother made an appointment to talk to a teacher over what she deemed an unfair grade. And she’s still steamed over Mrs. Hayward’s indignant response.

“I don’t have to listen to this,” Mrs. Hayward told my mother. “No parent should ever question a teacher.”

That was the last time my mother ever met with one of her children’s teachers. I thought of my mother’s experience a few weeks ago when I fell into conversation with another mother about “hovering.”

The woman said she was surprised how often other parents ran to teachers and principals with concerns, complaints and questions. “Should I be hovering more?” she wondered.

I will confess that I am hovering more now than 10 years ago. My oldest two children were pretty much on their own, as I was then following my mother’s credo of the school is always right, even when it isn’t.

As a room parent over the years, I often arrived at school in the morning to drop off snack or book orders and was surprised to find the teacher in earnest conversation with an agitated mom or dad. I never thought anything rose to the level where I had to set up a special session with a teacher, so I seldom checked the little box on the progress report that said, “Conference wanted.”

When my kids brought home inexplicable homework that reduced them to tears, I told them it was their job to talk to the teacher the next day, not mine. And when other parents would call to enlist me in campaigns — the teacher kept the room too hot or too cold or marked tests too easily or too severely — I usually demurred.

Even when teachers would pull me aside and advise me to talk to the principal about something, I hesitated.

But over the years, I’ve learned a great deal about the importance of parent advocacy, and it has changed my mind.

Frankly, I was naive in the beginning. I assumed that every decision about a child resulted from careful discussion and review. I imagined teachers and principals around a table engaged in thoughtful discussion based on the child’s performance and portfolio.

While that does happen, it has become apparent to me that expediency also shapes decisions. If there are too many students in the Spanish I class and too few in interior design, your child may end up learning how to match draperies and upholstery rather than how to conjugate Spanish verb infinitives.

A few weeks before my son began high school, his freshman schedule arrived in the mail. While the school had asked incoming ninth-graders to select a half-dozen possible electives, he didn’t get any of his choices. He got interior design.

Worse, only one of his first semester classes even approached an academic stretch. The others were, to put it plainly, fluff.

After much internal debate, I called the high school, expecting a standard rebuff that schedules were immutable. But, in fact, the cheery receptionist told me that schedule adjustments were the norm, and counselors always set aside the week before school to fix snafus.

“Great, can I come in first thing Monday?” I asked, “Oh no, honey,” the receptionist told me. “You’re among the last parents to call. The only slots left are Friday.”

While the most desirable classes were already filled, the counselor was able to switch my son from interior design to civics. And I learned a valuable lesson: There are times when you ought to speak up.

It’s not always easy to recognize the instances that warrant intervention. I look back now and realize that there were a few situations in my and my brothers’ schooling where my parents ought to have become involved.

My own checklist is basic: If my children are losing academic ground rather than gaining it, a meeting is in order. I don’t act often on their laments that the teacher doesn’t like them or never calls on them. I fall back on my mother’s advice in those cases: Be more likable and raise your hand higher.

Nor do I think it’s a parent’s role to jump into schoolyard conflicts with classmates. Through experience, I’ve realized that most pass and that parental involvement can escalate or prolong a situation that would have worked itself out over time.

My kids have never hated school so much they feigned stomachaches or cried every morning. Nor have I ever faced a teacher mismatch that merited requesting my child be transferred to another class.

But I think parents should have that discussion if their child hates school and dreads the first bell. While learning how to co-exist with all sorts of people is critical, I think there is the rare teacher/student discord that compromises learning and can’t be ignored.

I still send my kids off to the first day of school with trepidations. Will they like their teacher and their classmates? Will it be a good year? And, if it’s not, what can I do about it?