Wanting to get this teacher fired

[lividbeyondbelief]

My dd attends a language class on saturday mornings in central london. This week due to horrible traffic we were 30 minutes late to collect her. We tried texting her teacher to say we were stuck in traffic but never got a reply. Anyway to make a long story short - she left my dd outside the school, alone with another boy, whilst she went out to go buy lunch. To make matters worse she told her to lie to us and say she was in the room next door if we asked where the teacher was when we collected our dd.

Our daughter was really upset and cried whilst being outside alone with this boy. My dh noticed she had been crying but the teacher just dismissed it, saying to dh she cried because he was late.

Obviously the bond of trust is broken and she wont be going back ever again. My question is what else should we do?

You should have phoned, yes, but I think you've got that message now! I think it is outrageous to leave the kids like that, irrespective of qualifications. If you run any kind of activity for children you need to accept that parents will sometimes be late for reasons beyond their control. If the teacher has a health problem that means she needs to eat then surely she would have food with her?

Re the legal requirement for disabled access, not if the trouble I have with a buggy at times is anything to go by.

I'm not sure about the teacher getting fired, though I can understand why you feel that way. I do think it is worth addressing though so it doesn't happen again.

"My dd only told us tonight. We were not livid when collecting her, we had no idea she had been left alone."

• yet another inconsistency. You said early on in the thread, that you were shocked and angry to find your dd left outside 'on the street' (or was it playgground?!)

You now say that actually, you didn't notice anything untoward, except that your dd looked like she'd been crying (which the tutor, who was clearly at the school then, dismissed as her being upset by your lateness)

So, you went off and did the rest of your busy Saturday, and it only emerged at bed time that your dd said the tutor had gone to get her lunch. You then surmise from this that the tutor 'must have walked two streets away because that's the nearest place to buy food'!

Your story is full of inconsistencies from start to finish. Why say earlier that you were upset at her being left unattended when you are now saying you didn't even realise anything was wrong?

Also - you still haven't explained why you think the tutor should have phoned you to explain her movements (which may have been inside the building still, as you only have your dd's assumption that she went off two streets away) yet you couldn't be bothered to call her to explain your lateness?

Finally, none of the few people on here who have tried to defend your actions, have actually explained what this woman was supposed to do? What if she had children of her own to pick up? What about her parental duty to them? Or do they just go hang because you mistakenly think her duty to your child is greater?

She had no idea when you might turn up. I have known teachers (and I'm talking about real teachers in school situations, not some tutoring arrangement) who have waited with youngsters for well over an hour, sometimes late in the evening when a school trip returns, and parents can't be bothered to arrive on time and can't be bothered to contact the school to say so. Obviously in these situations, there is normally more than one member of staff who can wait... but you can see the problem can't you? What if a teacher has a trip arriving back at 9 pm, and has arranged to (for example) pick up her own daughter from an evening out at 10pm. What does she do if she's still got school kids waiting to be collected, and has had no communication from the parents? Leave her own daughter standing on a dark street corner waiting, because the parental duty of care to her takes lower priority than the parental duty of the parents who can't be bothered to pick up their kids?

OP - it doesn't matter how much you rant and twist and turn your story - YABVVVVVVVU to offload the entire responsibility onto someone else, when it's you and your DH who messed up, and you wouldn't stand a hope in hell of taking any action against this tutor.

SarahStratton said what i was going to say. Zone 2 is not central London. Your op was misleading and did gave the impression that your child was sitting on the steps outside a building in Oxford Street when actually she was on school grounds in the suburbs. Not the same thing at all.

Of course asking her to lie is not on but I don't think the situation was half as bad as you were trying to make out. I have two hours to kill when dd is in pre-school and it was obvious early on that unless you live next to the school then there really isn't enough time to do anything else without risking being late. I'd send DH off to do the school run on his own I'd you can't drive because this situation could easily happen again.

Oh and I'm wondering at the timing of the text. Because if you texted, say, when you were 10 minutes late, and didn't hear anything back, then by the time you were another 5 or 10 mins late, sitting in traffic and clearly going nowhere, surely to god that's when you follow up with a phone call, because there's no indication the text has even been received?! To send a text and then sit in traffic for a full half hour just 'assuming' that arrangments have been made to supervise your dd , is unbelievable!

Oh and if the traffic was so unexpectedly and unbelievably bad that a two minute drive took 30 minutes, isn't it strange that all the other parents except for those of the boy, managed to collect their kids on time.....

I'm shocked by this thread - are the posters having at go at the OP genuinely saying that if you leave your 8 year old child in the care of another adult and you're a bit late, they are perfectly reasonable to leave that child uncared for?

And the teacher/tutor didn't leave the children after 30 minutes, if I've got this right, she waited about 10 minutes and at that point left them to get her lunch as she was back in time for the OP to arrive. She'd been to get it and was back by the time the OP's DH picked her DD up, anyone could have taken the children and no one would be any the wiser.

OP - YWBU to try to get the teacher fired, but you wouldn't be to call the school, tell them you are angry and disappointed they didn't make any attempt to contact you before leaving your DD alone. If she trained overseas where this would be ok, that's an explaination for her behaviour, not an excuse.

I'd also discuss this with the other parents in the class, they really could do with being warned that the school think it's ok to leave children on their own outside without any attempt to establish when the parents where arriving, if in fact they were.

OP - being late was wrong, but it was a one off, but noone can be 100% certain that they will always be able to be on time, with all the will in the world, you can leave 30 minutes early and get stuck/have your car break down/be struck by lightening etc - you'd expect the person looking after your child to continue to do so until you or another responsible adult got there.

Oh and as someone who worked in Central London (zone one) for many years, I'm struggling to see how you can live THREE zones away from Zone two?

There's very little bullying on this thread. Just an utter lack of comprehension AA to how the OP can think she is being reasonable. Particularly given the constantly changing story and drip feeding of information.

Agreed in principle FPT, but all of this could have been avoided by OP ringing rather than texting.

"none of the few people on here who have tried to defend your actions, have actually explained what this woman was supposed to do? What if she had children of her own to pick up? What about her parental duty to them? Or do they just go hang because you mistakenly think her duty to your child is greater?"

I would class that as an emergency situation - call the parents, emereny contact, whoever was responsible for my DCs, anf then SS - as you say my DCs would be equally as important.

However, reading your post, I agree. A lot of things don't make sense. So while I think in principle adults should not leave children alone, I am reserving judgement on this case for now!

SarahStratton - what are you on about? there are 6 zones if you include the outer one, so of course the OP could live 3 zones away from zone 2!

Some people are having real problems reading what she is saying - I know she has been dripfeeding but it's not hard - she, her DH and DD2 dropped her DD1 at a LANGUAGE class (nowhere does she say it's English, it almost certainly isn't) in Zone 2, then she, her DH and DD2 drove to a café that is appropriate for the OP 2mins away, still in Zone 2, still in the same postcode area (i.e. not far). They then got caught in horrendous traffic where they couldn't move for too long, couldn't pull over therefore couldn't park. The DH couldn't leave the car as the OP can't drive. The OP can't leave the car and walk as she has health issues.

HOWEVER! They should indeed have phoned the teacher - if it had been me, I would have been phoning every 5 mins to apologise for being late and checking that DD1 was ok.

HOWEVER AGAIN! the fact that the teacher left 2 smallish children unsupervised for up to 15 mins is pretty shite. And she knew it too, or she wouldn't have asked the children to lie about it.

But YABU to want to get her sacked. Get someone to explain to her her duty of pastoral care, yes; reprimand, yes; sacked, no.

Good job the little boy's parents were late too, wasn't it. I wonder how they're feeling about it? I wonder if they phoned the teacher or just texted her?

The op has made it very clear in her last post that she wasn't at all fazed at finding her dd outside the school without adult supervision - she says it was the lunch issue which made her angry, and that didn't emerge until bedtime.

Of course, this is a complete u turn from earlier in the thread when she was ranting about her dd being left on a street in central London/ zone 2 or wherever she thinks it was

Methinks the op is tying herself in rather large knots here!

YABU for wanting the teacher fired.

YANBU to be annoyed that she left them outside alone, although have to take some resposibility for texting NOT calling. And by calling OP I mean repeatedly until someone answers.

As for teacher may having a condition where she needs to eat, if that is the case then surely she should have food on her, relying on a local shop would be a little daft. And what if the child has a medical condition?

Livid has said it was a one off, something she couldn't forsee. I'm a little now that my life has unforeseen problems in it compared to the problem free lives of many MN on here.

Nothing happened in this case BUT is is important now that a policy/ proceedure is drawn up in case this ever happens again to any other child.

The teacher was stupid and irresponsible for leaving your child and especially for telling her to lie. I would complain.

You were unreasonable in texting- I can't believe you didn't phone- And she shouldn't get fired, just warned.

Am at those who think you have changed your story during the course of the thread...

When I teach I turn my phone off. I doubt the OP would be very impressed if the tutor in question took time out of the lesson to deal with incoming calls, texts etc.

I really hope that the OP'S DH appologised for their lateness when he picked up their dd.

Am also at those thinking the story has changed. The DD was not alone when she was picked up, the teacher had returned by then or else she wouldn't have been able to talk to the DH. So the OP and her DH would not have known about the period of left-aloneness until the evening when the DD told them about it, and about the teacher asking her to lie about it if her parents had turned up while the teacher was missing, presumably.

I can't believe that you are all blaming the parent here !!!! What type of parents are you!!!!! There is NO excuse for a teacher to leave a child unaccompanied and in fact that teacher WOULD lose their job if this was reported as they have the legal duty of care - the teacher should have rung the parents as soon as they were late - that's a national policy! Whatever the reasons for you being late - and i agree 30 mins is very late - but these things do happen and a teacher cannot leave a child on their own - i'm a teacher and if something bad had happened to that child whilst in her care that teacher would be up in court now!

Doesn't sound like shes a teacher

I can see the point that OP should of called instead of texting & can appreciate that the tone of the OP is a little hostile.

But any adult especially one in a position of trust shouldn't leave kids alone regardless of if their parents are late or not. I would complain as any responsible adult would take the kids with them to the shop; by all means issue the parents with a late fee or dont have their kids back in your class but don't leave the kids alone it's not their fault the parents are late.

I can't believe that you are all blaming the parent here !!!! There is NO excuse for a teacher to leave a child unaccompanied and in fact that teacher WOULD lose their job if this was reported as they have the legal duty of care - the teacher should have rung the parents as soon as they were late - that's a national policy! Whatever the reasons for you being late - and i agree 30 mins is very late - but these things do happen and a teacher cannot leave a child on their own - i'm a teacher and if something bad had happened to that child whilst in her care that teacher would be up in court now!

yep i am a teacher and have been teaching 12 years and would NEVER do what that teacher/tutor did under any circumstances

Kitkat-it doesn't sound as thought the woman is a teacher, more of a private tuition type set up

sorry thought you were talking about me !!! I know what you mean but her legal obligations are still the same and if someone left my child - especially these days i would be fuming!!!

Her legal obligations Are the same ?? - er no, they aren't.

no, moral obligations are IMO, but legal obligations are not

Teacher should have taken children with her if she needed to buy food, not left them by themselves.

However, OP you should have telephoned the teacher about your lateness.

You shouldn't get her sacked, you should speak to her, apologise for being late, then make it clear that if it happens again, you will phone her, and she is never to leave your DD, or any child unattended.