Teacher mailing DS on personal mail

[ReallyIsThatSo]

Name changed regular-ish.

DS’s Head of Music wrote to say lessons bill overdue. Replied CCing ex who pays bill and thought no more of it.

I then get another email apology straight after for formal email tone prior as he’d just realised who he was writing to with a ‘ha’ smiley emoji!

I’ve never met him.

I confiscated DS’s teenage phone the other day and had a motherly snoop and saw a couple of emails from said Head of Music who’d sent a couple of music parts for a play they were doing. Nothing dodgy in the content at all.

BUT I thought it was odd because they have a school email system to communicate and also, he’s had to ask for the personal address. My son’s given it.

Obviously, after tonight’s random email - I’m now wondering what the actual fuck is all that about.

Teachers don’t mail kids on personal email addresses FOR ANYTHING, do they?

Or am I being ridiculous?

I’m pretty sure this bloke is going on the school residential next week.

My DS and ex both have their surname in their email address.

Am I getting carried away? What would you do???

I’ve worked in schools and I would’ve thought that you’d not contact a pupil directly for your own safeguarding and to ensure no blurred boundaries.

I've had many many students say they never check their college email (slightly older) I will still send the email to the college address but CC to the personal one.

That way they get the information and the college can see nothing inappropriate has been sent.

Ask your son to check school email

Have they been sent from a phone (there will be a footer stating that it's been sent from a device) rather than PC? It could be as innocent as the teacher was on his personal account on his phone and just hit compose by mistake

As a teacher not a cat in hells chance would I let any child or parent have my personal contact details. There is absolutely no need. Everything should come from the school account.

And in most schools staff are reminded of this (and social media use) at least once a year on inset days.

OP, I can't stop thinking about this.

Looking back at the other e-mails that have been sent from this music teacher...

Has he previously sent e-mails to you and/or EXH via his personal e-mail account, or has he always used the school account to e-mail you before?

If, prior to accidentally e-mailing you from his personal account, he has only ever used the school system, this would seem odd.

Especially if he has previously e-mailed your DS from his personal account but not you.

I'd also check deleted e-mails, as PP have said, and messages sent from your DS to the music teacher.

And when you e-mail the relevant member of staff, maybe copy & paste the e-mails that have made you feel suspicious & uncomfortable.

How did your chat with the HT go?

He shouldnt be emailing from his own personal account.

Dont understand the issue with a smiley face though.

He shouldn't be emailing from HIS personal account.
It could be a mistake (as someone said, maybe they have emails tot their phone or tablet and they've forgotten to switch accounts), it could be a big issue, it coukd be a very silly teacher.

It being sent to a personal email of a student is less an issue. At my school, students don't tend to use their school email or email staff so on the rare occasion I use it, I tend to send it to whichever they use most (always from my school one).

The smiley face and humour doesn't seem odd to me at all.

I'm not entirely convinced you can say there's an issue with fhe residential

Did he send you a text from his school mobile phone?

If he is using email on his phone he might have forgotten to select the correct email account. The school email system might be awful and it's easier to use his personal email address.

I don't think "it needs reporting". I think you just need to ask the school for clarification. It's not a safeguarding issue. It's a music teacher sending your kid music.

Times have definitely changed but when I was at school we used to email in our homework and coursework for English and history. Anything essay based really and would be sent to their personal work email (as opposed to generic)

Could the music teacher be a personal friend of your ex's, and the apology email have been meant for him?

My DCs are 13 and 15 and both email teachers from their private addresses about homework etc. So, therefore many of their teachers have their private email addresses.

I've emailed students personal emails to collect coursework etc, but always from my school email because they're monitored. If it came from the teachers personal email it might be that he has merged mail boxes on his phone and replied from the wrong one.

There could be an innocent explanation for it all.

Either:
reply and say 'sorry, I think you must think I'm someone else. We've never met! student's mum

Or

ask the school to look into it.