Would you leave a class WhatsApp due to a "mole"

[PsychoHacker]

I have one DC so I'm not very experienced with this sort of thing. I'm trying to work out if this is a non issue or if I have a right to be miffed.

There's a unofficial WhatsApp chat for DC's class. I've found it pretty useful as I don't have any other DC and this is my first rodeo with a child in school.

For a while now I've suspected that someone has been "feeding back" the chat to the school. The reason being that any time something is discussed, there seems to be a notice posted within a few hours, discussing exactly what was said in the chat.

I've not really given it too much thought as there is never anyone being malicious or saying anything bad about the school however there has been a few minor rants regarding the usual things like homework or school events etc.

There was a specific topic discussed recently that had nothing to do with the school, and there's no way the school would have any knowledge of it unless someone told them. Again nothing malicious however this really confirmed the "mole" theory for me.

Last week someone in the chat basically "outed" themselves as a friend of the teachers. Fine, doesn't make much of a difference to anyone however the more I think of it, the more uncomfortable it makes me.

Why would anyone feel the need to go running to the school with every little detail posted in this chat? Most of the topics are nonsense. Are they trying to score brownie points? Isolate themselves from the other parents? I just don't understand the thought process behind it.

I think I'll need to leave the chat as it's making me rather uncomfortable that someone is sharing my messages and input without my permission. Such a shame as the chat has been very helpful with keeping me informed with events and anything else school related. Wwyd?

But why do you feel uncomfortable if nothing malicious is ever written on the chat and if you rarely contribute anyway. What exactly is the mole reporting on and why would anybody outside your class chat be interested.
If the group chat were useful and helpful for practical purposes, I would be glad of it and continue to use it carefully.
Then there would be no need to be bothered about a potential mole at all.

I did read your post. You said someone from the WhatsApp was feeding info back to the school like a mole. Unless someone from the school is asking for this WhatsApp gossip from their friend, I can’t see why they’d care! My kids school barely has time to respond to official serious complaints, let alone taylor school correspondence to WhatsApp group gossip.

With anything you write, anywhere, but especially in groups, assume someone is going to screenshot it.

So the school know what the group have been discussing. So what? Why do you want it to be secret? I don’t understand why you feel it’s a problem. I would have thought it was a good thing for the school to know about parents' concerns, so they can do something about them if they’re justified.

Presumably, since most of the group are strangers to you, you won’t have been posting anything particularly personal. I've found class WhatsApp groups very useful for reminders, answering queries about school practicalities etc.

If you were now anxious because you enjoyed slagging off the school staff for no good reason, and didn’t actually want any issues to be resolved, that would be different of course.

Can you imagine being a teacher and there is a class WhatsApp group set up, which partly consists of complaining or bitching about everything you do.

Never put anything on a group WhatsApp chat that you wouldn’t be happy for everyone to see. I know a lot of people who have a laugh over the posts on their class WhatsApp chats and one person screen shots some of the more extreme posts and sends them on to friends (not sure how interesting that would be, but there you go). Group WhatsApp chats are not private. If your child is in a class of 30, there are potentially as many as 60 parents on the chat. If you were speaking to a roomful of 30 or 60 people, you wouldn’t say anything you wanted to kept private.

I am both a parent and a member of staff at my DCs school. I am on several WhatsApp groups, as are several other teachers. I wouldn't pass on anything to the school unless it was something practical (i.e. school needs to clarify something that there is general confusion about) and I certainly wouldn't name names or even mention the group.

A ‘mole’ - the drama 😂
I am in two class WhatsApp groups and find them really useful (and good for a laugh now and again - it’s like an episode of Motherland sometimes 😂)
On each group there is also a teacher and a couple of TAs from the school who have children in other year groups. Several of us are on the PTA/governors/part of other school
liaison groups. I am personal friends with Dd’s teacher and DS’s teacher is my sister. So I have been a ‘mole’ on several occasions. The juicy intel I have passed on? Real drama like ‘everyone is a bit confused whether the spelling test is on Mondays or Tuesdays’ or ‘kids say one thing, newsletter says another’.
By my criteria, there are moles everywhere 😂

These groups are so valuable as long as people behave like adults 🤷‍♀️

I can't imagine i ever say anything in a school group that would be interesting enough to report to anyone, same with all the other parents in my child's classes

We all lead happily boring lives, i can't imagine 'x left their folder in class' being juicy enough gossip

Are you sure there aren’t members of staff in the group because they are parents? Thinking about my dc’s primary school classes, even in a small school (20 ish students in combined class, eg Y1/2 or Y5/6), every class has at least one child of a staff member. My Y2 age child has 3 staff children in his class!

Unless you all are bitching about teachers, it sounds like someone is helpfully taking questions back to the school. Maybe even a parent governor if not a staff member? I know our parents who are staff are really helpful in this way because often the school doesn’t tell us things (the admin person is rubbish so communication is poor), but Joey’s mum who is a TA knows everything and keeps all of us in the loop. I think it’s probably a good thing.

Just as I teach my older dc, never say or do anything in a chat you don’t want everyone to know about. Surely adults must be more sensible than my teen in how to handle themselves in a WhatsApp group.

I think I'll need to leave the chat as it's making me rather uncomfortable that someone is sharing my messages and input without my permission.

How incredibly naive of you. Did this never occur to you before 😂. As pp said, never put anything on social media including and especially WhatsApp, that you wouldn't be comfortable with someone screenshotting and sending to the whole world. That's pretty much Social Media Rule Number 1 and has been since it existed.
Or in more old fashioned terms "If you haven't got anything nice to say, don't say anything at all".
I'm in a nursery WhatsApp group and not a bad word has been said on there- wouldn't bother me or anyone else if the entire convo was sent to the nursery.
I'm yet to experience school Mum WhatsApp groups but one of my friends has sent me screenshots of hers taking the piss out of some of the stuff the Mum's moan about.

I always found the "moles" quite a useful function of the group... any particularly batshit decisions by the school you could ask others about, get views and then decide whether to complain or not based on how many people agree with you.

Absolutely this.

Teachers are just as human as the rest of us - and if the shoe was on the other foot I don't think anyone would like a WhatsApp group of 30 moaning about us either individually or the job we do. Also it doesn't resolve the issue.

Best thing to do about concerns is to raise them with the school. Which the "mole" is doing so they can get sorted. I'd not to this as I don't like to get involved in stuff like this (and left our class WhatsApp group for this reason) but good for them!

If you want to rant about Mrs X behaviour policy - do it in person with your husband or best friend .

If want to know when the bake sale is, how much for the school trip to the museum is or if it’s this Thursday or next that they need to take in a cardboard box - ask on the group chat !

it’s pretty simple - don’t put anything in writing about school / staff that you don’t want to come back and bite you on the bum and don’t expect a group chat to be ‘private’ when multiple people can access / copy / share it…

if you have an issue with school - raise it privately in usual manner by having a word with teacher, sending an email etc .

it’s basic common sense surely?

I still don't understand what can be reasonably shared that you would worry about school knowing. If parents are concerned that the lunch bookings disappeared on the app again, or want to know what type of mufti is on Friday, or want to know if the projects are optional when the email wasn't clear, or what time after school club gives snacks... then those are questions for a class rep to send jointly to the office or the teacher if they don't know.

I would stay in the group, our class WhatsApp's often have parents in them who also work at the school. Learning support assistants etc.. nothing worth telling the teachers is ever discussed anyway!

It sounds to me as though someone has had a little moan about one of the staff and there have been email reminders from the school to avoid discussing individuals in these groups.

Imagine a large group of people that know absolutely nothing about your profession, thinking they have the right to moan and fuss about how you do your job and you just have to accept it because it's on a WhatsApp 🙄.

I don't really understand the us vs them attitude towards the school tbh.

It always gets back to the school somehow! And if it’s a particularly nasty thing you’ve said you are very likely to end up being asked to come in and discuss it with the head (with screenshots printed out).
Just stick to general chat and information and you’ll be fine to stay on!

Still want to know what the drama is lol my groups are so boring. Just stay and don't participate..they are really handy. Obviously grownups shouldn't be gossiping about staff and important issues on WhatsApp.

oooh very Nancy drew

I think I'll need to leave the chat as it's making me rather uncomfortable that someone is sharing my messages and input without my permission.

what the heck are you putting on the chat OP?!

Our class group is basically reminders of events, lost jumpers, warnings about illnesses going round. Nothing critical of the school or teachers. The only thing that could be ‘fed back’ to the school was when the school set a complex homework task that nobody really understood. In that case a clarification from the school was what was needed anyway (and indeed one parent did email to ask and shared the response on the group).

Bitching about the school seems to be the problem here, not that somebody is relaying it back. Rants about something that you don’t like have no place on the WhatsApp group. You can discuss these with trusted friends or approach the school yourself if needed.

I'm confused, 'Mole at a Rodeo' ?

I’m going to guess OP you don’t have a huge amount going on in your life in terms of work?