Bloody rude kids and parents- AIBU to be annoyed?

[dollydoops]

I’m a head of department in a secondary school and since the GCSE results came out last Thursday, I’ve been looking over students’ scripts who are near to the boundary for the next grade up, to see if they should be sent for a review of marking. I’ve had about 30 to do, and each one takes between 30 and 45 minutes, so the workload is not inconsiderable.

I have absolutely no problem doing this, as I said on a thread last week. I think of it as part of my job, and it gives me pleasure when a student’s grade goes up. However, I do have a problem with the staggeringly rude and entitled behaviour of some students and parents, including
-parents and students repeatedly emailing me to ‘chase’ their scripts and badger me to get them done quickly, even though they only came to me on Friday and there has been a bank holiday weekend in between
-students just sending me their scripts to review without even asking me
-students asking me to review their scripts without saying please or thank you
-students not acknowledging my email about their script at all, even though I have spent a long time writing it and making personalised recommendations
-one student who responded to my email suggesting that they shouldn’t get a review of marking, as their paper had been fairly marked, with ‘I find that hard to believe’(!!)

This is just so rude!! Do people not have any sense of basic email etiquette or manners any more? Has anyone else experienced similar?

name changed to protect my students and myself!

I am surprised that your school is letting you do this. We found it massively affected teachers workload and wellbeing. Are you private or state?

It seems odd that you review all boundary cases rather than just those which seem anomalous.

I am guessing the teacher will reply when they return to work. If I were you I wouldn’t chase it for a while- cut off is the end of September so there’s plenty of time. Certainly don’t chase before Monday!

It’s a private school, but when I worked in a state school I also did it.

We don’t review all of them

I appreciate that the pressure at a private school and parents feel that they have paid for results.

Makes me very grateful that our school allow us to select only those close to the border to review.

Students can request their papers outside of this but we are under no obligation to review their papers.

Love this! Genuinely.

Totally agree, very rude! Even if it is part of your job they should still be polite and grateful! I get this as I sometimes have people emailing me about how to get into my career and I take the time to reply and think about what they’ve said and advise certain training or work experience and other contacts etc and they very very seldom reply with a “Thank you for that” email. So I’ve stopped taking so much time over them now, and just give a basic overview. I’m a woman in a male dominated industry and I give a hand up to young people if I can, especially females and those from underrepresented groups, but I still think basic courtesy should be mandatory. I remember several senior people male and female helping me out and guiding me and I was always profusely thankful and couldn’t believe they had even replied! I think they maybe don’t think you’re still a human being with feelings or something, they’re just caught up in the me me me of exams. Grrrr. You’re great for helping them tho, at least you will have good karma!

I'm a teacher. There is no way I would be doing this in my holidays. The exam board won't check it immediately anyway. I will start on Monday when I am paid to do so!

Reviews started on results' day.

YANBU to highlight and object to this rude and entitled behaviour. I’m disappointed that you are spending so much of your precious holiday time checking these scripts. I am also an HOD and I do not check scripts. I look to see who is close to the next grade up and suggest re-marks for these. If students ask me if they should get a re-mark (they pay for this), I guide them based on closeness to next grade boundary. There is a long term coming up and it is important to return refreshed.

They should have been taught about please and thank you though ??

I can’t believe you are expected to do this during school holidays. Wouldn’t have crossed my mind to be honest.

I am a former teacher.
Absolutely unacceptable behaviour all round. If it were me I would set an automated email response.
1 set out rules for requesting review. If in accordance with the rules - a request is just that, a request, no guarantee, no expectations given.
2 scripts sent in without and accepted request, automatically rejected. No more to be said.
3 you work to your schedule, no-one else's
4 you will not respond to emails - if it is policy that you do, give clear boundaries -only within office hours, no evenings, weekends or holidays. No exceptions. No explanations
Be prepared to be tested by both children and parents
Especially the latter. Stand firm. You are a professional. Not their employer or whipping ( boy) women
Best wishes!

Sorry OP, that is so frustrating. You’re well within your right to point out how rude they are, IMO!

On the thanks front - I wouldn’t always send a follow up email if I have thanked you in my initial email, as I would worry about clogging up your inbox. Perhaps this is a lesson for me to not worry about that!

I was stunned by a thread on here and the attitude towards getting papers remarked just because people didn't like the grade - I didn't know it was even a thing! There is such an air of entitlement to pretty much everything these days.

Critique their email/attitude and reply that script has gone to the bottom of the pile.

Unfortunately teachers are at the coal face when it comes to falling standards of parenting in this country. I’m sorry you have to deal with all the entitlement, snowflakeness (I’ll pretend that’s a word) etc, etc.

Next time you send a reply to an email, I’d certainly point out any rudeness, etc., e.g. “You’ve not yet had a reply as I only received your request on Thursday, there’s been a bank holiday weekend and you are not the only person I deal with”.

I’d want to send out an email to all, stating those without manners will be supported last. Those that are able to use please, thank you & decent general manners will go to the top of the queue.

I'd rather do it now than in the chaos of the first couple of weeks of term, to be honest.

But I'll do it when it suits me, not when someone demands my time.

It is not surprising when you think of some of the stuff you read on here. Examples:

The person who asked was she rude a few weeks ago when she pushes past wheelchair users to go in disabled toilets,

Another poster her DC was involved in a serious bullying incident and she was making excuses for DC behaviour, this included a pile on where a student got injured.

People are horrid and SO SELFISH, please do not take it personally. You are doing your best.

Mt son is going to get his Eng Lang remarked as 2 marks from.boundary and he would like a 5.
I have printed out the form on school website and he will ask eacher to sign it at school.next week.
I wouldn't expect teachers to spend their free time sorting out his problem.

Your school needs to make some sort of statement which goes to all parents in the year group, reminding them that teachers are doing their best to work through all the information provided to them, that repeated e-mailing just slows the process down, and that rudeness will not be tolerated. Perhaps they could offer a rough timescale to expect to hear back from you/other teachers, and to wait until that has passed before making another enquiry?

This is interesting OP. I’m Head of English and I’ve been doing the same this week, but the parents at my school (state comp, high levels of PP and SEN) have been lovely so far. I can’t believe even your students can’t put a polite email together. It must be exhausting and disheartening for you - it’s hard enough work without it being thankless.

@GleisZwei that’s exactly what they should do.

2 years ago my son was near a grade boundary and the teachers advised by his marks which paper to go for. No review done. My daughter is 1 mark off a 9/9 in science. I assumed that the teacher might advise which paper/s to get reviewed from the marks/previous years knowledge. EO said to get papers and then up to the teachers what to do as to whether to review them etc. I wasn’t expecting them to do that and do think it adds extra work. Maybe if it’s a completely out of the blue mark for someone. I just want to find a mark!