AIBU to expect teachers to keep to parents’ evening time slots?

[Skipin29]

Waiting past my time every parent’s evening and then when I’m seen it’s rushed through and I don’t get the full 10 minutes.

You need to tell the waffling parents that their time is up and if you personally need to speak to the parent for more time then book them in a double slot.

The online PE’s I have done don't allow overrun - they cut you off at the end of the timed session. That sounds a poor system - I can’t imagine how tha5 even works

They need school cloud

I always feel sorry for teachers on parents evening.

They're often stuck waiting for one late parent to pick up at home time. Stuck with parents waffling on and on.

I bet they just want to get home!

I'm always mindful not to take longer than I need and stick to the time window.

I have wondered before if they should have timers set. If I was a teacher I'd be very tempted.o

Did you discuss everything you wanted to?

If not, why did you not say and can I ask about ABC?

Yes! Have an egg timer on the desk! Have a klaxon sound in the hall!
my sons school surveyed parents about what they preferred: online or in person.
i bet you all the parents who waffle about little Johnny were the ones who requested in person.

i got so cross one year I pulled up a chair nice and close. The previous family had taken up their slot and then all of mine too. Their son hadn’t done well in a test. They were perhaps the kind of parents who place a lot of importance on test results.

they were claiming lots of issues one after the other with no basis (no previous concerns and not displaying symptoms)… dyslexia, dyscalcula, SEND etc just trying to get the mark changed. English not their first language. It seemed like friends had told them these things exist here to get “special” treatment. They kept saying “we heard having this gets you more marks…. Our son has it.” “You need to change the mark.”

in the end the teacher finally told them they needed to speak to the SEND team or the doctor. That she couldn’t diagnose etc and she had noted the kid did not seem nuerodiverse.

they just kept asking for more marks. I stood up and told them they’d overrun into my slot and were now in the next family’s slot. They didn’t like it but I had had enough.

got through mine in a minute:,”lacks a bit of focus and will sometimes mess around but generally a good kid who you find polite? When you tell him off on the odd occasion he does then do as he is told? Quite good at Maths but needs to slow down and show his workings out?”
err… yes that exactly.
great. I will let you recover the time the previous family were encroaching on…

You have no idea this issues that may come up during the previous meeting. Teachers are paid sod all, have pupils being horrible all day to contend with and then entitled parents with zero patience after a full day if teaching. Try some.deep breaths!!!!

Our (secondary) school has had online ever since Covid times. The appointment is just cut off when the 5 minutes ends, even if someone is mid-sentence.
Can occasionally be frustrating but on the whole it’s a much better and fairer system meaning the tiger mums and wafflers aren’t eating into other people’s time.

When my older daughter went up to the 6th form college, that's what they did.

They just had normal teams meetings with no automatic cut off in high school - it was a nightmare!

Maybe for you, definitely not for everybody.

It’s not just parents that wait until parents evening to talk. We had parents evening a few weeks back and were told dc is “most definitely on the spectrum”. Teacher had raised no prior concerns so to discuss in the remaining few minutes was tricky! I think timers are the way forwards.

Online! It's the way to go and brutally cuts the parents off at the end. No more arguments for me.

We had parents evening on Tuesday and the teacher was over 30 minutes late. We were then 30 minutes late to the next teacher.

Our slots are 5 minutes. It’s mental!

I had to leave a parents evening as I waited 40 minutes and had to go to work. I did tell the head teach as I left I was unhappy about the situation, Id booked leaving myself plenty of time but spaces are limited but needed to leave now. He explained that they had a particular parent they needed to see and spend time with - I did say thats all very well but then don't book others in afterwards. I found out the next day after I left many others did as they were just fed up waiting.

Senior school there was a bell, so you got however many minutes and moved on

Our school puts a projector up which displays a huge count down clock and it beeps loudly when you get to end of your time and the teacher pretty much finishes the sentence and sends you on your way

I find in person PE very frustrating. Time slots system falls apart, and chaos descends. Online system much better. But I work in a commercial environment, where everything is much more organized and punchy.

Not lucky if you've lost an evenings wages to attend for that though

My child’s school used to ring a bell every 10 mins and parents HAD to move on, even if they were mid sentence. It was a good way to do parent’s evening.

This is me (primary), alongside a timer set on the interactive whiteboard test flashes insanely when the time is up.

It hacks me off so much when my colleagues run late if there are siblings involved.

That sounds like a you problem. If you wanted it to last longer you should have asked more questions or spoke up and said so to the teacher.

Everyone has part of their job they don't particularly like. Overtime is definitely one of those, teachers are no exception. Parents evening are part of the job, which no one forced them to choose.

Poor time management is bad, period. Whether you're a doctor or a teacher.

Slag off teachers bingo on MN today

I think it’s more like slagging off the management.

So whoever decides to not have a system in place for timely meetings rather than the individual teachers. Unless of course that teacher is just a Waffler.

Online parents evenings are so much better! In person ones just run over. Don’t miss them at all.

This is all very well if you have one appointment but late running teachers cause absolute chaos at secondary school when you have a tight schedule to get around all of the teachers in one evening.