AIBU to feel uneasy about a teacher commenting on my daughter's eyes?

[Kickinthenostalgia]

For context dd14 is in year 9, she’s very much all for her friends, always stuck in the middle, never starts arguments, she’s never in trouble, never had detention, most of the teachers love her, although she has a few boy best friends she’s not really into relationships just yet. Got a call today from the school, immediately my backs up because usually the only time they call me is when she’s in the medical room. No it’s a teacher singing DD’s praises, saying how she’s a pleasure to teach, etc etc. he mentioned he’s a new teacher at the school and as a father didn’t get feedback for his daughter who has just left so wanted to do it for his promising students.
so I was just talking to my mum about it, and she said to me is that the same teacher that told dd she had really nice eyes.
of course I’m like what you talking about, she never said anything. I laughed it off at first but the more I think about it, it’s a bit creepy. No? My mum defo wasn’t impressed and I’m surprised dd didn’t tell me considering she tells me everytime a teacher so much as shouts at her class. Obviously I don’t know the full story as she’s at school. I know I’ll need to keep an eye on this. I don’t know who it is, but just a bit surprised. I’m not being unreasonable to think this is slightly creepy right?

No teacher's life has been ruined because one parent told the school he had complimented a child's eyes and given some positive feedback. The worst that can happen is he'll get "professional advice" which will protect him in future.

Many children's lives have been ruined because no one spotted or took action at the early stages of grooming.

We do? But I agree it's odd. I'll sometimes say to students oh your hair looks nice today but I'm a female teacher in a girls' school

Yeah, it's an absolute pain in the arse.

You definitely should chat to your daughter in a low key manner but please before you start implying massively serious accusations check what has happened.

At the moment all you know is that a new teacher hasn't caught on to the schools usual praise procedures. Considering the intro day has 5 hours of info thrown at you and usually about 60 pages of procedures in a book to read this is not massively surprising. They will pick it up in time.

Potentially a different teacher has made a comment that could be x has nice eyes they are focused on her work.

If it is something more then you need to know but starting a witch hunt without all the information is irresponsible.

It's odd that he phoned you to sing your DD's praises. Teachers don't usually do that.

They did in early years at DC secondary - so mostly DD1 got it - head changes and whole ethos changed as staff left on next few years. I also on open evening for a younger child had head of year rush over to tell us how wonderful DD1 was - which felt bit odd but seemed sincere.

The eyes commnet I would require context for - DS been told by a primay teacher he had lovely eyes but I was there and it was part of a wider discussion on eye colour.

Obviously you need to know if it was the same teacher, but either way the comment (if it happened as you've heard) needs to be flagged to the school.

It is! I don't miss it being a policy. But I'll still try and send the odd positive email where I can, I do find students and families really appreciate it and that families aren't just hearing from us when it's bad news.

It is strange though that a male teacher especially said it, the male teachers I know are even more careful with what they say and do. For example, one experienced male teacher in the girls' school I work at point blank refuses to comment on skirt length etc as part of the uniform policy and what we're supposed to check as tutors. I fully agree! Absolute minefield and he knows better than to get involved.

Some schools teachers are encouraged to phone home with positive calls

Not jumping to conclusions at all 🙄.

It's creepy.

I'm still annoyed with my parents for not making more of a fuss about one of my sister's teachers saying 'it's great she doesn't use her looks to get what she wants', when my sister was 14.

Lot's of schools try and encourage teachers to ring home to give good news if they get the time. There's not normally ever time and it's a sweet but an unimportant and low priority task so it normally falls by the wayside by pretty much everyone so it's rarely ever done.

The eye comment is an odd compliment coming from a teacher but in isolation, the teacher probably has just been thoughtless. Although today with my Year 8's, we were collecting data of eye colour in the class to make bar charts. This involved students looking into each others eyes and I definitely said some "you have some of the biggest eyelashes I've ever seen!" or "you've got some really interesting golden colours in there!". I wouldn't ever outright compliment a student or mention their physical appearance otherwise, and especially not out of context.

Our school has a policy of ringing parents to share praise. The first and only time this happened I left a meeting as could see if was the school and DCs teacher was singing their praises and I was constantly waiting for the “but…”
I would enquire about teacher giving personal compliments though and find out the context at least.

At my school we are literally told to make positive phone calls and the pupils get reward points for it if we do

I’ve also said things like ‘you don’t need all that mascara/ false eyelashes you’ve got lovely eyes’ or something like that. Or if kids have to wear glasses and don’t want to some sort of compliment about them enhancing their eyes.
Bear in mind that you don’t even know if it’s the same teacher I think the posters who say she is being groomed are reaching a bit!

I don't think anyone is saying she is being groomed, only that OP should be alive to it as a possibility.

It's the old thing about never thinking it would never happen here.

You actually say that? Really?
For years now, the advice has been: do not make comments on students' personal appearance, positive or negative.

To be fair, Donald Trump would be the last person to call in these circumstances, what with him being a Friend of Epstein and all.

Ask dd what happened as we need more info to properly advise you

And this is why schools find it so hard to recruit male teachers.

This man has done a totally normal thing of phoning and praising.

You have no idea of it’s same teacher who said ‘something’ about her eyes, or indeed if anyone did or what they said. It’s a second hand piece of info.

Yet, this poor teacher is grooming her….

It's virtually unheard of for a secondary teacher to phone a parent and start randomly complimenting their child.

For starters they have lives of their own and regularly teach probably upto 100 kids a day. The last thing they'd do is spend their spare time calling up parents about their children for no reason. And complimenting their appearance? Massive creep.

The IT teacher at my school was sacked for something like this back in about 1990. I can't imagine safeguarding policy has got more lax since then.

😅😅

Hmmm, I want to think he was just being nice, but it is a little bit weird.

YANBU @Kickinthenostalgia

No, it's policy in many schools (qv). I kept it to the minimum and mostly emailed.

No. It needs raising with the school because there is a small possibility of grooming, and if no one reports no one will know if there is a pattern of this behaviour or if it escalates.

If it is a one off, he's probably kicking himself for being a bit crass when he was trying to be supportive, and no action will be taken beyond (maybe) some professional advice.

He definitely needs to be spoken to, he shouldn't be commenting on her appearance. At all.