Monday, February 25, 2013

Run run as fast as you can...

One of the teachers at my school pulled a "runner" this weekend. For those of you not in the know for international school lingo, a runner is when a teacher up and leaves without telling anyone, often times after a long break. It can be when a teacher doesn't return after the break, or like my last school the teacher returns after xmas only to call in sick and then leave in the middle of the night. This phenomenon is common to international schools and in the 3 I've worked at I've seen a runner every time.

When I heard about her decision to run I couldn't help but think how troubled she must have been. How long she must have been sitting on this indecision, trying to wait it out, counting the days, feeling lost and then making that decision to just do it.

Don't worry, the school has already replaced her. That's how replaceable us teachers are. We're doing such a bang up job that they can just pull someone in off the street and replace us within a few hours. I wonder if that's why her students were rumored to post a photo of her with some caption about her being a bad teacher. Wow, we are really molding great people here. I know we want our kids to read and write, but when you are a mean shit head do you really need to be proficient at school? So these little ass holes created a situation so bad that their teacher pulled a runner. I'm sure it wasn't the only problem she was having, but was it that proverbial straw.

At my last school the kids pirated a photo of the teacher and then started a fake facebook page about her. One of the main problems with international schools is that these rich kids practically own the city so it's hard to follow through with consequences. You can't really kick the richest kid out, you do need to keep up enrollment. It's no better at a public school in the US. Do you know how much effed up crap a kid has to do before they are sent to juvy? Come on parents, I'm still waiting for you to help.

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