Cool new term, "Helicopter parents"

[Blarg]

I like this one. A dude goes nuts on the coach when his daughter is cut from the basketball team.

[ QUOTE ]
"The new term is helicopter parents," said McKee. "These are the ones who are right there hovering over the playing field, over the classroom, and they want everything to go the way it should go for their special child."

[/ QUOTE ]

When Parents Attack! (http://www.newsnet5.com/news/5298043/detail.html)

[fyodor]

Every time a parent attacks someone the kid should be shot in front of the parent and then the parent should be shot. Every [censored] time.

[trying2learn]

[ QUOTE ]
Every time a parent attacks someone the kid should be shot in front of the parent and then the parent should be shot. Every [censored] time.

[/ QUOTE ]

can't really follow something like that.

[2+2 wannabe]

[ QUOTE ]
Every time a parent attacks someone the kid should be shot in front of the parent and then the parent should be shot. Every [censored] time.

[/ QUOTE ]

lol are you trying to fit this template into as many threads as you can?

[PokerGoblin]

What a [censored] idiot. I can't stand people like that. I will definitely be adding this to my list of pet peeves.

In HS none of the sports teams were of very high quality, and therefore every single week there were these [censored] parents in the stands during football and basketball games yelling at the coaches, yelling at the refs... it was/is ridiculous. Some even went so far as to send hate mail to the coaches. The worst part is most of them didn't even have kids on the damn team.

These people are pathetic

OK my blood pressure is way too high now.

PG

[MikeNaked]

Yah, HPs are one of the reasons I choose to stay in a diverse, low-income school district rather than my neighborhood, upper-class, white-bread school districts. Not enough parent involvement > too much parent involvement (as far as job satisfaction goes).

You go to parent conferences wearing a codpiece 'cause you know that the deserving Bs, Cs, and Ds you've awarded will cause the parents to attack and and complain to the administration. It's YOUR fault the 4.0 kid got a B, because Precious tries really, really hard and has never gotten a poor grade, blah blah....

[Blarg]

[ QUOTE ]
The worst part is most of them didn't even have kids on the damn team.

[/ QUOTE ]

Haha, that's pretty damn sad.

It's a shame how much our culture has dumbed down into little more than sports and music.

[Lazymeatball]

So you prefer working with students whose parents don't care whether they succeed or not? Funny, I've always heard the opposite when it comes to teaching.

[Blarg]

I saw a very interesting article in The Atlantic once by a teacher who confessed he used to be really into teaching kids and had standards for them, but found himself attacked on both sides when he gave out less than great grades whether kids deserved them or not. First, by the parents, who nearly universally want their kids to get good grades whether or not they deserve them, and are more interested in maintaining their image of their kids as smart than they are in their kids actually being responsible and trying hard. Second, by the administrators the parents complain to. He said that the teachers who cave in to the parents get better ratings by teachers, students, and the administration, and help secure their careers, while there is no reward whatsoever for doing the right thing.

One of the sadder articles I've read. He made the job of actually educating students and grading fairly sound basically hopeless. And a career-killer, too.

[JonPKibble]

[ QUOTE ]
One of the sadder articles I've read. He made the job of actually educating students and grading fairly sound basically hopeless. And a career-killer, too.

[/ QUOTE ]

Having almost considered working in this sector at one point, I am extremely glad I chose not to.

[MikeNaked]

[ QUOTE ]
So you prefer working with students whose parents don't care whether they succeed or not? Funny, I've always heard the opposite when it comes to teaching.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's why I qualified my statement with:

[ QUOTE ]
Not enough parent involvement > too much parent involvement (as far as job satisfaction goes).

[/ QUOTE ]

It's not that lower income parents don't care if their kids succeed or not. Quite the opposite. Lower income parents are simply much more respectful of a teacher's curriculum and assessment decisions than pain-in-the-ass HPs. I would rather have parents get out of the way and let me do my job rather than constantly breathing down my neck.

[MikeNaked]

[ QUOTE ]
He made the job of actually educating students and grading fairly sound basically hopeless. And a career-killer, too.

[/ QUOTE ]

It can be. You have to have exacting standards, irrefuatble proof of the student's performance, the support of administration, and iron nads. If you're missing any one of these elements, your life is hell.

Teachers are being squeezed by NCLB and public outcry by higher education and the citizenry on one side and Helicopter Parents on the other.

[Blarg]

From what I read in that guy's article, administration typically doesn't want to deal with the constant stream of freaked out jerk parents any more than the teacher does, so he's saying they put enormous pressure on him, as in job-threatening pressure, to just let pretty much everybody slide. Provable plagiarism, kids who never showed up, etc.

This guy was saying it was so bad that parents would threaten law suits and such, and sometimes even violence seemed imminent. There was neither proportion nor sense of responsibility on the part of the parents for either their kids or themselves. He definitely made it sound like a nightmare, and one which the administration just got angry about if it went past him and got over to them.

[rusellmj]

Didn't some guy get convicted about a year back for killing his kids hockey coach?
I went to watch my nephew's little league game several years back. When the umpire failed to show they somehow picked me out of the crowd to call the game. I'll never [censored] do that again. Parents from the losing team (who lost by one run) complained so vehemently the game was rescheduled and played again.
Some people just can't take that their kids might not be the best in the world or come out on top every time.

[Blarg]

Parents are horrible these days. Bigger children than their children are.

[ QUOTE ]
"The new term is helicopter parents," said McKee.

[/ QUOTE ]

I first heard the term on "60 Minutes" in a story about "echo boomers", the children of the baby boomer generation. Story here. (http://wcbs880.com/rooney/sixtyminutes_story_247194855.html)

[ QUOTE ]

They're hovered over by what college administrators call "helicopter parents." Protected and polished, they are trophy children in every sense of the word.


"Everybody gets a trophy at the end of the year. It's something you're used to," adds Gissing. "And you have the rows of trophies lined up on your windowsill, or whatever."

[/ QUOTE ]