Texas high schooler's rant against teacher goes viral, kid now labeled "hero"

[IrishSteelhead]

Texas high schooler's rant against teacher goes viral, kid now labeled "hero"

High School student Jeff Bliss decided to give his teacher a lecture - YouTube

THOUGHTS????

 

[Buster Bluth]

Kudos to him. Plenty of teachers are horrible and deserve to be excoriated like this. I loved it.

I stood up and had two teacher fired, one in sixth grade and one as a senior. The latter I busted changing students' grades strictly on how she liked them. Yes, that goes into grades and is rather uavoidable, but she was the worst about it.

 

[RyCo1983]

Edit...Buster, yeah many are absolutely terrible...BUT

Many teachers do their jobs...do everything this kid complained about. At least in my area...

It angers my teacher lady friend that nothing positive that so many hardworking teachers do goes viral.

Kudos to this kid for standing up for his right to learn...but this certainly isn't the norm everywhere.

 

[IrishSteelhead]

nothing positive that so many hardworking teachers do goes viral.

Thought about this, and am afraid there will be many copycats coming up, turning this into isolated incident into a national fiasco.

 

[RyCo1983]

Thought about this, and am afraid there will be many copycats coming up, turning this into isolated incident into a national fiasco.

I have quite a few friends that are great teachers. I've worked with kids in the school setting as well in classrooms with some great teachers too.
I've also met quite a few teachers that are pretty shits-y.

The geographic area or economic situation in the area could certainly have something to do with it.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

Edit...Buster, yeah many are absolutely terrible...BUT

Many teachers do their jobs...do everything this kid complained about. At least in my area...

It angers my teacher lady friend that nothing positive that so many hardworking teachers do goes viral.

Kudos to this kid for standing up for his right to learn...but this certainly isn't the norm everywhere.

Same reason that local news is so depressing. People slow down to rubber neck at a car accident, but they don't stop to watch someone hold an elevator door for a stranger.

Attorneys get a bad rap, too, but I cheer when I see some unethical as$hole getting exposed or disciplined by the state bar. Accountability is the only way to weed out the bottom feeders that give the good guys a bad name.

 

[IrishSteelhead]

I have quite a few friends that are great teachers. I've worked with kids in the school setting as well in classrooms with some great teachers too.
I've also met quite a few teachers that are pretty shits-y.

The geographic area or economic situation in the area could certainly have something to do with it.

That is implied. Bad teachers go to bad schools, because naturally nobody else wants to take those jobs. Sure you have the occasional "crusader" who stays at a bad school with at-risk kids because of a sense of duty, but overall the turnover rate is astronomical because of how easy it is to get burned out in that setting.

 

[RallySonsOfND]

High School student Jeff Bliss decided to give his teacher a lecture - YouTube

THOUGHTS????

Miss Bliss had a son?!

 

[RyCo1983]

That is implied. Bad teachers go to bad schools, because naturally nobody else wants to take those jobs. Sure you have the occasional "crusader" who stays at a bad school with at-risk kids because of a sense of duty, but overall the turnover rate is astronomical because of how easy it is to get burned out in that setting.

Yeah, it's not implied to the malleable minds of the general public, to educated thinkers such as ourselves it is.

 

[GoldenIsThyFame]

Meh. I mean I get it, but meh.

 

[TDHeysus]

I see this kid as not having any respect for the teacher, or the classroom...i dont know the context surrounding this video, but regardless this rant was done at the wrong place and wrong time. The student is disrupting class, and making a scene. If he truly cared about what he saying, then why not involve parents, and administrators (and other students and student parents)?

Even if everything he says is correct, the student should still be discipline for this rant. By ranting in the classroom, what purpose does that solve? so his classmates can whip out their phones and upload a video on facebook? The classroom is not the time or the place for it.

He says that a teacher needs to touch the heart of kids in order to inspire them? Sounds like he is putting the onus of responsbility on the teacher for the student not learning(if the student fails, its not their fault, its the teachers fault for not properly motivating them??????). yes there are bad teachers, but even a good teacher wont be able to reach a bad student who doesnt want to learn.

 

[IrishSteelhead]

I see this kid as not having any respect for the teacher, or the classroom...i dont know the context surrounding this video, but regardless this rant was done at the wrong place and wrong time. The student is disrupting class, and making a scene. If he truly cared about what he saying, then why not involve parents, and administrators (and other students and student parents)?

Even if everything he says is correct, the student should still be discipline for this rant. By ranting in the classroom, what purpose does that solve? so his classmates can whip out their phones and upload a video on facebook? The classroom is not the time or the place for it.

He says that a teacher needs to touch the heart of kids in order to inspire them? Sounds like he is putting the onus of responsbility on the teacher for the student not learning(if the student fails, its not their fault, its the teachers fault for not properly motivating them??????). yes there are bad teachers, but even a good teacher wont be able to reach a bad student who doesnt want to learn.

These are great points. IMO the teacher's dismissive attitude during his rant (which Internet armchair educators are saying is proof she didnt care) prevented a bad situation from getting any worse. I couldn't imagine the backlash if she said what a lot of people would in a situation where a child is disrespecting an adult.

 

[Buster Bluth]

I see this kid as not having any respect for the teacher, or the classroom...i dont know the context surrounding this video, but regardless this rant was done at the wrong place and wrong time. The student is disrupting class, and making a scene. If he truly cared about what he saying, then why not involve parents, and administrators (and other students and student parents)?

Even if everything he says is correct, the student should still be discipline for this rant. By ranting in the classroom, what purpose does that solve? so his classmates can whip out their phones and upload a video on facebook? The classroom is not the time or the place for it.

I think you're underestimating the disservice that teacher is doing to all of their futures. Bad teachers are the worst and we should have real policies in place that purge them from schools. As someone who has been involved tangentially with education from several levels, I know that's very difficult because of the obvious local politics.

I did the whole "involve parents and administrators" deal too, back in my day. It normally goes nowhere. I got the "yeah, we'll look into it" or "not much we can do..." from administrators and "try harder" and "get past it" from parents.

The thing with teachers is that you don't normally have them for more than one year. Everyone knew at my tiny Catholic grade school that the 3rd, 4th, 5th, 7th grade teachers were rather terrific, but that the 6th grade teachers with a strict disciplinarian and the 8th was a ditzy wench. The response is normally that "it's only temporary."

In my high school we had a teacher who taught Algebra, Geometry and one who taught Algebra II, Pre-Calc and Calculus. 90% of the kids at my shitsy high school went only went up to Pre-Calc so they had two teachers for two years each. It was just accepted that the Algebra/Geometry teacher was THE WORST, but that it was temporary. Well that changed for my class because before junior year the other teacher left and she was promoted, so we were going to have her for four years. Literally all we did was factor (now I'm the king of the ol' FOIL method, but when I got to OSU engineering and the professor brought up logarithms, I had never heard of them one time haha).

The first thing I did was get more than 85 students (I graduated with 68, to give you scale) to sign some sheet I made up during study hall saying "I have witnessed Ms. ___ treat particular students unethically and change grades yadda yadda yadda." The administration's response was weak. Very weak. So what did I do? I decided to prove it. She didn't hand back much paperwork so it was difficult.

I was getting straight Ds, and my best friend BustersFriend was getting B+s, so we agreed to have identical answers for a semester and see what happens. In the fall of my senior year I copied his homework every day before school, and did better on exams than he did. I got a D-, he got a B for the semester. That November I scored a 28 on the ACT in math, which isn't out-of-this-world but certainly not in the brain dead D- level either. So I had that on my side. I went and told the vice principal and got a "you probably shouldn't be telling me you copied homework for an entire semester, even if it does prove something" and dismissed it. She dismissed it on a technicality...

That spring she did herself in when she returned an exam (43 questions) in which I had only gotten four wrong. The grade was a 70%, a D-. So I stormed into the principal's office again, waved it in his face, and said it was "pure bullshit and you know it." Parents were called, the whole dealio. The teachers response was that I "didn't show my work correctly, and told the principal that she threw away the work and couldn't show it." Then my mother, a teacher herself, got really involved and that scared the hell out of this bitch. She called me into her office the next day, and PULLED OUT THE WORK, and said she keeps all of the work we do in a filing cabinet. To her credit, I didn't show work for some problems (ummm...it's FOILing, we get the process haha). However she more or less perjured herself when I walked into the principal's office with the work in hand, for telling different stories.

She tried to save her *** and gave me an A for the last semester. It didn't help. The variation in grades alone proved I wasn't somehow a terrific math student when I had D-s for three years straight.

/rant

 

[Buster Bluth]

Actually, not /rand. An addendum:

After she got busted (pun intended), she was giving me As for everything. I once copied my buddy's worksheet minutes before class (a multiple choice deal) and quickly turned it in. Minutes later, he gets called back. "Matt, all of these questions are wrong." "Oh. Ummmm, I tried really hard all night." "Too bad, they're all wrong go sit down."

Then she calls me back. I'm like "fuuuuuck" in my head. She tells me the same thing, I got her a "Oh. That's no good..." and she says, and the class could hear all of this, "but I know you tried hard so I'm going to give you credit for it anyway."

WHAT.

 

[Andy in Sactown]

Is there a way I can stoke Buster's fire so I can continue to read more of his personal experiences gettings shits teachers fired? vBucks?

 

[Riddickulous]

It's extremely difficult to evaluate teachers, IMO. Too many factors are outside their control.

That being said, there are some HORRIBLE teachers out there and I wish there was a more effective way to evaluate them.

 

[Bogtrotter07]

This is the seventeenth post on this thread and no one still has any idea of the context of that video. Since we are presumptuous; I will assume that this was a film and drama class and say both the teacher and the student (credit Jeff Bliss) deserve a daytime Emmy nomination! They were both stupendous, showing the gritty friction in a modern American classroom setting! Kudos to both! Bravo and brava!

 

[ulukinatme]

I agree with the kid to a point, however he probably could have chose a better way to deliver the message. A lot of teachers just hand out packets and don't do a lot of teaching. I understand they may be taking time to put together the packets, but you can't teach all kids the same way. The best teachers I had in high school really engaged the kids and reached out. Sometimes the lessons were a little unconventional, but they usually worked and it made you look forward to their classes.

 

[irishroo]

It's extremely difficult to evaluate teachers, IMO. Too many factors are outside their control.

That being said, there are some HORRIBLE teachers out there and I wish there was a more effective way to evaluate them.

Such as? There's really not as many as you think

 

[IrishHokie22]

I agree with the others who have said you can't really judge this teacher without knowing the context/circumstances in the video.

As for my own personal experience with high school teachers... I think they're a completely mixed bag. I grew up in a little hick town in Virginia and my senior class was around 125 or so students. Some of my teachers were completely worthless. I mean I could have taught some of my classes better than they could have (I mean it, not just saying that). Some classes I would just sleep in, others I would just play with my phone. One teacher I had would give ridiculous homework assignments that no one would know how to do (except one genius kid we had in our class), and we would all literally just copy his homework the next morning during the first few minutes of class.

I graduated 9th in my class and put forth little effort into school until late in my junior year (I know, whoopee). During my senior year, there was some competition to get into the final top 10 (you got your picture in the local paper; parents cared more than students did). One teacher a friend of mine had (I had her as well, just not this class) actually let two of her favorite students grade a big test that he had; one of these students was in the top 5 at the time, and the other right on the cusp of the top 10. He couldn't believe it. He knew they would grade the test subjectively, so he literally sat beside them and watched them grade his test, just to make sure he got the same benefit of the doubt that they did. He ended up making something like a 96 on the test (like they did), even though he probably only had around 70% of the test correct (again, like they did). I tell this story because... who in their right mind would let their own students grade their tests?

Not all teachers are bad though. I had one teacher in high school who was absolutely outstanding. She was a math/algebra/trigonometry teacher who not only really knew her stuff, but would also go out of her way to make sure each student understood what was going on. Best teacher I've ever had, at any level. I had some other good teachers in high school as well. I will admit high school didn't adequately prepare me for college. I breezed through high school then once I hit my first round of mid-terms in college... my reaction was mainly "dafuq?" I had to learn how to study (and my study habits still suck, compared to others I know). Oh well, I have my last exam ever as a college student (graduate student, actually), so it's all good. I should be studying right now instead of making this post, actually.

So I guess it just varies. I wish their way a better way to evaluate teachers, but as someone else said, local politics often play the biggest role, especially in small towns. Anyway, this is just the opinion of an Irish fan who often lurks and rarely posts. Carry on!

 

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

This kid thinks high school matters haha.

I'll bet 100,000,000 vBucks that this staged.

 

[NDinL.A.]

It's extremely difficult to evaluate teachers, IMO. Too many factors are outside their control.

That being said, there are some HORRIBLE teachers out there and I wish there was a more effective way to evaluate them.

As a teacher, I could off on this subject for days. You think my normal posts are long? (LOL).

For now, I'll just stick to the video:

1. He lost me at 'yo'. You're white bro. I say 'yo' as a joke, but not when giving a 'sermon'.

2. Actually, he lost me at his hairdo. No offense to all you dudes with long hair, but all the way down to the middle of your back, Nelson twins style? That's just wrong yo.

3. As has been said, what's the context of the video? That said, teachers that sit there and give worksheets all year without any teaching deserve to be fired on the spot. Huge disservice they are doing.

4. Try being a teacher and teaching punk kids all damn day, kids with parents who don't give a crap what they do at school and/or blame the teacher for the failings of the their children and/or themselves. Ain't easy.

Quick story about the type of stuff we deal with: Last week, a kid pushed another kid in the hall a few times and walked away. I knew the kid, tough kid but I never had a problem with him (in fact he always talks about playing bball for me next year when he's in the 7th grade). So I called him 3 times, just to tell him to settle down. He just ignored me and went to his class. His teacher saw and made him come talk to me. Nothing but attitude. Everything was, "You can't tell me what to do; you;re just picking on me, it's my right to act the way I want," etc etc etc. I was calm as hell, tried to talk about consequences and tried to tell him that all I wanted to do was talk real quick and he was making a huge deal out of nothing. Seriously, the amount of disrespect he showed me was unreal.

Next day he apologizes, says he was having a bad day, and I let it go. What does he do later that day? Cusses another teacher out, and says the same things. He gets reported and suspended. This is what kills me: his mom bitched out the principal for picking on their son! Screamed at him on the phone for 20 minutes about how unfair we were being. Un-friggin-believable.

See, this was supposed to be a quick post LOL. I didn't even get to how unbelievably hard it is to accurately assess teachers (and I think my school does about as good a job as I've ever seen). Oh well, this is a close-to-home, hot-button subject matter for many of us, and it's hard to put into words our feelings on it...

 

[ACamp1900]

Try being a teacher and teaching these punk kids is right....

It's hell to follow a pacing plan you get zero say on... To be told openly the tests are everything and your job depends on them, but you'd better not teach to the test or your fired... All while union protected teachers hand out packets and throw the finger like the teacher in this video... And all while you have zero say on classroom management or discipline for outbursts like this... At times it feels like every turn is a damn catch 22. Oh and you get paid too much...

With that said, the kid had some obviously good points about our current state of education.

 

[FearTheBeard]

I went to a small catholic high school and it kinda varied there. Id say about 60% were good teachers and the other 40 were jokes. There were a few i hated that were really tough and i learned alot, then there were some who just think writing stuff up on the board or handing things out is the way to go. Theres a difference between writing stuff on a board and actually teaching and fully explaining whats going on. Some of the teachers were so worthless we would watch movies for the second half of class everyday. It just varies, i respected some teachers but others i still treated with respect but thought they were wayyy to lazy and didnt teach at all. My calc teacher in college this year is a good example, i learned alot because i had to learn half on my own because in class he would storm through problems and when youd raise your hand hed say "ill get to you in a minute" five minutes later he filled the rest of the board and not only were you confused at the beginning you had no idea what was going on with the rest the problem/problems after that. Okay that was long im done haha

 

[IrishSteelhead]

As a teacher, I could off on this subject for days. You think my normal posts are long? (LOL).

For now, I'll just stick to the video:

1. He lost me at 'yo'. You're white bro. I say 'yo' as a joke, but not when giving a 'sermon'.

2. Actually, he lost me at his hairdo. No offense to all you dudes with long hair, but all the way down to the middle of your back, Nelson twins style? That's just wrong yo.

3. As has been said, what's the context of the video? That said, teachers that sit there and give worksheets all year without any teaching deserve to be fired on the spot. Huge disservice they are doing.

4. Try being a teacher and teaching punk kids all damn day, kids with parents who don't give a crap what they do at school and/or blame the teacher for the failings of the their children and/or themselves. Ain't easy.

Quick story about the type of stuff we deal with: Last week, a kid pushed another kid in the hall a few times and walked away. I knew the kid, tough kid but I never had a problem with him (in fact he always talks about playing bball for me next year when he's in the 7th grade). So I called him 3 times, just to tell him to settle down. He just ignored me and went to his class. His teacher saw and made him come talk to me. Nothing but attitude. Everything was, "You can't tell me what to do; you;re just picking on me, it's my right to act the way I want," etc etc etc. I was calm as hell, tried to talk about consequences and tried to tell him that all I wanted to do was talk real quick and he was making a huge deal out of nothing. Seriously, the amount of disrespect he showed me was unreal.

Next day he apologizes, says he was having a bad day, and I let it go. What does he do later that day? Cusses another teacher out, and says the same things. He gets reported and suspended. This is what kills me: his mom bitched out the principal for picking on their son! Screamed at him on the phone for 20 minutes about how unfair we were being. Un-friggin-believable.

See, this was supposed to be a quick post LOL. I didn't even get to how unbelievably hard it is to accurately assess teachers (and I think my school does about as good a job as I've ever seen). Oh well, this is a close-to-home, hot-button subject matter for many of us, and it's hard to put into words our feelings on it...

1. Dialect has never determined my opinion of a student
2. Hairstyle has never determined my opinion of a student
3. You're better than that LA
4. I understand your frustration (was in an inner city meat grinder for 7 years)

*Gotta be careful man

 

[ACamp1900]

I will say this... Was this a second chance school???.. Because if it was almost all work is packet based there, it has to be... Every class is all over the map in terms of progression in those schools... Just a thought

 

[NDinL.A.]

1. Dialect has never determined my opinion of a student
2. Hairstyle has never determined my opinion of a student
3. You're better than that LA
4. I understand your frustration (was in an inner city meat grinder for 7 years)

*Gotta be careful man

I was only kidding.

 

[Bogtrotter07]

I thought I would brighten this thread up:

I had some unbelievable teachers, once I escaped the Sisters of Notre Dame. (Just kidding, I didn't escape them, I hardly had any rappelling to do at all.)

In high school for my first year of French, I had Père Maline. He was a true Jesuit missionary, and I believe he was about 80 when I had him, which was in 1971. That would have made him almost as old as my grandfather.

So, you might ask, what was a classroom with such an elderly priest and thirty arrogant spoiled freshman brats like us like. Wonderful. He kept order. He was respectful, kind and loving. He had a phenomenal sense of humor. It was infectious. It spilled over to us. He would tell us stories of his experiences of the world, sometimes in English, sometimes in French or German. Sometimes he would speak to us in any of the other 7 or 8 languages he spoke. At the time he was teaching himself dialects of Cantonese.

One day he handed me a book, and an assignment to say here is my book, or something to that effect, and then when I completed the assignments he replied "Damned if it is! Get your own book!" And the class howled; I was confused and self-conscious for just a minute. Then, I looked down at this little man, shocked and puzzled, and he just looked up at me grinning from ear to ear.

He would occasionally set people up for this, and reward their effort with the point of his humor. Père Maline taught for a number of years after that, and I am sure with all the classes he had until the day he retired, he was the youngest in the classroom (at heart)!

 

[military_irish]

You can watch the whole video if you want, I did.

A very brief synopsis of what happened.

The whole thing that "kicked" off the rant is because apparently their specific class was not given the same amount of time for a test as other classes were. When he spoke up, the teacher, allegedly, said "quit b*tching". So according to him something just clicked and he spoke up.

He also said, throughout the course and year, she would just hand out packets and expect them to learn. When they didn't retain the information she would belittle them rather than help them.

The teachers is suspended WITH pay, and he has had no repercussions from the school.


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[A Pac]

Fourth year teacher here and it's my first in an inner city school. I really like where I teach and laugh when people assume my school is stereotyped as having all bad kids. They have no idea how wrong they are. True, some of the kids are jerks who could care less about teacher sand education. However, you can get that in every high school in this country, public or private.

Anyway, some of my kids bitch when we do notes or othe lessons because they don't like them. I hear a lot of: "why can't we just watch a movie" and "just give us a packet" stuff. It drives me crazy. It just shows the reinforcement they have received in their earlier educational lives. It pisses me off when they say that. That's not teaching.

Now this kid may or may not have a legitimate gripe. I don't know, I wasn't there. However I don't agree with the way he handled it. I have a absolutely no problem with a student offering their opinion to a teacher, but doing it in front of the class is not the way to handle it. Talk to the teacher after class. I understand that this kid was pissed off about getting kicked out and he has a right to be. However you can't go on a rant in front of the class like that. Good for the kid for wanting a better education, but there are better ways to handle it.