Teachers Need Upper Hand

For more than 20 years, “lack of discipline” has been creeping toward the top of the list of challenges facing education. Now teachers in a national poll say the problem keeps getting worse because the balance of power has shifted, giving kids the upper hand.

Teachers feel isolated and at risk because overcrowded classrooms, permissive parents and cowardly administrators are allowing rebellious kids to turn classrooms into battle zones. More than three-quarters of teachers say students are quick to threaten that “my parents will sue!” when teachers try to rein them in. Nearly half say they have been accused of unfairly disciplining a student, and one-third have considered quitting or know colleagues who have left the profession because student misbehavior made their jobs intolerable.

The teachers lay much of the blame on parents -- from overwhelmed, low-income parents who fail to provide the kinds of homes that foster respect and self-control to arrogant, wealthy parents who bully teachers and intimidate principals when Junior is threatened with punishment. Fifty-five percent of teachers complain that school districts back down when teachers’ decisions are challenged by angry parents.

But parents too feel their hands are tied. Seventy percent of parents polled in the Public Agenda research group’s survey said disrespect for authority had become such a cultural norm that it undercut whatever lessons in civility they tried to instill at home. More than half complain that they are ineffective because “society has put too many limits on parents’ rights to discipline their own children.”

All students lose when an entire class is held hostage by a single disruptive individual. They and their teachers should not have to pay the price for a societal problem. Cutbacks in counselors and nurses, campus overcrowding and more “mainstreaming” of special ed students all have overburdened teachers. But the solutions the survey suggests -- alternative schools for chronic cutups, changes in laws so as to limit parents’ legal options, more zero-tolerance rules -- deal with symptoms, not the problem.

Chronic misbehavior often masks fear of failure; the class clown might need help in math or reading, not a special school that confirms his failure. The parent of a child who misbehaves ought to be required to accompany Billy to class; that might embarrass the kid and educate Mom or Dad. Principals ought to walk the halls, visit classrooms and stay on top of discipline problems; their leadership sets the tone on campus. And teachers ought to help one another. Mentoring new teachers is essential, because there’s only so much you can learn about classroom management in college.

These are difficult times behind classroom doors. Letting teachers know “we’ve got your back” would help shift the power back to where it belongs.